Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

[Mher]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

If you live in Southern California makes sure to attend and also help spread the word about the event
this years protest is on Sunday to make it more convenient

https://www.facebook.com/events/6607...gular&source=1

The protest is this upcoming sunday
again all help in publicizing would be greatly appreciated

[Mher]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

If you live in Southern California makes sure to attend and also help spread the word about the event
this years protest is on Sunday to make it more convenient

https://www.facebook.com/events/660714137304565/?ref_newsfeed_story_type=regular&source=1

[Federate]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

Whats up with the recording?

Intimidation? Spying? Review of Armenian protest tactics? Analysis? Not sure.

[ninetoyadome]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

Whats up with the recording?

[Federate]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

Brussels, Belgium



Amsterdamn, Netherlands




Azeris videotaping them

[Federate]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

Commemorations took place across the world of the Sumgait genocide by Armenian communities.

Beirut, Lebanon



Damascus, Syria



Berlin, Germany



Moscow, Russia



Los Angeles, USA



Ottawa, Canada



Buenos Aires, Argentina

[ninetoyadome]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

Azerbaijan: Baku Screenwriter Has Fresh Take on Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict
February 28, 2011 - 3:17pm, by Khadija Ismayilova
Armenia Azerbaijan Culture Nagorno Karabakh
Rustam Ibragimbekov, an Azeri screenwriter, did not look to international negotiations or non-governmental organization reports for help in trying to show the impact of Azerbaijan and Armenia’s 23-year conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh on ordinary lives. Rather, he delved into state records associated with the 1988 slaughter of ethnic Armenians in the Azerbaijani town of Sumgayit.

Ibragimbekov, a 72-year-old native of Baku, has a track record of crafting wrenchingly emotional screenplays that explore how the Soviet system manipulated, and often destroyed individual lives. Along with Russian filmmaker Nikita Mikhalkov, Ibragimbekov co-wrote the script for the Oscar-winning “Burnt by the Sun,” a 1994 film about Stalin’s repressions. He explored a similar theme as a co-writer for Régis Wargnier’s Oscar-nominated “East/West” a work about the return of Russian émigrés to the Soviet Union.

With the February 27, 1988, massacre in Sumgayit, Ibragimbekov believes he has hit on a no less controversial topic.

According to official statistics, 32 people, including six Azerbaijanis and more than 20 Armenians, were killed during the massacre, which followed the mass deportation of ethnic Azeris from Armenia at the start of the two sides’ conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh territory. Armenian sources, by contrast, claim the number of victims ranged into the hundreds.

The story of “Ramiz and Julyetta” that Ibragimbekov has developed is based on court documents and eyewitness accounts published by a former Soviet state prosecutor who worked on the investigation into the Sumgayit massacre. It’s a tale that promises to shed light on an event whose memory has left lasting scars.

The book on which the film is based, “Sumgayit: The Start of the USSR’s Collapse,” is by Aslan Ismayilov, who drew on materials from the criminal investigation into the massacre and transcripts from Politburo hearings on the events. Ismayilov’s central argument is that the violence in Sumgayit was the result of an operation orchestrated by the KGB to justify the use of the army to crackdown on Azerbaijan’s independence movement. It was also used to justify the territorial claims of Armenians in Karabakh, according to Ismayilov. [Editor’s note: the book’s author is not a relative of the writer of this article].

Ismayilov, a former prosecutor who advocated for capital punishment for the massacre’s perpetrators, recounts that witnesses were pressured to change their court testimony “[w]hen the KGB’s role in the case was revealed.”

Against this backdrop, Ibragimbekov’s screenplay focuses on an ethnic Azeri man (Ramiz) from Baku and ethnic Armenian woman (Julyetta) from Sumgayit who fall in love. Ramiz is an apolitical hero -- a real Baku resident, as Ibragimbekov calls him -- who is largely indifferent to his ethnic identity. He goes to Sumgayit to see Julyetta, and ends up witnessing the February 27 atrocities. But when he goes to court to tell the truth about what he saw, he is arrested.

“I want to show the tragedy of two lovers, whose lives had been tragically changed by the conflict,” Ibragimbekov elaborated. He describes Ramiz and Julyetta as “far from politics, have nothing to do with either [side’s] liberation movement or territorial claims.”

That outlook, he believes, may allow the film to promote a deeper understanding of the conflict’s larger context. “The majority of people always get things right. When shooting stops, people-to-people contacts get back onto a peaceful path, as they understand that the conflicts are started by governments and radical groups, not by ordinary people,” said Ibragimbekov.

Seeking financing for the film’s estimated $2-million budget, Ibragimbekov has submitted the screenplay to Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism. A council of film experts is still reviewing the work, according to Yusif Sheykhov, head of the ministry’s Cinematography Department, who declined to comment further.

Some observers believe that state sponsorship for the project is highly unlikely. Elmir Mirzoyev, editor-in-chief of the Kultura.az news portal, says the endeavor may create problems for its authors since the screenplay’s concept “is too different” from the government’s PR message.

“Azerbaijani and Armenian audiences have been brought up with pseudo-patriotic propaganda by their countries’ respective media outlets and they simply are not ready to digest this message,” Mirzoyev said. “I expect the authors will be bullied for a pro-Armenian stance in Azerbaijan and vice-versa in Armenia.”

The chances for “Ramiz and Julyetta” to receive state sponsorship may seem even slimmer to those who remember Ibragimbekov’s 1998 film “The Family,” about the pogroms of Armenian families in Azerbaijan prior to the Soviet Army’s 1990 crackdown in Baku. The movie, which was shown in a number of international film festivals, has not been broadcast on local channels.

In recent years, the government has responded cautiously to creative works that deal with the Karabakh conflict. In 2008, the government unofficially banned a novel that described the tragic fate of Armenian and Azerbaijani gays. In 2010, the Ministry of Culture censored part of Chingiz Rasulzade’s movie “The Dolls,” during which a soldier is shown crying during battle.

One Sumgayit resident, however, believes that Ibragimbekov’s film will show simply what used to be the reality of life in Azerbaijan.

“Love between an Armenian woman and an Azerbaijani man was a common thing back then. There were lots of mixed families,” recollected 61-year-old unemployed Dagbayi Farajov. “Some of them suffered a lot because of the conflict … Some people saved their neighbors, loved ones from what happened in those days. It is part of the city’s stories.”

Ibragimbekov maintains that he is not afraid of a harsh reaction to his film. He thinks the government should spend more effort trying to convince the ethnic Armenian residents of breakaway Karabakh, whom he sees as Azerbaijani citizens, that it is ready to embrace them.

The filmmaker, however, describes himself as no pacifist. “I blame the leadership of Armenia for the occupation, and I think Azerbaijan should fight to get its lands back,” he said. “I consider the Armenian leadership and radical, aggressive groups in Armenia as my enemies, but I know that the people of Armenia are not responsible for everything their leadership does.”

Editor's note: Khadija Ismayilova is a freelance reporter based in Baku and hosts a daily program on current affairs broadcast by the Azeri Service of RFE/RL.

[ninetoyadome]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

and then we have the azeris again blaming Armenia and the USSR for what happened
Azerbaijan tries to lay the blame for Sumgait pogroms upon Gorbachev and USSR KGB
February 28, 2011 - 19:10 AMT 15:10 GMT
PanARMENIAN.Net - The head of the department on work with law-enforcement bodies of the Azerbaijani President’s Administration of the President, Fuad Aleskerov said that the Azerbaijani leadership states that the Armenian pogroms in Sumgait in 1988 were organized by Armenian nationalists and their promoters – Mikhail Gorbachev and USSR KGB.

At the same time Aleskerov tried to lay the blame for the events in Sumgait also on the Armenian side, saying that the “Armenian nationalists” allegedly have been trying to justify Armenia’s actions against Azerbaijan for many years.

Aleskerov also stated that Azerbaijan possesses the so-called facts, which prove that the Armenian pogroms in Sumgait were organized by Armenian nationalists and their promoters – Mikhail Gorbachev and USSR KGB, 1news.az reported.

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Some new facts were revealed during the reinvestigation of Sumgayit incidents, said first Deputy General Prosecutor Rustam Usubov at the presentation ceremony of sumgayit.com website in the Academy of Public Administration under President of Azerbaijani Republic.

Usubov said noted the establishment of special commission on the incidents in the General Prosecutor’s Office and said that 5 criminal cases are renewed on these incidents: “It is said that the Armenians are aggrieved from Sumgayit incidents, but in reality it is wrong”. He said that during the reinvestigation they found that some Armenians sent their properties to Russia and then burnt their houses: “The Armenians confessed that they took this step in order to obtain compensation. More than 100 rich Armenians withdrew their money from bank”.

According to him, investigation also revealed several phone talks between the city and Armenia and other countries during Sumgayit incidents.


there is no limit to there lies, they can't produce any evidence and yet they still babble on like morons.

[Federate]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

The real number of Sumgait victims exceeds 100

28.02.2011 16:38

Artak Barseghyan
“Radiolur”

The real number of Sumgait victims exceeds 100, and the fact is confirmed by survivors, President of “Shushi” Benevolent Fund Bakur Karapetyan told reporters.

He visited Sumgait in March 1988 and shot a 54-minute documentary about the events in the city. The screening of the film was prohibited in Soviet times.

According to Karapetyan, not all victims were identified. In the film he tried to tell about the massacres from the point of view of common people, who witnessed a new genocide organized by the leadership of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan.

According to human rights advocate Hrayr Ulubabyan, the massacres were ordered by the First Secretary of Azerbaijan’s Communist Party, Kyaram Baghirov, who visited Sumgait on February 26,1988.

http://www.armradio.am/news/?part=pol&id=19343

[Federate]

Re: Genocides of Sumgait, Kirovabad, Baku and Maragha

Grigory Ayvazyan publishes the list of perpetrators of the Sumgait pogroms

28.02.2011 15:20

Anna Balyan
“Radiolur”

Azerbaijan responded with massacres to the civilized methods of the Karabakh Movement that started in 1988. The first mass killings started in the city of Sumgait. Witnesses say that everything had been organized in advance, including the lists of Armenians. On these days we commemorate the memory of those killed in Sumgait from February 26 to 29, 1988.

President of the Assembly of Azerbaijani Armenians Grigory Ayvazyan has made public the list of perpetrators of the Sumgait pogroms. About one million Armenians were exiled from their homes as a result of the policy of ethnic cleansing. About 500 fled to Armenia, others left abroad.

Having studied the facts, the Assembly has concluded that the ethnic cleansings and mass killings were organized and perpetrated by the following officials: First Secretary of the Azerbaijani Soviet Socialist Republic Baghirov, Chairman of the Council of Ministers Seidov, head of department of the Central Committee of Azerbaijan’s Communist Party Asadov, First Secretary of the Political Committee of Sumgait Muslimzadeh and others.

Grigory Ayvazyan urges to adopt as soon as possible the bills condemning the Sumgait massacre and describing it as genocide, which have been pending in the National Assembly ever since 2009.

http://www.armradio.am/news/?part=pol&id=19342