NKR president honors Sumgait pogrom victims

The President of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic Bako Sahakian on February 28 visited the Memorial Complex of Stepanakert. He was accompanied by Primate of Artsakh Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church Archbishop Pargev Martirosian and high-ranking officials of the republic, according to the press service of the NKR President’s Office.

Bako Sahakian laid flowers at the monument to the innocent victims of genocide.

The Sumgait pogrom was committed against the Armenian population of the seaside town of Sumgait in Soviet Azerbaijan during February 1988. On February 27, 1988, mobs made up largely of ethnic Azeris formed into groups that went on to attack and kill Armenians both on the streets and in their apartments; widespread looting and a general lack of concern from police officers allowed the situation to worsen. The violence in Sumgait was unprecedented in scope in the Soviet Union and received heavy coverage in the Western media. A number of international and Soviet sources described the events as genocide of the Armenian population.

The pogrom took place during the early stages of the Karabakh movement. The official death toll released by the Procurator General of the USSR (tallies were compiled based on lists of named victims) was 32 people (26 Armenians and 6 Azerbaijanis), although some have revised this figure up into the tens and hundreds.