Azerbaijan is using every means at their disposal to normalise and promote their occupation of the Armenian city of Shushi, which they call Shusha (Şuşa).
Thessaloniki was not spared from this propaganda effort, with a bus in Greece’s second city promoting Azerbaijan’s occupation of Shushi.
Such a challenge did not escape the attention of the Armenian community in Greece, who asked authorities to remove the advertisements, something which was done without hesitation.
Although the advertisement has been removed, it does bring into question why it was ever allowed to be displayed.
The Azeri military captured the historic Armenian city of Shushi from local forces on November 8, 2020 during last year’s Nagorno-Karabakh War.
Although a historically Armenian city, Shushi had a mixed Armenian-Azeri population until the Shushi pogrom of 1920 when Azerbaijani forces destroyed the Armenian half of the city and killed or expulsed its Armenian population of around 20,000 people.
Due to the strategic advantage of the city, which directly overlooks the Nagorno-Karabakh capital of Stepanakert, the capture of Shushi became a decisive moment in the war, especially as Armenia surrendered and Azerbaijan declared victory a few days later.