Қаңтар трагедиясы: Бакудегі қанды оқиға (1990)

Violent 1990 crackdown on anti government movements in Baku, Soviet Azerbaijan

Black January , also known as Black Saturday or the January Massacre, was a violent crackdown on Azerbaijani nationalism and anti Soviet sentiment in Baku on 19–20 January 1990, as part of a state of emergency during the dissolution of the Soviet Union. General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party Mikhail Gorbachev and Defence Minister Dmitry Yazov asserted that military law was necessary to thwart efforts by the Azerbaijani independence movement to overthrow the Soviet Azerbaijani government. According to official estimates of Azerbaijan, 147 civilians were killed, 800 people were injured, and five people went missing. In a resolution of 22 January 1990, the Supreme Soviet of Azerbaijan SSR declared that the decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of 19 January, used to impose emergency rule in Baku and military deployment, constituted an act of aggression.

In December 1989, Azerbaijanis living in regions bordering Iran ripped down border fences, demanding closer ties with ethnic Azerbaijanis living in Iran. The local authorities in Jalilabad surrendered to rioters, turning over administration to the Popular Front of Azerbaijan. This was followed by a non violent turnover of the Lankaran administration to the Popular Front two weeks later. On 9 January 1990, the Supreme Soviet of the Armenian SSR voted to include Nagorno Karabakh in its budget and allowed its inhabitants to vote in Armenian elections, thus disregarding Soviet authority and Azerbaijani SSR jurisdiction, and causing outrage throughout the republic. This led to demonstrations which demanded the ousting of Azerbaijani communist officials and called for independence from the Soviet Union. Their rhetoric was, according to a Human Rights Watch report, "heavily anti Armenian". On 12 January, the Popular Front organized a national defence committee with branches in factories and offices in Baku. The aim was to mobilize the population for battle with local Armenians. Azerbaijani authorities also ordered the 12,000 strong Interior Ministry troops to abstain from intervening in the Baku riots and numerous Soviet army and fleet units of the Baku garrison and Caspian Flotilla did not intervene to stop the riots, claiming that they had no orders from Moscow authorities.</blockquote>

The decree contravened legal acts in force at the time, which provided that the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the AzSSR would have to turn to the central government with the relevant plea. Late at night on 19 January 1990, after the demolition of the central television station and termination of phone and radio lines by Soviet special forces, 26,000 Soviet troops entered Baku, smashing through the barricades in order to crush the Popular Front. however, findings of the Moscow based non governmental organization Shield found no evidence of "armed combatants of Azerbaijani Popular Front", which was used as a motive to crush the civilian population on 20 January. The independent Shield organization which consists of a group of lawyers and officers in reserve, observed human rights violations in the army and its military operations, and concluded that the army waged a war on its civilians and demanded to start a criminal investigation against the Minister of Defence, Dmitry Yazov, who had personally led the operation. The Azerbaijani Interior Ministry officials helped Popular Front activists in stirring disorder by providing them with weapons, technical facilities, and informing them about the movement of army units. The troops attacked the protesters, firing into the crowds. The shooting continued for three days. They acted pursuant to a state of emergency, which continued for more than four months afterward, declared by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, signed by Chairman Mikhail Gorbachev. The state of emergency was, however, disclosed to the Azerbaijani public only several hours For another 40 days, the country stayed away from work as a sign of mourning and mass protest. and 137 civilians died with the unofficial number reaching 300. Up to 800 were injured and 5 went missing. An additional 26 people were killed in Neftchala and Lankaran regions of the country. According to one report, 93 Azerbaijanis and 29 Soviet soldiers were killed in the street skirmishes. Other reports state that 21 soldiers were killed and 90 wounded in the fighting. However, how the soldiers died is still disputed. The soldiers' death toll was claimed by Soviet authorities to have resulted from armed resistance, although some of the soldiers could have been victims of friendly fire. Defence Minister Yazov also said that nationalists were plotting a coup d'état in Azerbaijan: "A meeting was planned at which it was proposed to declare the transfer of power into the hands of the People's Front." He noted how the "Popular Front" declared its own state of emergency in Baku before the action was taken and how Soviet state organs "ceased to control the situation."

During the Black January crackdown, Soviet authorities managed to suppress all efforts to disseminate news from Azerbaijan to the local population and the international community. On the eve of the military intervention, one of the leaders of Popular Front, Ekhtibar Mamedov, proposed to Kremlin officials that he appear on Azerbaijani TV at 8 PM to announce that the First Secretary of Azerbaijani Communist Party, Abdurrahman Vazirov, would be leaving, and no troops would invade Baku, thus restoring order. making it the only source of news to Azerbaijanis within and outside of the country for several days. The Kremlin leadership tried hard to keep the outside world and the population inside Azerbaijan unaware of the intervention, but Mirza Khazar and his staff foiled this attempt. Because of the actions of Mirza Khazar and his staff at Radio Liberty, Azerbaijanis in and outside Azerbaijan, as well as the international community, learned about the actions of the Soviet Army and were able to organize a protest. Shocked by this development, the government of the USSR complained officially to the United States about Radio Liberty's coverage of the military's intervention in Azerbaijan. The 20 January 1990 broadcasts turned Mirza Khazar into a popular figure among Azerbaijanis in and outside Azerbaijan. Malahat Aghajanqizi, a well known Azerbaijani poet and writer, described Mirza Khazar's appearance on radio at the time of the Soviet military action as follows: "On January 20, Mirza Khazar with his God given divine voice gave hope to the dying Azerbaijani people."

A special session of the Supreme Soviet of the Azerbaijan SSR was held on 22 January 1990 at the request of the public and by the initiative of a group of MPs. It tried to initially assess the 20 January events and adopted some documents condemning the crackdown operation by the Soviet army. The Memorial Society and Helsinki Watch reported in May 1991 that they had found compelling evidence that the imposition of the state of emergency had led to an unwarranted breach of civil liberties and that Soviet troops had used unjustified force resulting in many deaths. This includes the usage of armored vehicles, bayonets and firing on clearly marked ambulances.

On 18 October 1991, the Azerbaijan parliament restored the country's independence. On 14 February 1992, the Azerbaijani General Prosecutor's Office instituted a lawsuit targeted at the individuals involved in the massacre. In March 2003, the same lawsuit was targeted at the ex Soviet president Gorbachev for violating the article 119 of the Soviet Constitution and article 71 of the Constitution of the Azerbaijani SSR. In 1994, the National Assembly of Azerbaijan adopted a full political and legal evaluation of the Black January events. According to the decree of the President of Azerbaijan, Heydar Aliyev from 16 December 1999, all victims of the crackdown were awarded an honorary title of the "Martyr of January 20"
20 January is marked as Martyrs' Day (or literally, "the Day of the Nationwide Sorrow") in Azerbaijan.

20 January is recognized as a Day of Mourning and it is commemorated as the Day of Nationwide Sorrow In January 2010, a memorial for the Black January victims was erected in the Yasamal district of Baku. The monument was designed by Javanshir Dadashov and Azad Agayed, and architect Adalat Mammadov. The opening of the monument took place on 20 January 2010. The President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and the head of the presidential administration Ramiz Mehdiyev, chief executive of Yasamal Ibrahim Mehdiyev, and families of the victims of the tragedy attended the ceremony. The total area of the complex is The height of the monument and pedestal is The memorial depicts a group of people who are determined not to miss armed troops coming into the city, with some of them already fallen.