AZERBAIJAN’S 70-YEAR ANTI-ARMENIAN POLICY RESULTED IN SUMAGIT POGROMS

PanARMENIAN.Net
28.02.2008 16:53 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Azerbaijan’s 70-year anti-Armenian policy resulted
in Sumagit pogroms, political scientist Levon Melik-Shahnazaryan told
a PanARMENIAN.Net reporter.

"The Sumgait atrocities can’t even be described as conduct of
normal but embittered by propaganda industry people. Judging by the
large-scale involvement and silent agreement of the population, it’s
easy to conclude that the Azeri nation is seriously ill. Meanwhile,
the leadership keeps on filling the "syndrome of crowd" into the
fevered brain of a Turkic average man," Melik-Shahnazaryan said.

He reminded that in November 1988 a group of young patriots led by Igor
Muradyan (one of the founders of the Karabakh committee) requested
the committee members to introduce a draft resolution recognizing
the Sumgait events as Genocide to the Armenian SSR Supreme Council
session. "However, the committee chaired by Levon Ter-Petrosyan was
busy with a more important task – democratization of Armenia. The
patriots’ demands ended in a fight in then-Theater Square on November
4. The Karabakh committee rejected the proposal. November 21, 1988
emerged as the start of mass killings, pogroms and deportation of
Armenians from Azerbaijan," he said.

"A crime without punishment entails a recurrence. A crime without
condemnation transforms into mass mental disease," he noted.

Sumagit pogroms in February 1988 claimed lives of 32 Armenians. The
Armenian population of the town – some 15 thousand people – fled to
Armenia. Many of them died in Spitak earthquake on December 7, 1988.