Armenophobia in Azerbaijan

The political establishment of Azerbaijan chose armenophobia as its weapon in seeking to wrestle the Azerbaijani society into consolidation (assimilation process of ethnic minorities), to minimize the risks of a schism within the country (clan stratification and strife) and to re-channel the popular outcry.

2. The historical axis

Originating, evolving and spiraling among the Caucasian Tatars at the turn of the 20th century along the same tracks as anti-Semitism in Russia, armenophobia now represents an institutional component of Azerbaijan’s modern statehood.61 This means that we come to deal with a case of a profound rejection of Armenians in a context where the Azerbaijani perceive them today as educated, successful and wealthy people, whose very existence “stripped” the indigenous majority of their privileges and turned them into “uneducated”, “disadvantaged”, “impoverished” people and so forth.

Historically, Armenians became the axis, around which the ethnic and national identity of Azerbaijanis evolved62. At each point in history, the political and social discourse, the statements of public figures and researchers drew contrasting comparisons between the Muslim identity and Armenians.

The Armenian population with its relatively higher standard of living and higher level of education was seen by the local Muslims as alien and hostile which far from constituting any threat to their survival became a source of permanent sense of “inferiority” further exacerbated by the satirical, public and social discourse of the scant Muslim (Azerbaijani)63 intellectuals.

The profuse literary works, political and social discourse, pamphlets and satire, which laid bare their own backwardness, obscurantism and the absence of a national identity, mainly used comparison and contrast with the Armenians, rarely Russians and Jews, but were far from favoring the Muslim (Azerbaijani) population.

Overall, three main levels can be identified in the Azerbaijani perception of Armenians:

• Idealizing Armenians and setting them as a role models;

• Regarding Armenians as equals;

• Debasing and rejecting Armenians on the brink of an unabashed policy of xenophobia and bigotry against Armenians.

Pre-Soviet period

At the turn of the 20th century writers, public and artistic figures marked a clear borderline in their perception of Armenians and the local Muslim (Azerbaijani) population by viewing Armenians as a standard and example to emulate; this tendency is readily traceable in the works of Azerbaijani intellectuals.

The self-criticism that hinged on a contrasting comparison with Armenians found expression in all significant areas of public and social life. By the early 20th century, the education among the Muslim (Azerbaijani) population was still at a rudimentary level, while regions with the Armenian population had primary schools that had been offering joint education to children of both sexes as early as in the mid-19th century. Thus, the first school opened in Shemakh in 1863. The need to school the children was seen by the local Muslim population as something alien that collided with their customs and traditions and led to a greater exclusion of Armenians.

In 1875, Hasan bey Zardabi64 addressed his compatriots with these words: “Muslims! Don’t you regret that the whole world, and even our neighbors, seeks enlightenment, while we remain dead in our tracks waiting to “have everything stuffed in our mouths and chewed for us”? Muslims, who care for the fate of their nation, open up your eyes!”65

Such comparisons and efforts to hoist the Muslim (Azerbaijani) population to the level of Armenians drew from the local population led by the Muslim clerics strong feelings of aggression and rejection towards Armenians. The clergy sought to keep the population within the confines of the ummah66, while the intellectuals fought for the nascent national identity.

Lack of education was the decisive factor that tilted the scales against the intellectuals and by extension – against Armenians. The latter were frowned upon as catalysts of all woes associated with these changes.

Here is how the famous composer Uzeyir Hajibekov67 describes the comparison between the Muslims (Azerbaijanis) and Armenians:

Look, my friend, Armenian or Russian children do not go to school before they turn seven and receive a home education, while Muslim children stay away from school at home even after they turn seven, eight or nine years of age. <…> Armenian or Russian children are nurtured at home by intelligent and educated mothers who put them to sleep and let them out for a walk in due time, who fill their leisure with toys useful for both spirit, morals and physical health. Not a single bad or pernicious word reaches the ears of these children. What do they hear then? Music splendid for the mind and body, stories, poems and legends written specifically for children by famed pedagogues, correct instructive words of their parents, conversations of well-mannered and educated guests who visit their houses. What do they see then? The walls of their homes are decorated with paintings and pictures of flowers that please the eye, there are beautifully illustrated magazines and books on their tables, cleanliness and order surround them and so forth. <…> And what about our children? May Allah have pity on them! All they hear is obscene language, swearing, foul talk and intrigues! What do they see? They see nothing but the evil doings of their elders; they are surrounded by ubiquitous dirt and waste. Places of their games are full of dust and mud, and their playing is about… strangling cats, hurting dogs, dipping mice in oil and setting them ablaze.

It must be noted that parallels between Armenians were drawn not to “hail Armenians as superior” to Muslims. On the contrary, such parallels were acrimonious along these lines: “we are unlike them”, “we should resemble them”, and “we do nothing to become more educated and civilized like them”.

Mirza Alakbar Sabir

Thank God, we are not Armenians, to send our boy to school.

There, look at our praised beanpole of the son-in-law who was a swat at school, and what is there to gain from him?

No, I won’t allow my baby boy to be schooled! He is still a tot!

Let my boy continue swearing, he is just but a little one!

25 August, 190868

This backfired as phobias in respect of Armenians did not abate; instead, they were heated up and intensified. Considering the illiteracy factor of the population, it can be rightfully claimed that there was virtually no direct link between ‘the people and the intellectual elite’, and all communication was mediated through the clergy or a state authority which protected the interests of the business and had a stake in maintaining the ignorance and therefore their ability to control the masses and sought to eliminate their Armenian competitors.

During my stay in Baku I was extremely surprised by the vehement acrimony of foreigners against Armenians; apart from a couple of isolated cases, their sympathies were entirely in favor of Tatars. I must confess that I was impressed by this unanimity. I came to Caucasus without any biased judgment; however, I was inclined to believe that the sufferings of Armenians were greatly exaggerated by the European press which blackwashed Tatars. Agayev to whom I paid a visit convincingly proved the righteousness of Tatars, while the English, Russian and other disinterested observers were almost unanimous in their condemnation of Armenians. Even plain Russian soldiers and policemen who were asked to give their opinion on who was responsible for the unrest responded without the slightest doubt: Armenians. Where racial and religious hatred was white hot, it was hard to weigh all pros and cons at once. I had no choice but to rely on statements of those who knew well this land and seemed neutral. But I gradually came to the conclusion that foreigners were not as unswayed in their judgments as it seemed at first. Let along the Muslim skill of impressing, the position of foreign financial and business circles was influenced by their competition with Armenians. But for Armenians, foreigners could lay their hands on the entire oil industry of this place, instead, they must deal with an able, industrious and resourceful opponents <…> all of the above explains the rancor of foreigners against Armenians. A prominent English factory owner told me quite straightforwardly that all Armenians must be annihilated.69

The nascent small bourgeoisie under the guiding hand of Pan-Turanian ideologists benefited the ignorance of the population to advance their objectives, i.e. consolidation of the population of various ethnic backgrounds around the idea of the single ethnic self-identification based on the image of Armenian enemy rather than the common religion. The image of the Armenian enemy has become the very impulse that was necessary for the consolidation of the society and formulation of ethnic traits.70

A. Agayev wrote during the clashes between Armenians and Tatars of 1905-06: “It is thanks to these clashes that all Tatars of Transcaucasia came to realize that they belong to a single kind and related with one another by close ties, and that there is no difference between Tatars of Nakhichevan and Tatars of Baku”.71

A correspondent of ‘Kavkazskoe slovo’ (‘Caucasian Word’) newspaper S. Rafalovich wrote in his memories: “In my presence, the Minister of the Internal Affairs, Behbud Javanshir, said: “Today I received Tagionosov. I told him that it was in the best interests of Armenians not to come pleading to me. When I talk to Armenians, I feel such resentment that I forget myself which is surely to make things worse for Armenians”. When asked why he chose to accept the post of such responsibility, the Minister of the Internal Affairs, Behbud Javanshir responded: “Why? I became a minister only to do away with Armenians”.72

Dr. Khosrov bey Sultanov (Minister of Agriculture and State Property), along with many others, openly declared that in Azerbaijan there would be either no Armenians altogether, or they would be given the status of the Turkish rayah (rightless creatures). “Armenians have nothing to do here, let them go to their own country”, vehement nationalist voices were heard.73

Asad Karayev: We rejoice in your success. We have no doubt that the sum of around 100 million allocated from Baku will not be spent without benefit. May Allah bless the power of the money that can do more than mighty troops. Those who know the thinking of Armenians will always know how to become their masters. There is no Armenian who wouldn’t sell everything for money. This nation holds nothing sacred except money. This explains the large number of Armenian spies and agents as in no other country money can achieve as much as in case of Armenians. It is a fact of life. Wretched (poor) Jews are unjustly accused of this.74

The 20th century – Soviet period

With higher level of education and with equal conditions and the absence of the need to take personal part in the process of education, ethnonym and alphabet75 creation, historiography, etc., in the context of the rhetoric dictated by the epoch, Armenians came to be viewed as an attained benchmark. This found its expression in the thesis of “Armenian-Azerbaijani equality and brotherhood’’, “friends for centuries” and “companions in arms in the struggle”, etc.

It must be noted that in daily life and at subconscious level comparison and contrast were still quite common and were later on transferred into the areas of academic studies and administration. The perception of Armenians and the behavioral patterns that ensued formulated at several levels.

Outward – at the level of slogans and propaganda which were based on communist values and represented as a whole a showcase where recent tragic events came to be termed as “fratricidal war provoked by the tsarist regime”. In this sense, a footnote to the poem by Sabir appearing in a publication in 1983 is quite illustrative.76

Dedicated to clashes between Armenians and Azerbaijanis provoked by tsarist regime in Caucasus in 1905 and published in ‘Hayat’ newspaper along with the letter of Sabir in which the poet responded to the invitation for cooperation appearing in the newspaper to mark the commencement of its activities. “For people who made a bloodbath” etc.77 The reference is made to the fratricidal massacre between Armenians and Azerbaijanis.78

Or, the public statements of communist leaders of Azerbaijan:

Ex-president of Azerbaijan, Heydar Aliyev: Comrades! The entire life, short but vivid and full of profound meaning, the life of a professional revolutionary, versatile party and state activities of Stepan Shahumyan are a symbol of his selfless fight for freedom and the welfare of the working people, for the triumph of the communism ideals. <…> Back in March 1918, Musavatists provoked an anti-Soviet rebellion in Baku intending to quench the Soviet authority. Thanks to the resolute and firm measures taken by Bolsheviks, the rebellion was suppressed. Bolsheviks of Azerbaijan spared no effort in their struggle for the development of socialist revolution in all directions. Despite intrigues of the bourgeois nationalists, in defiance of a mortal danger they propagated in masses – in plants and workshops, in villages and provinces – the truth of the Lenin doctrine. The titanic labor of the chairman of the council of popular commissars of Baku could be seen in all reforms of the commune. Sultan Majid Afandiyev dedicated this figurative statement on him: “Stepan Shahumyan is the guiding hand of the Commune of Baku, its mastermind, knowledge, and thought… The compelling logic of his discourse hit and crushed the enemies of the Commune. He is the favorite leader of the army of oil industry workers” <…> the noble image of Stepan Georgievich Shahumyan is an inspiration for all generations of workers <…>. And today, with pride and love we say that this great son of the Armenian people, Stepan Shahumyan, is also a son of the Azerbaijani people, all peoples of the Transcaucasia, all multinational and united Soviet people (long and thunderous ovation).79

Latent perception implies the use of administrative resources with clear armenophobic tendencies against the background of ‘friendship’, ‘brotherhood’ and ‘solidarity’. This very administrative resource became the instrument of self-assertion in the region and, particularly on Armenian territories, and became the locomotive of the ambition to rewrite one’s own history, to find more ancient roots, ancient statehood, to define one’s own unique place and contribution into the treasury of the human civilization as well as to change the regional demographics. And all this occurred in contrast and comparison with Armenians.

Ex-president of Azerbaijan, Heydar Aliyev: In the future, we must create works so as they continuously and constantly prove the claims of Azerbaijan to the lands that host today’s Armenia. We must do this. We must pave the way for generations to come.80

These words uttered back in 1999 are a telltale evidence of the succession of the policy initiated back in the Soviet period as confessed unequivocally by H. Aliev.

Heydar Aliyev, ex-president of Azerbaijan: “<…> I speak of the period when I was the first secretary and contributed a lot to the development of Nagorno-Karabakh. At the same time I sought to change the demographics of the region. Nagorno-Karabakh raised the issue of establishing an institute, a university there. <…> I thought and I decided to do so. But with one condition; there should be three sectors: Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian. <…> Azerbaijanis from the neighboring regions were directed not to Baku but there. We also sent Azerbaijanis from the adjoining regions. I took this and other measures trying to increase the number of Azerbaijanis in Nagorno-Karabakh and to crop the number of Armenians.81

This was reflected not only in words but in actions: curtailing the rights and possibilities of Armenians as an ethnic unit to favor the Azerbaijani population. This was not the first but the most flagrant fact of mass discrimination in the history of the Soviet Azerbaijan, and it was quite purposeful and targeted.

Perception in the daily life: along with the development and progress of Azerbaijan, the country became caught between two worlds. On the one hand, there was Baku with its Europe-oriented upper class with its flexibility, moderation and openness; on the other hand, was the remaining part of the country, a huge social stratum that was retrograde and remained at the level of ‘ummah’, with its typical apathy and impassiveness towards the secular authority, with the traditional practice of docility and the customary religiousness.

A very illustrative example of xenophobia in daily life is described in an autobiographic essay by Vahid Ghazi.82

My grandmother used to tell us stories: “When we were kids, Armenians massacred many Turkic people. At the time, they called us Turkic. They killed us everywhere. They cut off the nipples of the women, laced them in strings and threw into our trenches. Those who could not stand it and stepped forward were shot down. They tied hot samovars on the backs of the people and made them run…”

But my grandmother never told me: “You must also hate Armenians!” I know, I heard that Armenians bring up their children with a feeling of hatred to Turkic peoples and Azerbaijanis. We did not have any such practice. The hatred links to memory and ours retained no vestige of it.

It must be noted that in their interactions with Azerbaijani who referred to facts based on their personal experience, all tentative of the Armenian side to hear a single confirmed example of Armenian children brought up “in the spirit of hatred to all Turkic” remained without response.

The testimony narrating the reaction of ordinary Azerbaijanis to the devastating earthquake of 1988 in Armenia is quite illustrative in the context of aggressive armenophobia.

General Alexander Lebed: The events unfolded with a relative calm up to December 7. In the evening of December 7, the news release of ‘Vremya’ announced that Armenia suffered a tremendous earthquake. <…>. The silence was suddenly broken by a sound, or to be more precise, by an entire roar of sounds that merged into a single general howl of triumph and glee that increased in intensity. <…> In an attempt to ascertain the nature of these sounds, I went out on the balcony along with another five or six officers.

<…> On the opposite side of the street, right across the building of the Regional Executive Committee there was a big nine-story residential block. All windows in the building were alight without exception; people on the balconies yelled, screamed, hooted and roared with wild laughter. Down went empty bottles, burning paper and some other objects. This nine-story residential block was not alone in its expression of cannibalistic mirth. The picture was identical in all adjoining buildings. The entire district beamed and howled in a frantic frenzy.

People that considered themselves civilized, educated to a certain extent and well-mannered, some of them supposedly religious and following the covenants of the Quran were united in this inappropriate barbarian celebration of a tremendous human tragedy. I felt a strong urge to cross out this cursed residential block with a long burst of my assault rifle. This could be the only way to make people degraded to apes claim back their humanity. How many merry, kind reasonable, hospitable people I met among Azerbaijanis! The discourse of many of them was so full of passion and conviction! Where have all these reasonable and kind people gone? How could it be possible that they all dissolved in this scum yielding to an impulse, the extent of heinousness of which is hard to define? This was a riddle to me. There can be only one interim and sad conclusion: any stage of civilization, any upper form of social and economic life is separated from feudalism and even the savage horde by a single step backwards, only one step… It takes just certain conditions, and people immediately prove themselves capable of showing that they climbed down the trees only very recently.83

Vardges Bagratovich Artsruni, head of the construction complex of Armenia: The Soviet Union still existed, and help streamed into the disaster zone from all parts of the country. Azerbaijan too had sent some fuel tanks by railway. The fuel tanks bore writing: “Congratulations with the earthquake! We wish you another one!” The train was sent back, and it became clear that there would be no reconciliation. This is impossible to forget. A little later, it became known that trains carrying food and humanitarian aid which passed by railway through Azerbaijan were rolled over to reserve tracks at Azerbaijani stations. Refrigerators were turned off for several days, and after meat and other foodstuffs became spoiled the train was sent on into the disaster zone. Mix trucks carrying cement were filled with water and after staying idle for 2 or 3 days were sent into the disaster zone. The construction and other machinery loaded onto platforms reached the regions of Armenia hit by the earthquake not only with shattered windshields but with everything else that could be broken (doors, windows, etc.). Following that, full blockade of the railway and road communication ensued.84

In December 1988, Armenia was hit by a disastrous earthquake that destroyed entire cities and claimed a death toll of many thousand lives. The entire world stretched a helping hand with humanitarian cargoes reaching Armenia from different parts of the world. Azerbaijan too sent trains, but they were loaded with crutches and nails for coffins.85

The parallel existence of three separate sets of values which were equally fostered and promoted ultimately led to an internal conflict within the Azerbaijani society which at the outburst of the first conflicts with Armenia revealed itself in line with the non-Soviet ideology instilled in the minds of the people in the following fashion: to take revenge on Armenians, to show them their place, to destroy them.

Decline of the Soviet period – Independent Azerbaijan

By the late twentiеth century as the Soviet Union collapsed, with a conflict between Armenian and Azerbaijan and a de-facto military, another round of rethinking history, self-identification, comparison (or contrast) with Armenians commenced, but this time it was on different precepts. Now Armenians were portrayed in a new quality as “not indigenous people”, as “weeds that must be pulled out”, as a “cancerous tumor” etc.

We shall not dwell on the chronological order of the conflict and all ensuing consequences, but we shall examine the ideology that served as the background against which these events unfolded. Considering the fact that the Soviet press was still censored, nationalistic ideas were instilled in the minds of the people through the ideologist-consumer system on public rallies, in self-published leaflets or through rumors.

The first public rallies were held with anti-Armenian slogans of Khalil Rza Uluturk, the poet of freedom and patriotism:

Original 86

Bakımızı əzizləyək.Əqrəblərdən təmizləyək!Şölə versin bu ləl, mərcanErmənisiz Azərbaycan!

Translation

Let us cherish our Bakuand purge it of scorpions!Let it glim, our ruby of Azerbaijanwithout Armenians!”

The Russian historian Andrey Polonskiy in his article Islam and Establishment of National Self-identity by the 1980-90s writes that “Azerbaijan had a less significant share of relaxed humanism compared to the majority of the Soviet republics. The crisis of Karabakh and increasing level of armenophobia contributed to shaping a well-defined image of the enemy which had a known impact on the character of this new identity (it was originally based on aggression and was victory-oriented)”.87

The tendencies and notions of denigrating Armenians and repudiating completely any contexts, comparisons or benchmarks with them going as far as to deny their very presence in the region were recalled to life and put into practice. The new historiography that swarmed with unabashed falsifications ranked very high in this policy of instilling and propagating armenophobia.