World needs to fairly assess Genocide of Azerbaijanis
By Mushvig Mehdiyev
Armenia committed a genocide not only against Azerbaijanis but also against Turkic nations in the early 20th century, a top religious official in Azerbaijan said.
Addressing the event dedicated to March 31 - Day of Azerbaijani Genocide, Head of the Caucasian Muslims Office, Sheikh-ul-Islam Allahshukur Pashazadeh said that despite this fact Armenians still dare to say that they were allegedly "annihilated".
"Now they are planning to mark the centennial of the so-called "Armenian genocide" once more introducing themselves as the "sufferers",” he said.
Pashazadeh added that unfortunately there are still heads of governments and religious leaders who support the Armenian extremists in their baseless aspirations. The Soviet rulers were also under their influence and as a result impeded to investigate into the issues in view of Armenians' criminal activity.
The event attendees adopted an appeal to the heads of states and religious confession leaders, as well as the international community to give the righteous political and legal assessment to the Genocide of Azerbaijanis.
Azerbaijanis faced the hardest of all challenges in the wake of purposeful ethnic cleansing and deportation policy carried out over the last two centuries by the Armenian nationalists and their supporters.
The murder policy against Azerbaijanis emerged in early 1900s, when the Soviet authorities appointed Stephan Shaumyan as the extraordinary Commissar of the Caucasus and sent him to Baku in 1918. The Bolsheviks headed by Shaumyan seized power in Baku and made ground for the Armenian armed formations to realize their bloody crimes throughout Azerbaijan.
The mass slaughter of Azerbaijanis started on March 3, 1918, by 4,000 armed men from Dashnaksutyun party under Shaumyan' strict instructions.
The genocide reached its climax on March 31, when Armenians destroyed hundreds of villages and towns in Azerbaijan -150 Azerbaijani settlements in Karabakh were raided and destroyed and an unforeseen bloodbath took place in Shusha.
More than 700,000 Azerbaijanis were massacred including some 30,000 in Baku and surrounding towns. Armenians vandalism resulted in the unprecedented destruction of numerous mosques and schools in Azerbaijan.
Based on an order by Azerbaijan's former president, national leader Heydar Aliyev on March 26, 1998, March 31 was officially announced as the Day of Azerbaijani Genocide.
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