Azeri lie about Khojali tragedy

The Azerbaijani side, including official sources, is trying to resort to new falsifications to trample Armenians in the mud. Using pictures of the pogroms in Kosovo, a Kurdish child killed in a disaster and others, the Azeri side is trying to present them as proofs of the Khojali tragedy.

On February 24, the xocali.net website was presented. The website is designed to expose similar falsification.

In the course of the presentation, the history of distortion of facts by Azerbaijani about the Khojali tragedy of 1992 was presented.

To expose the falsifications and misinformation by Azerbaijani, the Xenophobia Prevention Initiative created the http://xocali.net/ website.

About 20 false pictures have been found. The Azerbaijani side used them to cause the international community to form a negative opinion on Armenians. Azerbaijani are using pictures of Kosovo pogroms of 1999 or presenting the picture of the same dead body with hair and then scalped.

The lists of victims have been falsified by Azerbaijan’s government agencies. Specifically, the name of one person is spelled in different ways as though it were several people. NGO’s exposures are based on Azerbaijani sources.

The Director of the Armenian Genocide Museum – Institute Hayk Demoyan provided the results of his surveys to the http://xocali.net/ website. Specialists from Public Relations and Information Center, RA Presidential Staff, rendered their assistance to the project.

The http://xocali.net/ website has Russian, English and Azerbaijani versions. The French, German and Persian versions will be available soon.

Introduction: the Forgery and the Naming Deception of Fake “Azerbaijan”

The artificially fabricated bogus state of fake “Azerbaijan” was fraudulently counterfeited on Armenian territory in 1918 to forge an extension for the Ottoman Tyranny in the Caucasus with considerable obstinate British interference and later, non-negligible amount of help from the Bolshevik leaders whose red star was rapidly rising.

In pursuit of its delirious pan-Turkist ideology of “uniting” the tribes of Turkic origin from Finland to the Wall of China, the Turkish state has steadfastly clung to its number one priority of the total elimination of an Armenian state of any size, shape or form. The present day (2007) illegal embargo, imposed on the Republic of Armenia since 1992, the very days Armenians gained the upper hand in the “Azeri” perpetrated war on the people of Artsakh (Karabakh/Karabagh) who the “Azeris” claim to be the citizens of fake “Azerbaijan”, is the blatant evidence that the oozing stench of the poisonous cesspool of pan-Turkism is as repugnant today as it was in 1915. The Armenian genocide of 1894-1923 was indeed the result of this same policy.

When the Frankenstein monster was dumped from the putrefied Turco-Bolshevik womb in May 1918, the date when the Mussavat clan formed the very first fake “Azerbaijan” government, the head of the Turkish army that had invaded the Caucasus, Nouri Pasha, half sibling of Enver (one of the architects of the Armenian Genocide), called the newborn nonentity “Azerbaijan” after the northwest region of Iran: the real Azarbaijan (Atrpatakan-Aturpatekan-Aturpayegan). What has happened since comes to confirm the malevolent intentions of the Turks at the time of this naming trickery. Protests followed from some patriotic Iranians including Sheik Mohammad Khiabani who were willing to give up their 2200 year old right to the name Azarbaijan (Atrpatakan) and call their province Azadestan (Azadistan, Land of the Free, Azad = free) in order not to be associated with the newly created fictitious “nation”.

Roughly two decades later they undeservingly attributed the term “Azerbaijani” to themselves, much later still, in a manner of lavishing a term of endearment on oneself, this factitiously constructed “nation” called itself “Azeri”, a nation that has never existed throughout human history. The Turkic leftovers of Oghuz invasions in the region were called Tatars before the transmutation, though only after the region fell under Russian rule in the 19th century and that was a promotion because earlier these tribal nomads distinguished one another from the color of their sheep or their hats.

The instant metamorphosis from Tatar to “Azerbaijani” (later “Azeri”) in late 1930s was not an innocent affair either. This umbrella appellation was cunningly adopted to efface the numerous indigenous ethnicities of the region such as Tats, Talishes, Udins, Lezgins, Zakhors, Luitsis, Avars, Armenians, etc., who were subjected to every imaginable form of discrimination, common Turkish genocidal policy, in front of the indifferent eyes of Soviet leaders. While their numbers showed little increase and in most cases even dropped considerably in subsequent censuses, the number of “Azeris”, i.e. Turks increased exponentially.

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia counts 150,000 Tats in fake “Azerbaijan” in the 1930s (volume 53, page 669, 1937). According to the same source, the language of 30,000 of these was Hebrew and 20,000 spoke Armenian. Unofficial records count 300,000 to 500,000 Talishes, 700,000 Lezgins and 250,000 Kurds in fake “Azerbaijan”.

Below some examples of official “Azeri” “censuses”:

Table 1

From the 1920 document, League of Nations Memorandum on the Application for the Admission of the Republic of Azerbaijan to the League of Nations regarding “The Transcaucasian territory in which the Republic of Azerbaijan has arisen… Its population according to the last Russian statistics, is estimated at 4.615.000 inhabitants, including 3.482.000 Musulman Tartars (not a single “Azeri” H.), 795.000 Armenians, 26.580 Georgians and scattered minorities of Russians, Germans and Jews”. As far as “Azerbaijan’s” “historic” territory “occupying a superficial area of 40.000 square miles, appears to have never formerly constituted a State, but has always been included in larger groups such as the Mongol or Persian and since 1813 the Russian Empire. The name Azerbaijan which has been chosen for the new Republic is also that of the neighbouring Persian province.” (All emphases are mine. H.)

In 1921, after a passionate copulation between Kemal Ataturk and Lenin, under the supervision of that psychopathic, mass-murdering Georgian kinto, Joseph Dzhugashvil, a.k.a. Stalin, Armenia, who had suffered the most horrific tragedy in her history only a few years before, was sacrificed once again, this time on the altar of the newly forged Turco-Bolshevik “brotherhood”.

The Armenian province Nakhijevan was illegally put under “Azerbaijani” control and Kars and beautiful Ani that has been savagely destroyed since, Ardahan, and Surmalu including the most sacred symbol for the Armenians, Mount Ararat that had never been part of Ottoman Tyranny, were offered to Turkey; all in all the package amounted to more than 60% of the internationally recognized pre-Soviet Republic of Armenia of the day - minus the four Armenian vilayets, Van, Karin (Erzerum), Trebizond and Baghesh (Bitlis), granted to Armenia by the treaty of Sèvres according to which the arbitration of the delineation of the border between Armenia and Ottoman Turkey was awarded to Woodrow Wilson who signed his decision on November 22, 1920.

The shameful document for the Turco-Bolshevik treachery is known as the Moscow/Kars treaty of 1921. The first part of this criminal act known as the “Turkish-Soviet friendship and brotherhood” was signed in Moscow on March 16, 1921 between two fraudulent representatives of their respective states without the participation of Armenia. To put some make-up on the revolting face of this monster, the powerless Soviet appointed Armenian side was brought to the table and forced to sign the second part of this perfidy in Turkish occupied Kars on October 13, 1921, in essence regurgitating the points of the Moscow treaty.

The whole shambles is a gross violation of the jus cogens regarding treaties between states, where under no circumstances they are empowered to decide the fate of an absent party. It is utterly illegal because the genocidal bandit Kemal was not the recognized leader of Turkey until 1923; stronger still, he was condemned to death by the Ottoman court, confirmed by the sultan and the mullahs, for conspiring to overthrow the government. The “Union” of Soviet Socialist “Republics” was only recognized in 1924 whereas the Republic of Armenia with its 72000 square kilometers was recognized in 1920 by the international community when the League of Nations had refused to recognize fake “Azerbaijan”.

From League of Nations Journal N17 of the First Assembly (Geneva 1920, Page 139) “The Committee decided that though the request of Azerbaijan to be admitted was in order, it was difficult to ascertain the exact limits of the territory within which the Government of Azerbaijan exercised its authority. Frontier disputes with the neighbouring States did not permit of an exact definition of the boundaries of Azerbaijan. The Committee decided that the provisions of the Covenant did not allow of the admission of Azerbaijan to the League under present circumstances”.

The fake state had more luck with the age old devotion of the British Empire to pan-Turkism. “On …May 28th, the Republic of Azerbaijan was proclaimed at Tiflis. …On the 17 of November, 1918, General Thomson, at the head of British troops, and representing the Allied and Associated Powers, entered Baku …On the 28th December, 1918, …General Thomson proclaimed that the Government of the Republic of Azerbaijan would henceforth constitute the sole regular local government and that the Allies would guarantee their support to it”, according to the abovementioned League of Nations Memorandum where it was nevertheless maintained that the “recognition is only claimed by the Azerbaijan Delegation to have been given de facto and that it was given only by Great Britain, France, Italy and Japan, but was refused by the USA” and “The territory of Azerbaijan having been originally part of the Empire of Russia, the question arises whether the declaration of the Republic in May 1918 and the recognition accorded by the Allied Powers in January 1920 suffice to constitute Azerbaijan de jure a “full self-governing State” within the meaning of Article 1 of the Covenant of the League of Nations”.

In terms of the Soviet state of the time, the only legal document on Artsakh right after sovietization was issued on July 4, 1921, where the members of the Caucasian Bureau in Tbilisi decided to “include Nagorno-Karabakh in the Armenian SSR, and to conduct plebiscite in Nagorno-Karabakh only”. The next day, 5th of July 1921, according to a totally void decision from Moscow, for which its representative Stalin failed to get approval, Artsakh (Karabakh) was illegally annexed to the fabricated counterfeit “Azerbaijan” and was under its unlawful occupation and oppression for the next 70 years. The treacherous Moscow/Kars treaty of 1921 and the subsequent persecutions of Armenians in Nakhijevan and Artsakh may be considered the root cause of the Artsakh movement in 1988 that even by the Admission of the anti-Armenian Gorbachev shook the foundations of the Soviet “Union”.

The Soviet occupation of Iranian Azarbaijan and its propped up puppet Pishevari “government” in the region during WWII clearly show the pan-Turkist intent of naming the fictitious state after the real Azarbaijan. While US and international pressure had its influence in ousting the occupiers and Pishevari’s escape to the USSR, the main reason for the Turco-Bolshevik failure lay in the fact that the people of real Azarbaijan (Atrpatakan) were - and still are - aware of their Iranian origin and did not support the fake “Azerbaijan” conspiracy.

Figure 4

Click on the map for a larger image.

Artificial Pan-Turkist Border Thanks to Reza Shah

Hardly three years old, counterfeit “Azerbaijan” craved more Armenian territory and having the support of the Bolshevik criminals it obtained Nakhijevan and Artsakh (Karabakh) in 1921. The case of Nakhijevan is particularly unique in the sense that it is outside fake “Azerbaijan” territory and the only reason for putting it under “Azerbaijani” control as an “autonomous republic” was to cunningly provide a border between the newly fabricated pan-Turkic state with its progenitor, the Ottoman Tyranny.

In a trip to Turkey in 1934, Reza Shah of Iran became so mesmerized by the genocidal bandit Kemal Ataturk’s superficial modernization that he aided pan-Turkism, perhaps unintentionally, by ceding a beak shaped area from Iranian territory to the Turks to provide a fourteen kilometer border between Turkey and the illegally usurped Nakhijevan, in reality between Turkey and fake “Azerbaijan”.

“Azeri” fabricated one million lie

“Azeri” fabricated one million lie

Along with the 20% occupied “Azeri” territory lie, the bogus figure of one million “Azeri” refugees accompanies the cacophonous whimpering of wolf in sheep skin Tatar charlatans.

Another mercenary, “Solomon Ortiz, a Democrat Congressman and co-chairman of Azerbaijan delegation of the US Congress, said in the House of Representatives that as a result of the invasion of the Armenian Armed Forces in Nogorno-Karabakh and seven regions, 1 million of Azerian people became immigrant and refuge”, from a Turkish source, typos included.

Meanwhile this myth has been demolished even by the Turkophile Council of Europe.

From point B.II.13 of the above webpage: “13. In Azerbaijan three categories of people need to be distinguished: displaced persons who had to flee Karabakh (as a result of a fire they ignited in Sumgait. H.), displaced persons from the districts of the Republic of Azerbaijan that are, strictly speaking, occupied (strictly speaking, they were shelling civilians day and night, therefore the fire had to be extinguished. H.), and Azerbaijanis from Armenia, who are refugees under international humanitarian law (168,000 total, 144,000 of which sold their houses 24,000 received compensation; therefore, under no laws can they be considered refugees. H.). It is impossible to establish the number of people currently concerned with any certainty …These figures can however be updated by statistics provided by UNHCR (for the end of 2004)11 which indicate a figure of 578,545 internally displaced persons and 8,606 refugees”.
Compare, from points B.II.5 and B.II.6 of the same page: “…the number of refugees opting for Armenian citizenship was relatively small. This changed with the enactment in 2000 of a law on persons forcibly displaced from Azerbaijan between 1988 and 1992 who have been naturalised; …As a result, over 15,000 refugees in 2000 and over 16,000 in 2001 acquired citizenship …In terms of numbers of refugees and displaced persons, …These figures can however be updated by more recent statistics (end of 2004) provided by UNHCR4 which indicate a figure of 235,235 refugees.” (All emphases are mine. H.)

Eight thousand six hundred and six “Azeri” refugees give and take for 235,235 forcibly displaced Armenian refugees and that from a pro-Turkish source!

It’s not just the inflated number that reeks of fraud; it is the sniveling of “Azeri” authorities about the wretched conditions of these, whenever they get the chance to spew it at the international community, whereas they threaten to wipe Armenia off the map with the help of arms bought with their billions of oil dollars, on a daily basis and from the highest officials to every outlet of internal mass media. Instead of housing the displaced “Azeris” in up to 118,000 houses plundered from the Armenians who were kicked out through acts of genocide from 1988 to 1992, official Baku and Co. parade their nonexistent refugees in front of the world to cash in world pity.

I. Of 420,000 out of a total of some 484,000 inhabitants who left the seven liberated districts 45,000 returned to “Azeri” controlled areas of Aghdam and Fizuly, all according to “Azeri” sources, data presented to the Council of Europe in May 1997. Thus 375,000 left the liberated territories.

II. The number of “Azeris” who left Armenia for Azerbaijan sold or exchanged their houses or received the equivalent of 110 million US dollars in all, as compensation for houses damaged in the devastating earthquake of December 7, 1988.

III. A total of 40,000 “Azeris” left NKR for “Azerbaijan”.

Table 4

Grand total: 583,000 displaced “Azeris” (not one million), as a consequence of “Azeri” perpetrated war, less than 8 % of the total population of “Azerbaijan”. Isn’t it the Turks that constantly cry “It was war… people died” when one mentions the Armenian Genocide?

Before the genocidal acts reached Artsakh proper, the total Armenian population of Artsakh with its deceitfully severed northern regions, counted 268,000, by the end of 1988.

When in 1923 the “Azeri” usurpers were given the free hand by Bolshevik bandits to falsify the borders of Artsakh, they left several densely Armenian populated areas out of the “autonomous” Nagorno Karabakh Oblast, namely the historic Armenian province of Gardman-Hyots region. This was the continuation of the same genocidal policy for which fake “Azerbaijan” was faked in the first place.

As a result of the pogroms in Gandzak in November 1988 the whole Armenian population was expelled and by means of the Ring Operation with the help of the Soviet Russian army from April to May 1991, 24 Armenian settlements were ethnically “cleansed” and completely occupied.

Table 5

Proportionally speaking, Armenians have had to put up with far higher number of refugees not to speak of the fact that unlike in the case of the “Azeris”, none ever received any compensation. Around 33% of the entire Armenian population of Artsakh and 100% of Armenians all over fake “Azerbaijan” including usurped Nakhijevan were brutally expelled and lost all they had to the claws of the murderous scavengers.

The population of fake “Azerbaijan” is over 8 million according to “Azeri” data, this in contrast with some 3 million in Armenia and Artsakh. Even if the “one million” myth could hypothetically be considered, it would still be less than the proportion of Armenian real refugees.

“Azeri” fabricated 20% myth

“Azeri” fabricated 20% myth
The constant sniveling about the 20% “historic Azeri” territories occupied by Armenia is an utterly blatant lie because it includes the area of NKAO, the autonomous Mountainous Karabakh region that was never part of an independent “Azerbaijan”. Neither Artsakh nor Nakhijevan were part of fake “Azerbaijan” when it was being counterfeited on Armenian territory in 1918 and were only treacherously snatched from Armenia following illegal dealings between Lenin and Kemal in 1921 when the already Sovietized fake “Azerbaijan” did not exist as an independent state. On December 10, 1991, 99.89% of the people of Artsakh voted for independence in a legal (even in Soviet terms) referendum. As a result, two independent states emerged on Soviet “Azerbaijani” territory after the fall of the USSR.

Counting the 4,400 square km former NKAO area as “occupied Azeri” territory means that people of Artsakh have occupied their own land. The remaining liberated territories, part of historic Armenian province of Artsakh, amount to 7,086 square km which roughly corresponds to 8% of the area of fake “Azerbaijan”. Even if we were to count the former NKAO area the total would not exceed 13% of fake “Azerbaijan”.

The lie also keeps silent about the fact that of the seven liberated districts, two were partially freed: Armenians control only 35% of Aghdam and 25% of Fizuly, but the impostors cite the entirety of the seven regions being taken by Armenians. On the other hand they, along with their western allies and their media shut up concerning the fact that “Azeri” aggressors have usurped and ethnically “cleansed” Shahoomian and parts of Martakert and Martuni regions of Artsakh totaling 750 square km, i.e. 17% of Mountainous Karabakh proper (for 8% supposed “Azeri” territory), and the Artzvashen district of the Republic of Armenia. This point is not represented in the shamefully debasing “peace” paper put together by the so-called OSCE Minsk Group.

Once more: the seven districts surrounding Artsakh had to be liberated to establish a security buffer, a consequence of “Azeri” actions using the region as a launch pad for air raids, firing Grad rockets, long-range artillery shelling using even ship guns, all of it against people they shamelessly call citizens of “Azerbaijan” who in case of “returning” the territories (just like that!) will “enjoy” the highest level of autonomy. The question arises, how a generation of Armenians who grew up or were born since 1991, could voluntarily choose to exchange their deservedly earned, de facto independence for genocidal Turkic yoke?

Table 3

* Only 25% of Fizuly is under Armenian control therefore 25% of the population of 100,000 has been presented in the table.

** Only 35% of Aghdam is under Armenian control therefore 35% of the population of 158,000 has been presented in the table.

The maps presented in this section show the situation as is where on the “Azeri” constructed map, apart from its inaccuracy in terms of the shapes of borders, the picture has been completely distorted to somehow convince the world that Armenia holds 20% of “Azeri” territory, a percentage that is regularly blown further up to a quarter of “Azerbaijan” as well. Not for nothing have the Turks usually been regarded as weak in reasoning, in Turkish logic 8 = 20.

Incidentally, while the 20% figure has been grabbed out of the air, and keeping in mind that the area of historic Armenia is about 400,000 square kilometers, more or less ten times larger that today’s Armenia including Artsakh, it unintentionally (most likely) corresponds with the percentage of Armenian territory that fake “Azerbaijan” occupies. Indeed, it is counterfeit “Azerbaijan” that has been fabricated on 20% Armenian land which it unlawfully occupies and desecrates, not vice versa.

More Lies from a Warmongering Loser

The insignificant Khojaly incident scam is indeed the most grotesquely repulsive and widespread of the “Azeri” lies in relation with their miserable defeat in the war they perpetrated against Armenians in the 1990s. It is also the only “trump” (with a “little” help from their western admirers of course) in terms of accusing the Armenians of an atrocity that neither happened the way the impostors picture it, nor, whatever it was, did it touch the “Azeris”, the whole tragedy being the mutilation and desecration of about thirty four Armenian hostages performed well inside “Azeri” controlled areas days after their butchering, photos and videos of whose dismembered bodies, mainly taken by the “Azeri” reporter who was murdered after he found out the truth, were abused to bring the Armenians down to their genocidal level.

Yet it is not the only brazen fabrication of the masters of hypocrisy. There is, on one hand the incessant howling and whimpering of the whole pack from the highest governmental level to the “intellectuals”, students and the “man” in the street spewing hate rants, declaring war and demanding the obliteration of Armenians to get Artsakh “back”, on the other hand their wailing and sniveling in front of the world about the “loss” of 20% of “ancient Azeri territory”, one million “refugees” and the “genocide” they “suffered” in the hands of bad Armenians.

It is truly lamentable that in our day and age the states pretending to be the advocates of freedom, human rights and the rights of people for self-determination are totally deaf and blind to these warmongering announcements and monstrosities regularly committed by Turks against Armenians yet their sensitivity to and unconditional approval of these blatant lies are always guaranteed.

If the so-called free world blindly buys the foul statements of the Turks, there should be no surprise when the Muslim world reacts sympathetically to these lies normally without objective examination of the history of the issue and the irrefutable data that exposes the thinly disguised “Azeri” fabrications.

The dirty and dangerous religion card has never been played by the Armenians against all the calamity the Turkic abomination has brought their nation and civilization, even when during the whole Turkish domination the utter discrimination and dehumanization was justified according to the Islamic doctrine. The Christian nations under the Ottoman yoke were considered mere cattle that deserved no justice and could be treated by a Muslim of any rank anyway they chose. During any period of massacre and deportation – and these were regularly carried out for centuries – cries of “Gavur (infidel)”, “where’s your savior now?” or “accept Islam or die” were typically let out by the frenzied assailants.

Yet not all Islamic states treated their non-Muslim citizens in similar manner. Particularly the sheltering of Armenian “deportees” by desert Arabs in the dark days of the Armenian Genocide, the warm reception of the survivors in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt and Iran and the utmost respect they enjoyed afterwards have obliged the Armenians so deeply that they will be eternally thankful to the Arab and Iranian peoples. The Armenians in their turn have done their best to be useful to their new home and have participated in its progress in all fields.

And these blood****ing defilers of the Armenians cannot hold back their ghastly, inhuman desires and after centuries long use and abuse of these peaceful people who for thousands of years minded their business in their home, the usurpation of 90% of historic Armenian territory, the physical extermination of the indigenous owners of the same, the destruction of the spiritual heritage spread all over the land that confirmed the ownership thereof, the undeserved appropriation of their culture, the denial of all of that and the projection of all their vices on the Armenians, have not shown the dignity to reciprocally refrain from exploiting the filthy religion card in these days of rising Christian/Muslim misunderstanding and antagonism.

No wonder: since the Turk has not yet acquired, among others, the human characteristic known as shame, they would also throw this ugly card on the table and unabashedly misuse it to win sympathy from Islamic countries.

On every occasion of gathering of representatives of Muslim nations including the Islamic Congress, the lies about 20% occupied “Azeri” land, one million refugees, Khojaly scam and the Armenian “aggression” against “poor”, Muslim “Azeris” are regurgitated ad nauseam, resolutions are passed condemning Armenia without the chance for the Armenians (usually not allowed in such meetings) to present their case for an objective scrutiny of the affair.

For instance, the state of Pakistan that because of its nonexistent history clings solely to its Islamic identity has refused to recognize the Armenian state and no relations exist between the two countries. Fortunately this does not apply to the majority of Islamic countries that have warm relations with Armenia and in turn the Armenian state immensely values this friendship which comes from the subsequent years of the genocide in case of Middle-Eastern Arab countries and indeed, millennia old ties from days before Islam and Christianity with Mesopotamian peoples and especially Iranians.

So when did this chronic Turkish mythomania start and what would happen to Turks if they let all the lies go and accepted who they are, what they are and where they came from?

To usurp the caliphate which according to Sunni Islam was meant to be exclusively in the hands of the Quraysh tribe, the clerics of sultan Selim I (1512–1520) justified the transgression by changing the law thus: since Selim had eliminated all rivals including the Abbasid Al-Mutawakkil III and the Mamluk dynasty, the caliphate should pass to those who had the right of sword rather that of bloodline. Enter fake caliphate.

The Armenian historians have noted that whenever the Turks “conquered” a region in Armenia, they immediately sent their agents to the area who would first of all change the place names, usually by replacing the name with some similar sounding, yet irrelevant, Turkish term or rename it whichever way they chose. Compare the recent changing of Mount Ararat into Agri Dag, Akhtamar into Ag Damar (Turkish for white vein (!)) or Anatolia (Greek for east) into Anadolu (Turkish for land of many mothers (!)), etc.

The most loathsome and tasteless of all is the obliteration of Armenia into “Eastern Anatolia”. Anatolia means east in Greek which in itself is a meaningless term. “Eastern Anatolia” would signify eastern east, i.e. total nonsense. The other name Asia Minor, coming from the Romans, is a more meaningful appellation for the peninsula that ends at the 38th eastern meridian. The Armenian Highland starts from there eastwards, thus, where Asia Minor or Anatolia ends.

It is truly woeful that even educated scholars have plunged into this genocidal Turkish pitfall and parrot this odious term when talking about Armenia and the Armenian Genocide. Seems the not so logically competent Turk is wittier than meets the eye after all.

Another lie concerned the underestimation of the Armenian population and exaggeration of that of Muslims. Of course, here they cunningly used the religion factor since a very small percentage of those Muslims were Turks. Here the census was not conducted by counting individuals, rather the number of families was considered. Armenian historians note that traditional Armenian families were large, usually having more than 10, sometimes even 25 and 30 members. The Turkish clerks multiplied the number of Armenian families by 5 and the Muslims by 10 and higher. This way they got a distorted number of population proportion, a lie which they misuse until today.

In addition, most of the times the term Ermeni, the Turkish transliteration for Armenian, was being interpreted as not solely meaning Armenian, but another generic term meaning Christian! This way a false Muslim “majority” was created meaning Turkish and the largest millet in the whole “empire” was gradually being eliminated.

We saw that Turkey’s offspring copied all the methods of lying, genocide and denial from its progenitor and that the artificially manufactured blanket term “Azerbaijani” in 1930s was a devious process to eliminate all non-Turkish ethnicities of the region, the usual lies that with the help of powerful allies, especially the Anglo-Saxon world and Israel, have become so current they are even believed by supposedly neutral or pro-Armenian intellectuals, political analysts, reporters, etc.

The most usual tactic of these pro-Turkish channels consists of giving the whole issue the outward look of equality between the parties. This point is discussed in more detail in the section Fabricated History to Suit a Fabricated “Nation”, suffice be said that the fable of an ancient “Azerbaijan” that engulfed the whole of present day fake “Azerbaijan”, Armenia and Dagestan plus parts of Turkish occupied Armenia, plus real Azarbaijan (Atrpatakan), plus the whole of Median empire, plus wherever the whim of the fabricators takes them at the moment of their creative outburst, is valid currency among pro-Turkish sources that comfortably utter the fallacious terms “Northern Azerbaijan/Southern Azerbaijan”, the “decimation” of the “ancient “Azeri” nation” in two by the evil Russians in the first quarter of the 19th century as a result of Golestan/Turkmenchai treaties and gobbledygook of the sort.

Besides the Khojaly scam the most frequently repeated “Azeri” lies in relation with their pathetic defeat in a war they themselves unleashed are: the so-called 20% “Azeri” territories occupied by Armenian “aggressors” who were doing nothing but defending their homes that were being bombarded from all points surrounding Artsakh, and the myth of one million “Azeri refugees”, double the number of “Azeris” that as a consequence of the war they started mostly sold their houses and fled.

Khojaly Appendix

Quotes from independent sources including “Azeri” reporters, survivors, even their presidents Mutalibov and Heydar Aliev, have confirmed that the whole thing was nothing more than a smear campaign against the Armenians. The unscrupulous Thomas Goltz also licked up the filth he had thrown at the Armenians, this time blaming the media created, classic “enemy” of the west, the Russians.

Heydar Aliyev, (Aliev I, the founder of the only “Azeri” dynasty in history, succeeded after his death by his warmongering whelp Ilham) the president of fake “Azerbaijan” from 1993 to 2003 admitted in April 1992, just a month after the insignificant Khojaly incident that “The bloodshed will do us good. We shouldn't interfere in the course of events”. (Bilik-Duniasi News Agency)

Ayaz Mutalibov the “Azeri” president in time of the event that led to his fall said in an interview with Nezavisimaya Gazeta: “however, the Armenians had left a corridor for the escape of the people.” (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, April 2, 1992) And in another in Novoye Vremia Magazine he confirmed his statement made nine days earlier: “It was evident that some people had organized the shooting for shifting the power in Azerbaijan”. (Novoye Vremia, March 6, 2001)

Elman Mamedov, the mayor of Khojaly: “We knew that the corridor was left for the exit of the peaceful people”. (Russkaya Misl 03.03.1992, quoting Bakinskie Rabochiy newspaper)

M. Safaroghli, an Azerbaijani journalist admits: “Khojaly was located in an important strategic position. Losing control over Khojaly would mean a political fiasco for Mutalibov”. (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, February, 1993)

Arif Yunusov, “Azeri” human rights activist thought: “The officials in Baku did not try to hide their awareness, including Ayaz Mutalibov the president of Azerbaijan …the offense on Khojaly was not a surprise” (Ogoniok Magazine, N 14-15, 1992). “The town itself and its population are willingly sacrificed for the political purposes, i.e., prevent the National Front of Azerbaijan from coming to power”. (Zerkalo, July, 1992)

R. Gajiyev, member of the Operating Committee of Aghdam Branch of NFA (National Front of Azerbaijan): “We could have helped the people of Khojaly because we had the resources and means. However, the authorities of the republic wanted to demonstrate to the people of Azerbaijan that they are not able to do so and ask for the assistance of the CIS Army and with the help of the latter also neutralize the opposition”. (Izvestia, April, 1992)

Tamerlan Karayev, the former Chairman of the Supreme Council of “Azerbaijan” testifies: “The tragedy was perpetrated by the Azeri authorities”, in particular, “some of the top officials”. (Mukhtalifat, April 28, 1992)

Megapolis-Express wrote: “It is impossible not to admit that if the National Front of Azerbaijan had in fact defined far-reaching goals, it succeeded in addressing them. Mutalibov is compromised and forced out of his post, the international community is in shock, the Azeris and their brotherly Turks believe in the so-called “genocide of the Azerbaijani people in Khojaly”.” (Megapolis-Express, N17, 1992)

Letter from Eurasia: The Hidden Russian Hand by Thomas Goltz (the scambug with a Turkish wife who invented the Khojaly hoax)
Foreign Policy, No. 92 (autumn, 1993), pp. 92-116
doi:10.2307/1149147
This article consists of 25 page(s).

Far from admission to forgery or an attempt to silence his guilty conscience (if he has any) the villain tries to implicate the Russians in the perpetration of the alleged carnage. He does not miss a chance to degrade Armenia to a weak puppet of Russia and attributes the success of the Armenians to ruthless Russian mercenaries alone. Interestingly enough he shuts his muzzle regarding the Afghan mujahedin, Al Qaeda and Chechen terrorists, Ukrainian and other Slavonic mercenaries, etc., used by the “Azeris” against the Armenians nor does he want to remember the Ring Operation where the Russian army helped the “Azeris” to force the peaceful inhabitants of 24 Armenian villages out of their homes, the true beginning of “Azeri” war on Artsakh, a full year before the Khojaly incident scam.

“Finding a smoking gun is difficult, though there are bullet casings lying all around. The most celebrated case to date is that of six Russian nationals who were picked up by Azerbaijani security forces while on a surveillance mission in Karabakh in September 1992… They said they had nothing personal against the citizens of Azerbaijan, but rather had been tempted by cash bonuses offered by Armenians and were fighting in FOREIGN POLICY Karabakh for nothing less than the love of money.

The personal histories of the six, too, seem identical: Sons of typical working-class homes scattered across the Russian steppe, they were all drafted in late 1991, just as the USSR was falling apart and morale in the former Soviet armed forces was at an all-time low. Desertions--especially by non-Russians---grew to an all-time high. I saw many such youths pass through Balm during the late fall of 1991 and spring of 1992, making their way from units in Karabakh to their homes in Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Ukraine.

Finding a smoking gun is difficult, though there are bullet casings lying all around. But these six were Spetmaz, not deserters from their units in Karabakh; they had formed a new unit to fight there after having departed their usual barracks on the base of the Russian 7th Army in Yerevan. It is at that point that the connections become interesting but murky.

According to the testimony of the six before and during their trial, their unit was commanded by a Captain Katanja, reportedly a relative of Major General Nevorov, second in command of the 7th Army. The 7th's chief then was General Theodor Rayut. Rayut is now in charge of all Russian forces based in the Caucasus; his headquarters are in Georgia--a republic currently beset by its own problems with "rogue" Russian soldiers.

According to the trial testimony of the men, in the spring of 1992 Captain Katanja introduced the recruits to a Colonel Jena, a Russian Spetmaz officer who had served in the 366th Motorized Rifle Regiment that had been based in Stepanakert. Both Azerbaijan and Armenia accused that regiment of taking sides according to the political winds blowing from Moscow during the early days of the Karabakh conflict.

The 366th was officially withdrawn from Karabakh after a massacre in the Karabakh town of Khodjali, on February 26, 1992, when up to 1,000 Azeri residents were killed (according to which proof? H.) and other Azeri civilians effectively cleansed from the disputed area (not a word about the Grads that were being fired from Khojaly destroying hospitals, kindergartens, schools and houses, nor Sumgait, Baku, Gandzak, Martunashen, Getashen, Shahoomian, Maragha, etc., massacres, nor mention of 400,000 Armenians “cleansed” from all over “Azerbaijan” before the “Azeris” instigated the war. H.). The Khodjali massacre was a turning point in the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, marking the end of what had largely been a guerrilla struggle between inimical neighbors and the beginning of something more like a conventional war between armies. But many points remain unanswered---especially the role of the 366th.

A half-Armenian, half-German photographer traveling with Armenian units on patrol the night of February 25-26, 1992, told me that the participation of dozens of tanks and armored personnel carriers (APCs) of the 366th in the attack on Khodjali was a surprise, if a welcome one for the Armenians; two Turkmen deserters from the 366th I interviewed (why only Turkmen? H.), who escaped to the Azeri town of Agdam with survivors from Khodjali, likewise confirmed that their former unit spearheaded the attack.

Even more bizarre was the grisly aftermath, when fleeing civilians were cut down and then mutilated in the no-man's land between the two sides (you rascal! They were mutilated after February 29 by the “Azeris” to quench Turkish sadism and to prevent their bodies from being recognized, because they were slaughtered Armenian hostages. H.). The Azeris, quite naturally, accused the Armenian forces of perpetrating a massacre; the Armenians replied that their forces had merely flushed the Azeris out of Karabakh and that the subsequent massacre of civilians must have occurred at the hands of the Azeris themselves.

While horrific brutality and the cynical sacrifice of one's own people by both sides (??? H.) are hardly strangers to the Karabakh conflict (are you talking from your rectum or defecating from your muzzle? H.), there is a third possibility: that the massacres and mutilations in the no-man's land were carried out by others determined to make Khodjali a point of no return in the escalation of hatred between the two peoples (aren’t you withholding information, scumbag? Weren’t you present on both shows on February 29 when there were no mutilated bodies and March 2 when they were the 32 or so mutilated corpses of the Armenian hostages? H.).

The evidence for that interpretation is thin, but tantalizing (so why on earth are you concealing vital evidence? H.): Two days after the massacre, Azerbaijani authorities managed to acquire a Russian military helicopter to ferry international journalists to the killing grounds. Before they could set down among hillocks littered with dead bodies, they were engaged by another military helicopter and driven away under fire.

Neither the Azerbaijani nor the Armenian forces operating in the area were known to control such aircraft at the time. So what is left is the strange conclusion that Russians were shooting at--or playing with--other Russians in the sky, possibly to prevent the passengers aboard the first craft from observing the activities of the rogue Russians on the ground. After Khodjali, the 366th was officially removed from Karabakh, but many of its soldiers and officers--as well as most of its equipment--stayed behind.”

Khojaly Incident

Khojaly- Incident
The genocidal acts of the “Azeris” in Sumgait, Baku, Gandzak, Maragha, Shamkhor, Shamakhi, Karintak, Shushi, Hadrut, Getashen, Berdadzor, Sheki, Voskepar, Zakatali, Chardakhli, Shahoomian, the “Ring” operation, etc., from 1988 to 1992 that drove over 400,000 Armenians out of their homes which were appropriated by the “Azeri” plunderers are conveniently “forgotten” by the Turks and the West, yet a totally insignificant wartime incident is blown out of proportion and attains the magnitude of the greatest intergalactic tragedy in the history of the universe…

The insignificant Khojaly incident scam is the sole “winning” card in the possession of a losing “Azeri” aggressor after they failed to shake the resolve of the Armenians of Artsakh to rid themselves of the destructive Turco-Tatar yoke, unlawfully imposed upon them for seventy years by Bolshevik and Kemalist rogues after their bestial, blood drinking orgy that chopped off 60% of the Republic of Armenia of the day (minus the four vilayets to be returned to the Armenians according to Woodrow Wilson’s arbitration) and offered it to the Turks without negotiating with the landlord.

Despite genocidal acts and the subsequent all-out war instigated by the “Azeri” army, the Armenian volunteers defended their home and succeeded in repelling the aggressors determined to wipe Artsakh from its millennia old Armenian population. The racist rant spewed by the then “Azeri” president Elchibey (Elçibey) in June 1992, that if there were any Armenians left in Karabakh by October they could hang him in the central square of Baku, is the proof that the extermination of the Armenians was minutely planned by the highest ranks in “Azerbaijani” government.

Fabricating a hoax that would transgress every limit of tastelessness seemed the most effective measure to the desperate “Azeri” losers to stop the successes of the Armenians in liberating a small part of their Turkish occupied territory from the genocidal Turks. Suddenly the violent all devouring wolf became an innocent lamb that was being wronged by the same people who they were shelling with Grad rockets on a daily basis.

Starting in 1991 the “Azeris” were using Khojaly as a launching pad for artillery and rocket fire on nearby NKR capital Stepanakert, indiscriminately targeting civilians. Hundreds of innocent men, women and children had been killed and wounded and schools, hospitals and houses were destroyed as the result of this totally neglected war crime and Artsakh airport, vital for communication with the outside world and the delivery of humanitarian aid, had become inaccessible as long as Khojaly was under “Azeri” control.

A matter of life and death for Artsakh, Khojaly had to be liberated and in January 1992 decision was taken to neutralize the sadistic “Azeri” killing base. Using every means of informing the civilians, including TV, radio and even loudspeakers, the Artsakh authorities warned the “Azeris” of the coming counter attack and a humanitarian corridor was opened to let the civilians pass through which was duly used. The then president of fake “Azerbaijan” Ayaz Mutalibov and the mayor of Khojaly Elman Mamedov have acknowledged the awareness of “Azeri” leadership and the military base in Khojaly of this fact in diverse interviews at the time.

On the night of February 25, 1992 Artsakh forces started the operation and after a mere five hours they had conquered and neutralized the Khojaly base. Besides dozens of enemy combatants, the collateral loss of 11 civilians was also the low price the “Azeri” side had to pay before they had to give up their genocidal fun. Later, the remaining civilians were handed over to “Azeris” and the POWs exchanged for their Armenian counterparts.

Along with the civilians who used the corridor, a group of “Azeri” soldiers also fled to Aghdam (Agdam). On the way they provoked skirmishes with the defenders of the Armenian village of Nakhijevanik which resulted in deaths on both parties.

On February 29, 1992 journalists were flown to the “Azeri” controlled area where images of dead bodies were photographed and videotaped. On a second visit, on March 2, 1992 another batch of journalists examined the bodies and because of a blunder on the “Azeri” part to control the identities of the journalists, at least two of them who had been on the first visit noticed that some of the bodies were severely mutilated.

The Czech journalist Yana Mazalova was one of those on both flights and noticed the considerable alteration of the bodies on the second visit where only two days after the first demonstration, Turkish corpse art had been performed to bring the Armenians down to their genocidal level in front of the cameras and in the pro-Turkish western media controlled eyes of world.
The independent “Azeri” TV journalist Chingiz Mustafayev (Fuat-oghli) who had filmed the bodies on both visits realized the malevolent intent and led his own investigation. He reported his conclusion of the “Azeri” falsifications of the affair to “DR-Press”, a News Agency in Moscow. Soon afterwards, he was mysteriously killed near Aghdam, an area still under full “Azeri” control.
In his report Chingiz Mustafayev had stated that he had not seen a single dead body in Khojaly and only a couple dozen dead “Azeri” soldiers near Aghdam killed in the Nakhijevanik skirmishes were filmed on the first visit on February 29.

After the second visit on March 2, 1992, where they had noticed the mutilations Chingiz Mustafayev informed the “Azeri” president Mutalibov about the changes. Mutalibov warned him he could risk his life if he imparted the information. The prophesy came true.

It is especially remarkable that the main culprit in spreading the lie of a thousand dead without proof, the rascal, Thomas Goltz was present on both visits and withheld the information regarding the alteration of the corpses. This is criminal behavior that in the least should have cost him his job, yet the miscreant still holds his position and is busy earning his miserable life writing misleading articles.

Regarding the number of civilian casualties, the “Azeri” misinformation hasn’t stopped blowing up the figures that increase every year. It appears Turks that have a high population growth rate, breed and – since one has to be of a certain age to be able to procreate - grow up faster when they are dead. How else can one explain the fact that the 11 dead civilians soon became 100, then 163, later moving the 6 just a tiny bit to the left, the figure grew to 613, soon rounded up to 1000, sometimes later double-rounded to 2000, and presently there’s talk of 2.5 million “Azeri” victims of “genocide” by the Armenians.

Interestingly, Turks also cite 2.5 million casualties of “genocide” by the Armenians during WWI, when the entire Armenian nation was being driven to the desert to roast. If Armenians had the supernatural power to kill 5 million Turks, then one wonders why no Christian Armenians live in all Turkish occupied Armenian territories. Since Turks constantly diminish the number of the Armenians living under Ottoman Tyranny and beyond bringing the number down to one million, 800,000, 600,000, 300,000 to null to claim that hardly any Armenians were killed during that period and since there are absolutely no third party accounts of killings of millions of Turks, one wonders how on earth such a “small” bunch of people could muster up a genocide machine to destroy 5 million without anyone noticing it.

But the reducing of the number of the Armenians is bad for the Turks because the lower the number of Armenians in early 20th century, the bigger the crime, since according to countless sources the Armenians were the most numerous nation under the bloody rule of the Ottoman bandits as attested by Armenian historians, Turkish records (Risales) and European travelers.

Jean Baptiste Tavernier, who traveled six times in the East in the period of 1632-1668 notes: “the land stretching from Tokat to Tabriz is almost exclusively inhabited by Christians and this region used to be part of the Armenian Kingdom ...That's why it's not surprising to come across fifty Armenians for every single Muslim”. Also, in his official report for the Ottoman Ministry of Interior prepared in 1778-1780, Reis Effendi states: “the Armenians are the most numerous reaya-population in the Ottoman State”.

The scam would not have much effect if it wasn’t for the support of certain scoundrels who wouldn’t lose a night’s sleep if their deceitful acts smeared the Armenian nation, bringing them down to the level of Turkish barbarians who have been drinking Armenian blood for the last nine centuries on proper Armenian homeland and beyond.

To appease his Turkish wife, the dishonest scambug Thomas Goltz had a big role in fanning the stink of Khojaly hoax that has spread all over the internet creating the false image of Armenians capable of Turkic savagery. His reports to the western media where out of nowhere he made up the one thousand casualties figure, ALL of them “Azeri” civilians and ALL killed by the bad Armenians, provided the push that started the avalanche of the ever swelling lies. In addition, the videotapes of poor Chingiz Mustafayev have been abused to provoke animosity against the Armenians.

The issue that has been deliberately ignored is that there were 47 Armenian hostages in Aghdam among them women and children, of who only 13 came back. The remaining 34 have been missing. Another issue is that the witnesses testify that the dead were shot from a close range. The “Azeri” side also does not specify the place of the death of the alleged hundreds of civilians.

The Armenians could in no way have the possibility of killing the civilians from so close a distance in an “Azeri” controlled area, unless they had rifles with a barrel longer than ten kilometers or so.

One of the countless alleged western sources cited by the Turks goes: “Channel 4 News at 19.00, Monday 2 March 1992: 2 French journalists have seen 32 corpses of men, women and children in civilian clothes. Many of them shot dead from their heads as close as less than 1 meter”.

The number 32 roughly corresponds to the figure of 34 missing Armenian hostages and knowing that the “Azeris” claim about 20,000 dead during the whole conflict, here we get to the main motive why this particular event has been forced to attract the most attention. The reason the “Azeris” emphasize this incident is the ruthless mutilation and disfiguring of certain corpses, a despicable act that was committed after the 29th of February visit of the journalists.

That this atrocity was carried out by the “Azeris” themselves is beyond question. Chingiz Mustafayev found out, reported it and lost his life. A hypothetical assumption that the Armenians could have done it will have to suppose that knowing the falsehoods already spreading against them - even before the start of the operation - regarding the non-event, to make it look even worse for themselves, they were outrageously crazy risking their lives sneaking deep inside enemy controlled area sometime between end of February 29 and first of March to perform ritualistic acts exclusively in the line of cultureless nomadic savages and return to their posts without being noticed by any guards of the corpses or other soldiers controlling such a strategically important border.

The unquestionable fact is that fearing the butchered 34 Armenian hostages, whose innocent bodies were thrown onto the pile of “Azeris” to help fabricate their “genocide” thesis, would be recognized sooner or later, they engaged in their ancestral ways of artistic expression and merry making mutilating and desecrating the Armenian victims beyond recognition. Here lies the real tragedy of Khojaly: unsurprisingly it is the Armenians who got butchered and carved, yet once again the truth is twisted upside down. The murderous Turk becomes the victim of their victims.

The pictures of dismembered Armenian hostages taken by a murdered “Azeri” journalist with a grain of integrity coupled with falsities produced by scum like Thomas Goltz have succeeded in portraying the genocide perpetrating “Azeri” wolves as sheep mistreated by Armenian “aggressors” who did nothing but defend their lives, an unforgivable crime according to Turks that won’t settle with less than docile Armenians bowing their necks to Turkish scimitars.

Let’s imagine that this insignificant event happened according to the “Azeri” hoaxers. Is it not nauseatingly sardonic to compare this trivial wartime incident to the meticulously planned, total annihilation of the Armenian nation in 90% of Armenian homeland spanning at least five centuries but carried out most demonically in the periods between 1894 and 1923? Could the alleged killing of 11 Turkish “civilians”, as a result of a five hour military operation to disable the rocket launchers in Khojaly that were shelling the civilians of Artsakh day and night, amount to the monstrosities the Turkish kind inflicted on the Armenian nation ever since their granpaws and grandclaws trampled the civilizations west of the Caspian into mounds of rubble?

Such impudence would be a mere understatement to the Turkish brazenness. The following half-literate discharge comes from a Turkish source quoting an American senator, Don Barton: “Although from time to time, it has been called on the Congressmen to recognize “the so-called Armenian genocide” which has no ground, there has been even one word regarding to the Armenian massacre in Hocali (Khojaly H.).”

Unfortunately many uninformed Armenians have also been influenced by the gigantic amount of rubbish – mainly regurgitation of the same filth - that has been spread everywhere and especially on the World Wide Web. Search every Armenian forum on the internet and you will certainly come across numerous threads dealing with this unimportant wartime incident, either started by intruding Turks that think they can break into everywhere there are Armenians even in cyber space, or by an Armenian who without having studied non-Turkish sources has bought the hoax, whereas the hellish ordeal of hundreds of thousands of innocent Armenians going through a bloody house to house slaughter hundreds of kilometers away from Artsakh or Yerevan, before any war started and only in return for peaceful, civilized demonstrations, everywhere in fake “Azerbaijan” are totally ignored even on the Armenian forums.

Personally, I have rarely stumbled upon a forum thread about for instance, the horrific genocide in Maragha, a village north of Artsakh where only unarmed peaceful people lived and contrary to Khojaly it was not used as a military base. The barbarities were witnessed on location by Baroness Caroline Cox: ““Azeri” soldiers sawed off the heads of 45 villagers, burnt others, took 100 women and children away as hostages, looted and set fire to all the homes, and left with all the pickings from the looting”. This deliberate act of ethnic extermination is far worse than the insignificant Khojaly incident scam, yet it has not received one millionth of the attention of the latter, even by the Armenians themselves. Needless to say there is no Turkish website of any sort where the “Azeri” barbarities are scrutinized or a grain of remorse or self-criticism has been spent on these atrocities.

The vileness of the “Azeri” delirium has crossed every boundary of the logical where one doesn’t know whether to laugh or to wonder. The head of the “Azeri” Diaspora – yes, they have aped that as well! – has demanded that a monument be erected in Israel to commemorate the “Azeri holocaust (!)” Imagine the embarrassment of the Israeli sensitivity to the exclusive use of this term regarding the claim for its application to a non-event allegedly occurred during a five hour military operation…

The Khojaly lie has grown so big that even objective western commentators have fallen into the trap. In an article about the Armenian Genocide, a distinguished British journalist known for his pro-Armenian stance has recently degraded the whole Artsakh movement to a crude act of retaliation by the Armenians to get even with the Turks for the Armenian Genocide. It is astonishing that such a seemingly informed intellectual has never heard of state planned genocidal acts of the “Azeris” in Sumgait, Baku, Gandzak, Maragha, Shushi, Getashen, Shahoomian, etc., mostly perpetrated before the all-out war and the shelling of innocent civilians during the “Azeri” aggression, and believes the lies of low-life hoaxers such as Thomas Goltz, Thomas de Waal, Brenda Shaffer, Sabina Frazer, Svante E. Cornell and dregs of similar caliber.

Azerbaijani make up Khojalu myth to conceal own offenses

Exclusive interview by Ara Saghatelyan, Director of the Centre of Information and Public Relations of the staff of the President of Armenia, to Novosti-Armenia agency.

Novosti-Armenia – Mr. Saghatelyan, each year days of memory of victims of Armenian pogroms in Sumgait are marked in Armenia and worldwide. Along this, the Azerbaijani propaganda is attempting to promote anti-Armenian xenophobic campaign branded “Justice to Khojaly”. What is your position on this?

Saghatelyan – In a vain attempt to distract the attention of the international community from large-scale genocidal activities against Armenian populations of Sumgait, Baku, Maraga, planned and mercilessly implemented under the auspices of authorities of Azerbaijan, from blockade and total bombardment of Stepanakert from Shushi, Khojalu, Maylibeyli and other firing points, which resulted in a few hundred of elderly, women and children killed, the authorities of Azerbaijan chose the way of complete falsification. Hiding behind freedom of expression, Azerbaijani propaganda has traditionally been violating one of fundamental derivatives of freedom of information – the right for truth. With that, the process of falsifying the truth is patronized by the higher authorities of Azerbaijan, aided by resources of diplomatic staff and special services. However, in reality, the expert society fully realizes that military operation to break Stepanakert’s blockade in the direction of Khojalu and death of people under Azeri-controlled Aghdam are two different stories.

As to the tragedy, which occurred in February, 1992 near Aghdam, controlled at that time, according to a number of foreign sources, by People’s Front of Azerbaijan by means of several militarized criminal groups, then the international community has a clear picture of what really happened.

Novosti-Armenia – We now observe the development of situation around the issue of Khojalu. Is that really the case?

Saghatelyan – It is true that contrary to the attempts of Azerbaijani propaganda, the quantity and quality of facts, supporting falsifications by Azeri side, are going up day by day, reaching today a critical level.

The recent interview by Ramiz Fataliev, who headed the Parliamentary committee to investigate the so-called Khojalu events in 1992, made the situation even clearer. In September of 2009 in an interview to Azerbaijani service of Radio Liberty Fataliev confessed, that 4 days before the breakthrough by Armenian military forces of Stepanakert’s blockade in Khojalu direction, namely – on February 22, 1992, a session of National Security Council of Azerbaijan took place, which passed a decision “not to move the people from Khojalu”.

In fact, hindering evacuation of civil population of Khojalu was a consequence of political decision of Azerbaijani authorities: these actions, similarly to further activities by People’s Front, had been planned in advance. Comments here are not necessary.

Novosti-Armenia – What can you say regarding the level of case-based reasoning of Azerbaijani side over this issue?

Saghatelyan – On the whole, over 90% of the so-called case-based reasoning in case of Khojalu has been falsified either completely, or partially by Azerbaijani propagandists. The facts that this or that extent relate to reality are, in essence, a direct consequence of objective processes, or regretful outcome of intrigues by political elites of Azerbaijan of the time. Then, those who died near Aghdam, were used in Azerbaijan itself by the People’s Front for settling internal scores, which was also stated by president Mutalibov himself. And today, the memory of those killed is being used with the same purpose – satisfaction of political ambitions.

And the propaganda machine of Azerbaijan is functioning in such a disorganized manner, that it continues to cynically spread not merely false, but very often – contradictory information. The video recordings, spread by Azerbaijan and attributed to cameraman Chingiz Mustafaev, who died in the summer of 1992 with “unidentified circumstances” in the same Azeri-controlled Aghdam, are, to put it very mildly, not void of stage effects.

Who and how organized the massacre near Aghdam, shooting to death people who were leaving Khojalu? In addition to the statement by then President of Azerbaijan Mutalibov, which was aired many times, I can quote reports by the Defense Ministry of Azerbaijan related to the situation of February 6, 1992. “27 local military groups are active in Aghdam. Mostly, after seizure of the populated areas, they are involved in looting, capture of domestic animals and personal belongings”.

Novosti-Armenia – Could you bring specific examples?

Saghatelyan – Has anybody compared photo and video materials of the so-called Khojalu chronicles, promoted by Azerbaijan on the highest level? Just take them and compare. Anyone who takes a close look at this footage will definitely observe a number of contradictions, inconsistencies, stage effects and forgeries. You have to be really “smart” to use the world-known footage of tragic events in Kosovo and sell them for Khojalu.

Just to mention Azerbaijani video chronicles of February 28 and March 2, 1992. Re-edited and post-recorded, against any common sense, they vividly show how at least a couple of victims out of those, whose bodies were boarded on a helicopter and “taken away” during the shootings of February 28, were still there on the ground on March 2, during the additional recordings, due to some strange reason.

The same is happening to other victims - they keep disappearing and appearing in various recordings, in different positions, dress or undresses, mutilated. And all this is going on the territory undoubtedly controlled by Azeris.

The Khojalu case is a myth, promoted with the objective to keep own crimes in shadow. And the frequently initiated hysteria, coupled with forgery of materials and attempts of fooling the international community, serve as factual proof that political elite of Azerbaijan has simply converted the tragedy of the people (their own elderly, women and children) into a propaganda tool on the highest level. This is an irrefutable fact, of which the international community is well aware of.

Azerbaijani flag burnt

February 18-19, protest actions were held in front of Azerbaijan’s Embassy in Tehran, Express newspaper reports. The picketers burnt an Azerbaijani flag, threw egg at the Embassy office and profanes state symbol. Meanwhile, according to the source, the Congress of World Azerbaijanis plans to hold a protest in front of Iranian Embassy in Baku.

This is not the first scandalous incident between the states. On the threshold of Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s visit to Baku, Iranian “Sahar” TV started broadcasting anti-Azerbaijani video clip. On the background of Palestinian children’s bodies, victims of Zionistic aggression, shots of Israeli and Azerbaijani officials’ meetings are shown in the video.

The massacres in Baku -- police lawlessness

On February 13, at about 13:00 local time, a group of religios guys decided to hold a peaceful march in memory of the death of the Prophet Muhammad from the subway Nizami to Shehidlyar Hiyabany. The purpose of the march was to lay a wreath at the Martyrs' Alley , paying homage to martyrs.

Near the Azdrammy area, the group was stopped by the police, but after several minutes of negotiations, a group consisting of 100-150 boys was allowed to march. Accompanied by 10 machines with police officers, the guys came to the monument of Narimanov, but subsequent events have fully confirmed the opinion of godlessness of our police and of breakbone resolution methods for such processions.

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It is not clear after whose order, the group was banned from continuing the march, despite the fact that only a few hundred meters were left to reach the Shehidlyar Xiyabani . Batons and ruthless methods were used to disperse the peaceful march that turned into a bloody clash. Tens of faithful children were severely beaten with batons, many of them got fractures. Ambulances refused to provide first aid. Many of the marchers were detained and forcibly sent to the 26th police department.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5vXJJFs_L8&feature=player_embedded

Sex banned in Azerbaijan

11:24 / 02/11/2010

Set phrase “No sex in USSR” seems to become topical in post-Soviet republics again. Thus, signs with names of small enterprises have been recently disappearing from Azerbaijani streets. Local authorities came up against a curious question.

At the reception of one of the foreign delegations, Azerbaijani president started telling about country’s unique achievements, Turan news agency reports, referring to foreign delegation source.

One of the guests ironically noted that Azerbaijan is unparalleled in everything that relates to sex, let alone other realms. He reasoned it by numerous advertisements “sexi” (on Azerbaijani small businesses sounds as “sex” and such signs are found on every such enterprise throughout the country) on Azerbaijani roads.

Azerbaijani authorities were unpleasantly impressed by guest’s joke and local officials were instructed to immediately remove all similar public ads.

A.G.

2 Azerbaijan soldiers kill 4 colleagues

Officials in Azerbaijan say two soldiers opened fire on colleagues at a military base, killing four of them before committing suicide.

The country's Defense Ministry said in a statement Friday that the reason for the Thursday evening shooting was not immediately known.

The statement did not specify where the shooting took place and officials declined further comment.

News reports in May said an Azerbaijani soldier killed four others in a shooting during exercises.

http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1168223&lang=eng_news

1988-90s Massacres in Azerbaijan must be recognized as Genocide

“Events in Azerbaijan’s capital of Baku happened 20 years ago is nothing but the Genocide. There is not any other determination for what happened,” told Aysor’s correspondent chairman of ‘Return to Hyke’ Social Organisation, Robert Melik-Pashayev.

Deported from Azerbaijan Armenians will receive neither contribution, according to Robert Melik-Pashayev. “Who will compensate? Azerbaijan will not compensate, while our people and government remain silent. Our organisation gives to the world that Armenians left more than 100,000 houses in Baku. Moscow government has investigated and approved that there took place massacres, marauding, and larceny. There are confirming documents at state archives. Azerbaijan’s government must appear in court,” he said.

Armenia’s government can apply to Russian archives for cases of those years to recognize those massacres and deportations against Armenian population in Azerbaijan as Genocide, according to Melik-Pashayev. The public man also pointed that those Azerbaijanis who lived in Armenia never become victims of massacres and deportations while the Armenian community of Azerbaijan became the victim of atrocious and intolerable premeditated massacres.

http://www.aysor.am/en/news/2010/01/13/bakoupogroms-melikpashaev/

Family Of Gunman In Azerbaijani Army Shooting Wants Answers

BAKU -- Elxan Azizov was born and raised in the Azerbaijani capital. But the 20-year-old's grave is in Zeyva, in his father's native Ismaili region in the country's northeast.

Azizov died last week after he and a fellow soldier reportedly shot and killed four officers on their army base in Azerbaijan's western Dashkesan region.

Two additional officers were wounded in the January 28 shooting incident, which ended when Azizov and his fellow soldier, 19-year-old Sadiq Mammadov, either shot themselves or each other.

"He only had five months left to serve. Why would he do it?"

Few details are known about the incident or what might have prompted it, although rampant corruption and abuse are generally believed to contribute to a culture of violence and despair in the Azerbaijani military.

Speaking to RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service, Azizov's father, Bayali, says he believed his son was forced to shoot the officers, possibly out of self-defense. "He wouldn't do it," he said. "He only had five months left to serve. Why would he do it?"

Bayali Azizov describes his son as uncomplaining. But he and other family members suggest that Elxan might have acted out in response to repeated abuse or hostility.

Elxan's aunt, Latafat, says her nephew was a person who "wouldn't tolerate insults." She adds: "He was forced to kill himself and others because of insults. We don't know exactly what happened. He took all his problems with him."

Many Azerbaijanis consider the Defense Ministry to be one of the country's most corrupt institutions. Despite Azerbaijan's oil wealth and a steady increase in state funding for the military, conditions at most army bases remain abysmal, with frequent reports of conscripts being subjected to hazing and ill treatment.

Plight Of The Poor

On the day of the shooting, Bayali Azizov says, Elxan called a cousin with a strange request. "Forty-five minutes before the incident, he called his cousin," he says. "He asked for a blessing from all of his family members; he thanked them for everything, and then he hung up."

Elxan's aunt, Latafat Azizova, says the army must investigate the case properly.

Family members were worried by the call, and Bayali Azizov resolved the next day to travel to the Dashkesan base. But then several men arrived at the house, asking questions about his son's psychological state. They left without explanation; it was only several hours later that Azizov learned about his son's death, from a TV report.

Television cameras were not permitted to record footage of either Elxan Azizov's body or his subsequent funeral on January 30. The family says it saw no trace of torture on his body. But Latafat Azizova says the burden is on the military to ensure the incident isn't glossed over.

"He had a bullet in his heart," she says. "He was safe and sound when we sent him there. We were supposed to get him back alive, and they sent us a body. We want this case to be investigated properly."

Bayali Azizov raised three children on a meager salary earned by doing odd jobs on Baku construction sites. The plight of poor families, who are unable to bribe themselves out of compulsory service, has also embittered the Azizovs.

Latafat Azizova says that if her brother had not been poor, Elxan could have avoided military service on an army base, and last week's tragedy could have been prevented.

"He raised his children through hard work," Latafat says of her brother. "We didn't have alcoholics, drug addiction, or psychiatric problems in the family. We worked hard to make a modest living. My son also served in the army. He was treated badly, and had ulcers, but he never complained."

Foreign Corrupt Practices Act: 2009 in review

In July 2009, following a six-week jury trial, Connecticut businessman Frederic Bourke was convicted of violating the FCPA related to his investment in a privatization program in the Republic of Azerbaijan. At trial, prosecutors from DOJ and the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York argued that Bourke and his business partners, particularly Viktor Kozeny, arranged to receive a controlling interest in the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) through a secret partnership with government officials. Following the verdict, Bourke was sentenced to one year and one day in prison and ordered to pay a $1 million fine.

The prosecutors in Bourke’scase alleged that Kozeny and members of his investment consortium bribed government officials to encourage them to privatize SOCAR and to ensure that the consortium would gain a controlling interest in it. The government presented evidence that, acting through Oily Rock Ltd., Kozeny and the others bribed government officials by making cash payments to them, by surreptitiously transferring a twothirds interest in Oily Rock’s stake in the privatization venture to them, and by helping them or their family members to obtain medical appointments, visas, and college admissions in the United States. Bourke was not alleged to have played a significant role in carrying out the bribes (although prosecutors presented evidence that he arranged for two officials to receive medical treatment funded by Oily Rock) but the DOJ proceeded against him because of his extensive involvement with Oily Rock (he had invested approximately $8 million in Oily Rock and accepted directorships, salary, and stock options with companies related to it) and his knowledge of rampant corruption in Azerbaijan.

Thus, at Bourke’s trial the government relied on the “conscious avoidance” theory in addition to a conspiracy theory. In regard to the former, the FCPA provides that “[w]hen knowledge of the existence of a particular circumstance is required for an offense, such knowledge is established if a person is aware of a high probability of the existence of such circumstance, unless the person actually believes that such circumstance does not exist.” Based on that provision, the government argued that Bourke was guilty of violating the FCPA because he purposely avoided knowledge of Kozeny’s bribery scheme. To show that Bourke was aware of the high probability that Azeri officials were being bribed as part of the investment effort, the prosecutors presented evidence of corruption in Azerbaijan generally, of Bourke’s personal knowledge of the corruption, and of knowledge by Bourke’s colleagues of the corruption.

In a post-trial motion for acquittal, Bourke argued that the government’s evidence of his alleged knowledge was so tenuous that the court’s conscious avoidance charge likely misled the jury into believing it could convict him on the basis that he had “not tried hard enough to learn the truth.” He also argued that the evidence showed mere negligence at most. The court rejected both contentions, pointing to the testimony of several witnesses that Bourke “knew that corruption was rampant in Azerbaijan” and knew about Kozeny’s “exploits and misdeeds” in Czechoslovakia during thatcountry’s earlier privatization period. In addition, the prosecutors had presented a taperecorded telephone conference among Bourke, a business partner, and their attorneys during which Bourke made statements evidencing a concern that Kozeny was paying bribes. The court also pointed out that, when asked to assume a position on Oily Rock’s board of directors, Bourke instead arranged to accept a position with a related entity, in an apparent attempt to distance himself from knowledge of Oily Rock’s activities. Finally, the court credited the government’s reliance on evidence comparing the scant due diligence work performed by Bourke and his attorneys with the due diligence efforts of others asked to join the consortium, noting that “[t]he Government was entitled to show that others – who were exposed to the same sources as Bourke – had high suspicions regarding the legitimacy of the venture which they were able to later confirm while Bourke willfully shielded himself from learning all the facts.” The court concluded that, even if Bourke did not actually know about the bribery scheme, the government had presented sufficient evidence to show that he “knew of the high probability that bribes were being paid” and “took steps to ensure that he did notacquire knowledge” ofbribery.

http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=c0c8c6c6-6841-4e0c-b457-b149b36e80df

Six dead in Azerbaijan military shooting

Six dead in Azerbaijan military shooting

(AFP) – Jan 29, 2010

BAKU — Two soldiers in Azerbaijan shot and killed four fellow servicemen before killing themselves, the defence ministry said Friday, in the latest shooting rampage to shock the ex-Soviet republic.

Media linked the killing with what experts say is rampant brutality and corruption in Azerbaijan's military.

The incident was the second mass shooting in Azerbaijan in less than a year, after a man shot dead 12 people at a university in the capital Baku last April before taking his life.

"Two soldiers opened fire killing four servicemen and wounding two before killing themselves," defence ministry deputy spokesman Temur Abdullayev told AFP.

He said the incident occurred on Thursday evening but that no further details were immediately available.

Azerbaijan's Trend news agency cast doubt on the ministry's version of events, quoting military sources as saying the two soldiers who carried out the shooting had been shot and killed while trying to flee the scene. It said a local division commander was among the dead victims.

The opposition Azadliq newspaper reported that the shooting took place in Azerbaijan's Dashkesan region on the border with Armenia.

Azerbaijan is locked in a long-simmering conflict with Armenia over the disputed Nagorny Karabakh region, which broke from Baku's control with Yerevan's support during a war in the early 1990s.

Azadliq said a number of senior officers were among the victims and claimed that violence within the military was to blame for the shooting.

Experts and soldiers' rights groups have raised concerns about violence in the Azerbaijani military, saying a culture of corruption and brutal hazing prevails.

In a 2008 report, the International Crisis Group said the Azerbaijani military was plagued by "endemic corruption, nepotism and hazing."

Azerbaijani military prosecutors in 2008 arrested two sergeants and reprimanded several senior officers after videos surfaced on the Internet of conscript soldiers being savagely beaten.

Authorities have denied, however, that hazing is widespread in the military.

Rights groups have accused militaries throughout the former Soviet Union of tolerating brutal hazing practices inherited from the Soviet army.

The university shooting in April stunned this small, mainly Muslim republic on the Caspian Sea, which had never before seen the kind of public rampages that have plagued some Western countries in recent years.

Last November, a shooting spree on a US military base at Fort Hood, Texas, left 13 people dead and 43 wounded. US officials have said the suspected gunman, US Army Major Nidal Hasan, is being investigated for links to Islamic extremism.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gQmkN9Grc9u_z6PwFQ8xZ5hwcw2w

Azerbaijan: Newly Independent but Mired in Corruption

Azerbaijan: Newly Independent but Mired in Corruption

Margaret A. Woodbury
May 22, 2001

President Heydar Aliyev is determined to ferret out corruption.

It is a windy, crisp February evening, and a crowd of dignitaries in formal attire is filing into the Khagani Business Center in downtown Baku. United States Ambassador to Azerbaijan Ross Wilson and Deputy Prime Minister Ali Hasanov are scheduled to deliver speeches of thanks to the International Rescue Committee (IRC) for hosting the fundraiser for people forced from their homes by Azerbaijan's long war with Armenia over the disputed Armenian enclave Nagorno-Karabakh (see map below).

But the war ended with a Russian-mediated ceasefire in 1994. Azeris have had seven years to become inured to the fact that some 1.1 million people, or 13 percent of the country's population, were forced from their homes over the course of the six-year conflict. So perhaps it is not so strange that the talk among those present in the Khagani Business Center this evening is not so much about refugees, or internally displaced people, as it is about corruption.

Transparency International, an independent watchdog group founded by former World Bank officials, recently listed Azerbaijan as the third most corrupt nation in their annual survey of 90 countries. "Didn't you hear?" jokes a Swedish United Nations worker as she joins a discussion about the survey results. "Azerbaijan really got the first most corrupt country listing, but the government bribed someone to move them down to number three."

In Azerbaijan, it seems everyone can tell some story from her daily life about having to bribe a corrupt official. Visitors are warned never to open the door unless they expect company, since the police routinely come knocking to collect bribes. A traffic stop is almost certain to result in an immediate "fine," and arrests and fines for trivial offences such as being alone in the evening with a member of the opposite sex are common, locals complain.

These countless examples from people's daily lives can add up to produce a serious macroeconomic effect. According to a World Bank report cited in the leading opposition daily Yeni Musavat last November, 60 percent of the Azeri economy is informal, and thus not subject to scrutiny, accountability, or taxation. Yeni Musavat reported that if the same ratio applies to the government's finances, then some $1.4 billion would be lost to corruption yearly, based on an official budget of $900 million. The paper warned the government that unless it undertook urgent reforms, Azerbaijan would run the risk of being compared to Nigeria - another oil-rich, notoriously corrupt state, which had the dubious distinction of being named the most corrupt country in the world according to the 2000 Transparency International survey.

Indeed, says World Bank Acting Country Manager Saida Bagirova, Azerbaijan will need an improved structure to manage its oil revenues to avoid "ending up like Nigeria." But Bagirova is optimistic and notes that an oil fund has been set up by presidential decree. "This will be an account, separate from the regular budget, strictly for oil revenue, with the limit that only dividends from the fund may be tapped during a one-year period," says Bagirova, who stresses that the World Bank is "very interested to see this fund be transparent." Currently the World Bank plans to distribute $300 million over a three-year period through the fund. But Bagirova says the amount could be tripled if the public sector shows an interest in implementing the World Bank's recommended reforms.

Azerbaijani President Heydar Aliyev has guarded his power jealously since 1993, when he seized power in a bloodless coup. International observers site corrupt voting practices in every post-Aliyev election. Observers from the Organization on Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the United Nations reported widespread abuses in the country's first legislative elections in 1995. Likewise, the U.S. State Department reported that the 1998 presidential election that returned Aliyev to power were "marred by numerous, serious irregularities … and lack of transparency in the vote counting process."

Reports from the last November's parliamentary elections indicate that things may not have improved very much since. Jacob, an Englishman who came to Baku as a businessman and who did not want to give his last name, acted as an official observer for the OSCE last November. On night of the IRC fundraiser in Baku, he recalled his experiences:

"The election officials did everything they could think of to keep us away from the counting tables, They told me to go out to dinner, go for a walk, out for a smoke, and they seated us far away from the actual counting tables and the ballots. But when I asked, or rather demanded, to be close enough to actually see, the other observers gained courage and we all came across the hall to the tables. … The electricity failed twice, but everyone had cigarette lighters, so we held them up and watched as [the officials] pulled ballots from under the tables and switched them with those on the table. Only after that did the chairman start the vote count,"

Jacob estimates that about 400 ballots were swapped that night.

As Rauf Arifoglu, Yeni Musavat's editor in chief, has discovered more than once, openly criticizing government corruption can have unpleasant consequences. " This government does not like independent thinking," Arifoglu complains, pointing to one incident in which masked assailants severely beat a journalist from the paper shortly after his story on corruption in the Azeri government was published. The incident was not atypical. The U.S. State Department notes that journalists reported 60 cases of harassment and intimidation last year and that on April 29, 2000, police beat 17 journalists covering a local demonstration.

Arifoglu has spent time in prison, himself. Last August, a member of the Musavat opposition party hijacked a plane and demanded that President Aliyev respond to former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright's letter requesting that the elections be conducted fairly. Arifgolu conveyed the hijacker's demands to the chief of national security and was put in jail until October for concealing prior knowledge of the hijacking. The government argues that Arifoglu was party to a criminal publicity stunt. Arifoglu still maintains that he was imprisoned on trumped-up charges to keep him quiet during the period before the election.

As yet, no trial date has been set for Arifoglu, though he still faces up to 20 years in prison. He believes the charges are being kept pending to keep him in check without the need for a high-profile court case. According to the U.S. State Department, he may have reason to suspect as much. "The Azeri judiciary," it concluded last year, "does not function independently of the executive branch and is corrupt and inefficient."

But many here say that corruption in the judicial branch pales next to that in the Ministry of Health. "Absolutely, the most corrupt," says an English director of an NGO that works with Azeri orphans. Irina Stirbu, a maternal-child health program manager with Save the Children in Baku agrees: "Because of the level of corruption [in the Ministry of Health] reforms needed to advance our work from humanitarian assistance to meaningful development can not happen."

In fact, officials with the United Nations Population Fund, Mercy Corps International, and Pathfinder International, all of whom are involved in funding and advancing health care in the country, say the levels of corruption run so deep that often doctors even prefer to perform abortions on women rather that dole out contraceptives because of the bribe dollars they can collect from an abortion procedure. "Yes, it is true," says Dr. Elvira Anadolu, country director of Pathfinder International in Azerbaijan. "To make money, doctors may prefer abortions versus issuing oral contraceptives," she sighs but adds that the situation is improving with increased training efforts from international organizations.

Though it is perfectly willing to make political capital out of corruption in the current administration, the opposition has given little intimation of how they would do things differently if given power. Isa Gambar, head of the leading opposition party Musavat and chairman of the parliament during the time his party was in power from 1992-1993, is adamant about the need for change: "We need to change the laws to discourage bribe taking and decrease the level of dependence the people have come to expect from their government. And if some company is chosen for a government project, we will list all the reasons for our choice to make bids transparent."

When asked to elaborate on his anti-corruption plans, Gambar replied, "It is hard to explain all our programs," but insists he has sent a detailed package to the president.

Nara Aliyeva, a young Azeri woman who works for a humanitarian organization in Baku, is unimpressed by Gambar's pronouncements. "All his words are nice, yes, but why, when they were in power before did they not do these things?" she asks. "In 1992 to 1993, things were horrible - the streets were so unsafe that you would not dare to walk about after dark. Only when our [current] president took power did things settle down. He stopped the war with Armenia and took control of our streets."

Indeed, in a land where everything can be bought, many here are wondering what, exactly, is the price for peace and freedom?

Margaret Woodbury is a freelance journalist based in San Francisco and New York.

http://www.worldpress.org/Europe/211.cfm#down