Twenty-eight years have passed since the occupation of Azerbaijan's Shusha city by Armenia.

Shusha, one of the unique cultural centers of Azerbaijan, is a city, characterized for its natural beauty, and is a valuable monument of national architecture and medieval urban art. Constantly keeping the Azerbaijani national-spiritual values and traditions of music, Shusha before forming as a city of great economic, political and cultural significance, has passed a rich way as a center of Karabakh khanate, played its role in the lives of the people of Azerbaijan. This city, which went down in history thanks to Gasim bey Zakir, Khurshidbanu Natavan, Mir Mohsun Navvab, Najaf bey Vezirov, Abdurrahim bey Hagverdiyev, Yusif Vazir Chemenzeminli, Firidun bey Kocharli, Ahmad bey Agaoglu and other eminent personalities, is known worldwide as the cradle of the Azerbaijani mugham.

In 1977 at the initiative of Heydar Aliyev a decree "On the declaration of the historic part of the city of Shusha as historical and architectural reserve" was passed. Since that time, creative work in Shusha became widespread, house-museums of the great figures of our culture and arts Uzeyir bey Hajibeyli, Khurshidbanu Natavan and Bul-Bul were created, a mausoleum of an outstanding poet Molla Panah Vagif was built.

As a result of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the Republic of Azerbaijan, which adopted on October 18, 1991, relevant documents for the restoration of its national independence, came face to face with the aggressive policy of ethnic cleansing by Armenia. Given that the country which was undergoing profound political, economic and social crisis and finding ways out of from tense situation in Nagorno-Karabakh, has not yet formed its own national army, it relied only on voluntary assistance of self-defense units during the defense of Shusha which has high military and strategic importance. However, despite the fact that they fought valiantly, and had a decent resistance, on May 8, 1992, the Armenian armed forces armed to the teeth occupied Shusha.

In the battle for the defense of Shusha, 195 our compatriots were killed, 165 people were injured, 58 people captured, and taken hostage. 

More than 876 settlements, about 7,000 industrial, agricultural and other enterprises in Shusha, more than 153,000 housing units with a total area of more than nine million square meters were looted, burned and destroyed. In addition, as many as 4,366 social and cultural facilities of Shusha, 616 secondary schools, 242 pre-school institutions, 397 hospitals, 10 clinics, 10 maternity hospitals, 76 pharmacies, four sanatoriums and 10 mosques were destroyed by Armenian aggressors.