ADAM SCHIFF: MANY WHO ORGANIZED SUMGAIT BLOODSHED SERVE IN HIGH POSITIONS ON THE AZERI GOVERNMENT

Panorama.am
18:24 04/03/2010

Politics

US Congressman Adam Schiff released a statement commemorating the
twenty-second anniversary of the Sumgait Pogroms, the 3-day massacre
of Armenians in the winter of 1988.

Recalling that 22 years have passed since the pogrom against Armenians
in Sumgait, Azerbaijan, Schiff said:

"The 3-day massacre in the winter of 1988 resulted in the deaths of
scores of Armenians, many of whom were burnt to death after being
brutally beaten and tortured. Hundreds of others were wounded. Women
and girls were brutally raped. The carnage created thousands of ethnic
Armenian refugees, who had to leave everything behind to be looted
or destroyed, including their homes, cars and businesses."

"These crimes, which were proceeded by a wave of anti-Armenian
rallies throughout Azerbaijan, were never adequately prosecuted
by Azerbaijan authorities. Many who organized or participated in
the bloodshed have gone on to serve in high positions on the Azeri
government. For example, in the days leading up to the massacre,
a leader of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, Hidayat Orujev,
warned Armenians in Sumgait: "If you do not stop campaigning for the
unification of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia, if you don’t sober up,
100,000 Azeris from neighboring districts will break into your houses,
torch your apartments, rape your women, and kill your children." Orujev
is currently the State Advisor for Ethnic Policy to Azeri President
Heidar Aliyev," the Congressman said.

"Despite efforts by the Government of Azerbaijan to cover up the
events of February 1988, survivors of the pogrom have come forward
with their stories. They told of enraged mobs, which threw furniture,
refrigerators, television sets and beds from apartment balconies and
set them afire. Armenians were dragged from their apartments. If they
tried to run and escape, the mob attacked them with metal rods, knives
and hatchets before the victims were thrown into the fire. One witness
said of a victim, "He was still moving, trying to escape from fire, but
five young men were pushing him back into the fire with metal rods."

Others told of Interior Ministry troops, who stood by doing nothing.

"The Sumgait massacres led to wider reprisals against Azerbaijan’s
ethnic minority, resulting in the virtual disappearance of Azerbaijan’s
450,000-strong Armenian community, and culminating in the war launched
against the people of Nagorno Karabakh. That war resulted in almost
30,000 dead on both sides and created more than one million refugees
in both Armenia and Azerbaijan," he highlighted.

"This April will mark the 95th Anniversary of the Armenian Genocide,
a crime that Azerbaijan’s ally and protector Tukey has devoted enormous
political resources to deny. Just as we cannot allow the first genocide
of the Twentieth Century to fade into history, the memory of the
victims of Sumgait must not be forgotten either," Mr. Schiff concluded.