This page contains Artsakh (Karabakh) related textual excerpts from various sources from 1988 to present.This page contains Artsakh (Karabakh) related textual excerpts from various sources from 1988 to present.Source #1: Armenian Review, Winter 1991, Volume 44, Number 4/176
The Ethnic Structure of the Population of Mountainous Karabagh in 1921 by Merujan Karapetian
In mid-August 1921, a month after the decision of the Caucasian Bureau of the Communist party of Russia (Bolsheviks) annexing Mountanous Karabakh to Azerbaijan , a census of the village economy was conducted in Azerbaijan. The census was ordered by the chairperson of the Council of People's Commissars of Azerbaijan, Nariman Narimanov. The Central Statistical Administration of Azerbaijan published the results in 1922 ...
The Russian ethnographer N.G. Volkova, a specialist in the Caucasus, writes:
"In Azerbaijan, in the areas where Armenians formerly lived, empty lands remained or Azerbaijanis and Kurds were settled there. In the Shamakhi district 24 villages, with 17000 residents, were destroyed; in the Nukhi region, 20 villages, with 20000. The exact same happened in the cities of Agdam, Gyandzha, Nukhi, Shemakhi. The Armenian population remained only in the areas the Musavatatists did not reach, the heights of the Elisavetpol province (the Kazakh, Elisavetpol, Dzhevanshir districts)."
The contention is fully supported by the 1921 census data. Thus, while in 1914 Armenians made up 12.6% of the population of the Geokchay district, the proportion was already down to 4.9% in 1921. In Shamakhi the drop was from 13.4% to 7.3%; in Agdash from 19.5% to 0.7%; in Nukhi from 20.2% to 2.4%.
While in 1914 the number of Armenians in the Geokchay, Shamakhi, Aresh,and Nukhi districts added up to 73,526, in 1921 it was down to 12,716 ...
By the time of the 1921 census the following Armenian villages, which had a total population of 10,260 in 1917, no longer existed; Chartag (581 people); Dashbulag (1,672); Taraka (365); Zaraf (637); Yagubly (1,229); Top (132); Akhpilakend (899); Yengikend (121); Dzhudzhamysh (186); Salibeyli (469); Kozly (766); Medzhlis (311); Dzhafar-Abad-Khoy (510); Aydin-Bulag (431); Sabatly (1,954) ...
Table 12 Population of Mountainous Karabakh by Nationality (summarized)
District Armenians Azerbaijani Turks Varand 30104 309 Dizak 29806 120 Jraberd 29480 1570 Khachen 33036 1285 Shushi 0 3266 Total 122426 6550 Source #2: Armenian Review, Spring 1991, Volume 44, Number 1/173 Demographic Evolution in Transcaucasia: 1959-1989 by Serge Afanasyan Table 1: Population in Armenia (in thousands) 1959 1970 1979 1989 Armenians 1552 2212 2725 3084 Azerbaijanis 108 148 161 85* * After November 1989 Table IV: Population in Azerbaijan (in thousands) 1959 1970 1979 1989 Azerbaijanis 2481 3777 4709 5805 Armenians 422 484 475 390* * Before November 1989 Table V: Population (in thousands) Mountainous Karabakh 1959 1970 1979 1989 Armenians 110.0 121.0 123.0 145.0 Azerbaijanis 8.0 27.0 37.0 40.0 Nakhijevan Azerbaijanis 127.0 189.0 239.0 294.0 Armenians 9.5 5.8 3.4 2.0 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Here is a summary of the above information for Mountainous Karabakh with appropriate percentages. 1921 Armenians 122,426 (94.9%) Azeris 6,550 ( 5.1%) 1959 Armenians 110,000 (93.2%) Azeris 8,000 ( 6.8%) 1970 Armenians 121,000 (81.8%) Azeris 27,000 (18.2%) 1979 Armenians 123,000 (76.9%) Azeris 37,000 (23.1%) 1989 Armenians 145,000 (78.4%) Azeris 40,000 (21.6%) Obviously, both of these articles are appropriately footnoted with their sources and if need be, I can also print those. George Aghjayan Gaghjayan@aol.com
Source: Transcaucasus: A Chronology, Volume One, Number One January 7, 1992
September 2, 1991
In a joint session of the Nagorno-Karabakh Regional Council and the Shahumyan District's Governing Council, the establishment of the "Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Republic" is announced. The republic also removes itself from Azerbaijani control and opts temporarily for direct control by Moscow. The declaration states that the decision was made following Azerbaijan's declaration of independence. The declaration is based on the USSR Constitution and laws which "extend to the peoples of the autonomous entities and ethnic groups the right to independent decision-making as regards their state-legal status in the event of a Union republic's secession from the USSR." According to the regional council chairman, "the emergence of new conditions-the declaration of independence by the Azerbaijan Republic, which we welcome, generated concern with the autonomous regioand the Shahumyan District about their destiny. Therefore, we proclaimed the Republic and are ready to make use of Article Three of the USSR 'Law on the Procedure for Solving Issues Relating to a Union Republic's Secession from the USSR' and to raise the question of changing the state-legal status of our autonomous entity as the subject of the USSR. Law and democracy should be the same for large and small state-national entities."
September 3, 1991
The Azeri Parliament deems the establishment of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Republic as illegal and unconstitutional. In a statement, the session regards the move as 'a political provocation and hostile act against the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.'
September 24, 1991
Boris Yeltsin, President of the Russian Federation, Nursultan Nazarbayev, President of Kazakhstan, Levon Ter Petrossyan, President of the Armenian Parliament, and Ayaz Mutalibov, President of Azerbaijan, sign a joint communique on the resolution of teh Karabakh crisis. On the same day, Azerbaijani OMON forces attack the Armenian village of Chapar in the Mardakert region, killing six villagers and wounding several. Missile and artillery attacks are launched against the Armenian village of Noragyukh in the Askeran region.
September 26, 1991
beginning on the night of 25 September and continuing into the morning of the 26th, two Azerbaijani Special Militia Detachment (OMON) helicopters bomb the center of the capital Stepanakert and four adjacent villages.
November 27, 1991
The Azeri parliament, in an unconstitutional move, unilaterally annuls the autonomous status of the region. It is also resolved to increase the size of the rapidly forming national army and the name of the regional capital, Stepanakerd, is changed to Khankendi.
November 27, 1991
A session of the USSR State Council (the temporary ruling interrepublican body) passes a resolution calling on Azerbaijan to restore the autonomous status of Karabakh which was unconstitutionally abolished by a decision of the Azeri parliament.
December 1, 1997
The Chairman of the USSR Constitutional Compliance Committee, Sergei Alekseev, announces that actions taken by Azerbaijan revoking Karabakh's autonomous status is unconstitutional. This ruling further ratifies the USSR State Council decision on November 27th.
George Aghjayan Gaghjayan@aol.com
"If there is a single Armenian left in
Karabakh this October, the Azerbaijanis
will hang him in Baku's Central Square."
--Former Azeri President Elchibey, 6/92
Source: David Davidian, via Asbed Bedrossian
Along those lines, here is something interesting I found in "Ethnic Cleansing in Progress, War in Nagorno Karabakh" by Caroline Cox and John Eibner.
They site page 70 of "A Reporter at Large: Roots" by Robert Cullen and appearing in The New Yorker, April 15, 1991 for the testimony of Azaddin Gyulmamedov (a young Azeri-Turk who witnessed the Baku massacres of January 1990).
>We went to see what was happening. We saw these guys in the streets. I don't know who they were-drug addicts, maybe. They had sticks and clubs, and lists of Armenians and where they lived. They wanted to break down the doors of Armenian apartments and chase them out. The police didn't do anything. They just stood and watched. Same with the soldiers, who had weapons. We asked them to help. There were about a dozen soldiers and ten of us, and there were about twenty in the gang, but the soldiers wouldn't help. They said: "You can do it yourself, Blackie. We're not getting involved."<
George Aghjayan Gaghjayan@aol.com
  
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