27 Years Without Maragha: the History of the Toughest Time in Karabakh Conflict

• 04.10.2019, 12:40
•  World,  NKR

Kavkaz-uzel.eu

April 10, 1992, the village of Maragha (NKR) saw a massacre. Larisa Alaverdyan, Armenia’s previous human rights defender, representative of “Against the Violation of Law” NGO labelled it as “contemporary Golgotha.”  

27 years back, on April 10 the Azerbaijani authorities unleashed an organized massacre of the peaceful population of the tiny Karabakh village of Maragha with 5000 people. All of them were ordered to leave.  

Seda Poghosyan, a narrow survivor recalls, “Women, old people and children were hiding in basements and dugouts. Three days later on April 10, 1992 the Azeris invaded Maragha. A few people came up to the dugout where I was hiding with my daughter-in-law and two grandchildren, – 4-year-old Karen and 2-year-old Vigen. The Azeris ordered us to get out. An old man, called Sasha, was the first to go up the steps, followed by Asya and Zabel. Once the person showed up from the dugout, he was murdered. My daughter-in-law went to, leaving the children with me. The Azeri man raised the blade but stopped and started to strip her jewelry. Then he ripped her dress. She tried to run away, but the Azeri followed her. The exit of the dugout was free. People rushed out. The Azeris distracted with looting for a while, noticed them and rushed to slay them with axes, blades and scythes. Masya and Ruben Ananyans were immediately slain. I saw my daughter-in-law’s sister, Karine running from the slaughterers… “ 

Throughout the history of Azerbaijani-Karabakh conflict, full of cruel incidents and vandalism, NKR Martakert region’s Maragha incidents are one of the most extreme manifestations of sadism and ruthlessness against peaceful population.  

On April 10, 1992, following a three-hour artillery preparation, units of the regular army of Azerbaijan invaded from the Azerbaijani settlement of Mir-Bashir (now Tartar) into the peaceful Karabakh village of Maragha. About 100 people, mostly women, old people and children, became victims of aggression. Dozens of people were taken hostages, some were later exchanged, but the destiny of many is still not known. Almost two weeks later, on April 22-23, Maragha saw the next attack, and the people who had returned to their homes were forced to leave the village forever.

The crimes in Maraghe became a link of the chain of pogroms and deportations in the North of Artsakh, Baku, Sumgayit, Kirovabad and other settlements of Azerbaijan, aimed at frightening people and stripping them of the opportunity to live in their native land. A few days later, Baroness Caroline Cox, vice-speaker of the House of Lords of the British parliament, arrived at the scene of the tragedy and was shocked by the picture. "They are not of the human race," said Lady Cox of the Azerbaijani military who had conducted the massacre. The baroness not only took photos and videos of the atrocities, but also described them in her numerous interviews and in the book “Ethnic Cleansing in Progress.”  "What we saw there does not stand to description. The village was devastated to ruins. People had buried the dead or rather what was left from them, decapitated corpses, charred human remains. We saw sharp sickles with blood stains, used to dismember.

After the massacre the Azeris looted and set the village to fire. By the way we were told that soldiers were followed by civilians with suitcases to complete the looting, We saw some of those well-stuffed bags on the ground, which the marauders were not able to carry,” Caroline Cox witnessed.

In 1997 a number of human rights organizations jointly prepared an extensive report on what had happened in Maragha and sent it to the United Nations Human Rights Commission. The international human rights organization Helsinki Watch officially confirmed the martyrdom of dozens of civilians and other dozens of women and children taken hostages. However, the tragic incidents in Maragha were not adequately covered by the foreign press. As of now, they have not been given a proper assessment by the global  community.

"You possess the most powerful weapon, the truth,” Baroness Cox assured. “The question that Azerbaijan tried to commit genocide against the population of Karabakh should be voiced in the international organizations. It is necessary to be more active in presenting to the world the mass crimes against Armenians in Maragha, Sumgayit, Baku, etc. These are crimes against humanity. I understand and support the Armenians of Karabakh, who will never again be able to live under the Azerbaijani authority, since the Armenians living in Karabakh under the authority of Azerbaijan have gone through a lot…”

The incidents that took place in Karabakh Maragha village, which is to this date occupied by Azerbaijan, can’t be called military operations as the settlement in question did not have military bases and was populated by peaceful civilians who became the main target of aggressions aimed at displacing the people from their motherland.

The foreign ministry of the NKR states that the massacre of the peaceful population of Maragha is a crime against humanity and civilization and the organizers and doers must be punished to the fullest extent of the law.