Zarakolu: An Urgent Call to Defend Righteous Azeris

Having a conscience is a distinctive moral quality of mankind. The conscientious, the honest, the righteous represent the true pride and honor of a country. But criminals wielding an axe never can!

Eylisli
Eylisli

Ekrem Eylisli, a writer in Azerbaijan who should have been the pride of his country, is now instead in mortal danger, and the threat comes from the president of the country, a post-Soviet autocrat. The title Eylisli received—of “People’s Writer” of the Republic of Azerbaijan—and the associated state award have been rescinded; his author’s pension has been cancelled; and his wife and son have been fired from their jobs.

An author, scriptwriter, and dramatist, Eylisli, 75, adopted the great Soviet writer Maxim Gorky’s philosophy on fraternity at the Maxim Gorky Literature Institute in Moscow. He is a prolific writer, and has been published in many magazines and newspapers. In 2005, he was elected to the parliament. His literary life began in 1959 with poetry, and continued with stories, plays, scripts, and novels. He has also translated into the Azeri language many works by humanist writers such as Gabriel G. Marquez, Turgenev, and Chinghiz Aitmatov. His plays have been performed in many former Soviet cities, including Yerevan.

Yet, now, lynch mobs have been mobilized in front of his house, very much like those we once saw in Maras and Sivas. “Come and bring your axe!” they say, a slogan attributed to Azeri officer Ramil Sahiboglu Safarov, who decapitated an Armenian officer with an axe in his sleep in 2004, 20 days before they were to return home from a NATO-sponsored “Partnership for Peace” program in Budapest, Hungary.*

Melahet Ibrahimqizi—an Azeri parliamentarian who, as part of a delegation, flew to Ankara to convince parliamentary chairman Köksal Toptan,** CHP leader Deniz Baykal, MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli, as well as various AKP functionaries, to block the Turkey-Armenia protocols—is now attempting to extend the lynch campaign to Turkey. In an aggressive speech delivered to the Azeri Parliament, he said that Eylisli insults not only Azerbaijanis, but the Turkish nation as a whole. Demands were subsequently made in that parliamentary session to have Eylisli take a DNA test and be stripped of his citizenship.

The reason for all of this is the publication of his latest novella, “Stone Dreams,” in the Russian literary magazine Druzhba Narodov (Fraternity of Peoples). It has not yet been published in Azeri. An enraged mob gathered in front of his home in the capital of Baku shouting, “Shame on you, traitor!” They burned his books and portraits, which showed a cross printed on his forehead.
The novella tells the story of two Azeri men who tried to protect their Armenian neighbors from ethnic violence. It also mentions the pogroms against Armenians in Sumgait and Baku in a vein of conscientious criticism. The novella was actually finished in 2007, but could only be published five years later in Russian.

Interestingly, an Armenian writer, Levon Cavakhyan, who also explored the Armenian-Azeri conflict in a conscientious tone, around the same time, was awarded a prize in Azerbaijan. The Writers Union, of which he was a member, reacted to his acceptance of an Azerbaijani award—though not to his writing of the story itself. Cavakhyan resigned from the Union in protest. He was never, however, the target of a hate campaign, as is the case in Baku now.

Researcher Sarkis Hatspanian explains that Cavakhyan wrote the story “Kirve” (Godfather) in 2008, in which he said, “Azeris are not my enemy.”*** Eynisli, who had said “Armenians are not my enemy” at about the same time, now faces a lynch campaign for having uttered the same sentence.

Although invited to live in Western countries and Russia, Eynisli takes a proud stance, saying, “This is my homeland and I will not leave it.”

I call upon international public opinion, as well as the democratic public in Turkey and Azerbaijan, to actively stand in solidarity with Ekrem Eynisli, and possibly avert a new murder similar to that committed against Hrant Dink.

 

* Safarov was condemned to life in prison in Hungary for the murder of Gurgen Margaryan. On Aug. 31, 2012, however, he was extradited to Azerbaijan, and immediately released and promoted by Azerbaijani’s president.

** Toptan exercised his powers as chairman of the Turkish Parliament in 2009 by impounding and returning—at the behest of CHP’s MP Sükrü Elekdag—books sent to members of parliament by the Gomidas Institute, thereby violating the parliamentarians’ freedom to communicate.

*** See facebook.com/notes/sarkis-hatspanian/kirve/489684637733351.

 

Ragip Zarakolu is a founding member of the Human Rights Association and of Social History Foundation; a member of PEN Turkey and of the Writers Union of Turkey; a member of the Turkish Publishers Association and of the International Committee for the Freedom to Publish; a Nobel Peace Prize nominee by Swedish Parliamentary members and by the French Section of the International Work Group’s (GIT) ‘Academic Liberty and Freedom of Research [in Turkey]’ (www.gitfrance.fr and www.gitinitiative.com). 

Ragip Zarakolu

Ragip Zarakolu

Ragip Zarakolu is the longtime director of the Belge Publishing House, which for more than three decades has challenged publishing taboos on subjects such as the Armenian Genocide and minority rights in Turkey. Zarakolu is also chair of the Freedom to Publish Committee of the Turkish Publishers Association, and a member of the Turkish PEN Center.

28 Comments

  1. [Reward offered in Azerbaijan for slicing off the ear of a writer depicting Armenians as friends]
    http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/reward-offered-in-azerbaijan-for-slicing-off-the-ear-of-a-writer-depicting-armenians-as-friends.aspx?pageID=238&nID=41008&NewsCatID=355

    {The leader of Azeri pro-government party Muasir Musavat (Modern Equality) told Reuters on Tuesday the party was offering 10,000 manats, nearly $13,000, for anyone who cut off Aylisli’s ear.}

    And these medieval nomadic savages wearing European suits are supposed to ‘govern’ an ancient, cultured, civilized people in Artsakh ?

    • Avery, I wonder if you would say the kind of things you say here online in the presence of your American friends and co-workers. THey would cringe at the racist bigotry you so openly espouse here. So you take the words of some random “pro-government” party member and generlize from that to a whole nation?

      Do you not see the hypocrasy of it all? At least, we have an Aylisli and we are openly discussing on TV our “hatred” towards Armenia. Where is the Ayslis of your civilized Karabakians or Armenia? Or have you done anything wrong at at all? And I guess it is part and parcel of being civilized to raze down the towns of Lachin, Kelbecer, Gubadli, Fizuli, Gebrayil, Zengila, Khodhali, Susha, and many other Azeri cities. I guess it is also part and parcel of being civilized to evice from their homes over 600K?

      And Mr. Zarakolu, dare you ask Avery what he thinks of your fathers too? Know thy enemy! Nomadic, barbarian, etc … I will let him answer it.

    • Wonder no more, Kerim: I do and I do.
      Whatever I write in public, I also will and do say in public.
      If there is something I would not say in public, I would not write in a post either.

      {“So you take the words of some random “pro-government” party member and generlize from that to a whole nation?”}

      Read my post again carefully:

      “The leader of Azeri pro-government party Muasir Musavat….”: concentrate on ‘leader’.

      Leader → “govern”: got it ? I am not talking about the whole nation of Azerbaijan. I am talking about the Azeri leaders who would govern Armenians of Artsakh (…as they are demanding from NKR Armenians): clear ?

      And yes, a Musavat party leader that openly offers a reward to someone to cut off the ear of a 75 year old writer is a medieval nomadic savage wearing a European suit. The fact that you are dismissing it instead of unequivocally condemning it tells a lot.

      The other leaders of Azerbaijan who make a hero out of a psychopathic ax murderer are also medieval nomadic savages wearing European suits.

      The other leaders of Azerbaijan who publicly declare that they will shoot down an Armenian passenger airplane, carrying Armenian civilians, are also medieval nomadic savages wearing European suits.

      Is there any doubt in your mind that I will say what I just wrote to my American friends and co-workers ?

    • Kerim so if i understand this well ,Turkic people don’t like when the house they live in,with all their possessions, are taken and their peoples are evicted either by force or death? What do you think the Armenians have been going through for the last 400 years under Turkish rule? Do you think it was good? And yet the Armenians should somehow show some respect and compassion to Azeri’s? What nonsense..

      In this case all the Armenians were asking for was freedom from being oppressed by Azeri’s that have no legal rights to do so. What they got was Armenian burnings, mass raping, torture, maternity mutilations and again mass evictions.. And then the one month long bombardment of civilians..

      Avery is right, don’t fool yourself, your government IS a reflection of its people. Ask ANYONE under Turkish rule they will tell you the same thing.

  2. First, let me say this. I am an Azeri who believes Nagorno Karabak proper should be recognized as independent, in exchange for the adjacent occupied territories that even Armenian government does not want. I also think Turkey should recognize the Genocide and offer a territorial concession and remuneration to Armenia. I also think it was amoral and a big mistake to pardon Safarov.

    As for Ayslisli, he should be free to say and write as he wishes. And he has enjoyed freedom of speech, being always daily on TV to explicate his view. But it is also the right of those who disagree with him to criticize him, even if harshly. Yes, there have been random personal threats, but there are random threats in America regarding celebrities. No one in their sound mind would attribute them to the official US government. Yes, Azeri government has taken away his stipend and rewards. That, I believe, was the right thing to do. He is free to write whatever he wishes but has no right to being paid by the public for it.

    And people like each puts his/her own spin on his situation there. The real thing is that we are not upset at him because he is sympathetic to Armenians. Instead, he condemns him because he has taken 100% Armenian side, without any balanced view. He says nothing, absolutely nothing, about the bad things that Armenians too are bound to have committed in a war that has caused 30000 deaths and 600k refugees. He says it is up to Armenian writers to do so.
    Your piece here irritated for me for various reasons. First, as a Turk, I think you have a plenty of people to protect without have to worry about us Azeris. Why don’t you protect Hrant Dinks in Turkey and the elderly Armenian women. We will take care of our own country. Don’t try to earn favors at our expense.

    Also, there was a malicious undertone in your piece. Gratuitiously comparing us to Armenians and showing how much worse we are. For example, you so subtly mention “sympatric” writings of an Armenian writer. Ayslisli’s novel was not just sympathetic to Armenians, but was totally accusatory to Azeris, without any nuances. The two cases are totally different. Also, you select your facts with a bias. For example, did you know that a couple of years ago local Armenian film-makers were planning showing a few Azeri documentaries in Armenia, and there was a huge uproar in Armenia, and it all got canceled. So hostility is on both sides, not on Azeri.

    In sum, please mind your business. You have a lot of mending to do with Armenians. Your nation has killed 1 million of their ancestors. I think they will understand us better if we get a bit too upset at a writer for writing a silly novel.

    Again, I sense that you are someone who relishes being contrarian. Fine. But do it at your own expense please.

    • Kerim please! The last time I was in Artsakh, just over 3 months ago, both the village ‘Khodjali’/Ivanyan and the town/city of Shushi (including its early/mid 19th century PERSIAN mosques) were standing upright – in fact the scale of building construction and the rebuilding of public spaces taking place in Shushi over the past 2 or 3 years are truly breathtaking. Almost all traces of the destructive war launched by Baku in the 1990s have disappeared and the other places you have mentioned are also being gradually developed as valuable agricultural lands. If Ilham Khan launches another destructive war perhaps Ganja’s (historic Armenian Gandzak and Shahumyan region of Artsakh) quarter million population will flee and the regime will force them to live under tents around Baku as ‘refugees from Armenian brutality’. You will then have to speak of 850K refugees! But will you blame the Armenians again? For what – for defending their right to life on their own land and for not wishing to be slaughtered and genocided?
      And Kerim, as far as Ragip Zarakolou and his writing is concerned I think it would be better if you showed a little respect and had the decency first to read a little about this great man and his devoted life-long struggle against racist-nationalist Pan-Turkism (which is now the official ideology in the Baku Khanate) before you made comments about him or offered him advice about what he should write or say!

    • Kerim I don’t think you’re being quite fair with Avery – not that he needs defending about what he says. It is you who need to use your words more carefully rather than twist Avery’s words to suit your disingenuous purpose.
      The item Avery is quoting clearly states THE LEADER (of Azeri pro-government New Musavat) not, as you twist it, ‘SOME RANDOM “pro-government” party member’.
      Now in fairness to Avery, anyone remotely familiar with the history of Bashibozuk-Tatar-nomadic ‘ideology’ and practice over centuries of their domination of the region (10th to 16th- centuries cannot but describe them as savages – which they were and the overwhelming majority of historians have described them as such) can see that this leader of pro-government New Musavat party is hardly different form those nomadic and savage Bashibozuks! After all Bashibozuk’s did exactly that and more – pillage, rape, cut the throats of peaceful, settled and civilised Armenians until they had to either flee their millennia old lands or convert to Islam! Precisely what is being offered to this noble and rightous writer Mr Ayslisli!
      I won’t even mention Ilham Khan’s promotion and rewarding of the ax murderer of Budapest, or the destruction of thousands of Khachkars in Nakhijevan or the Bashibozuk brutalities against the peaceful civilian Armenians of Sumgait, Baku, Kirovabad and elsewhere in the 1990s!
      The times have changed but even in the 20th and 21st centuries the ideology and practice in Baku has, unfortunately, remained Bashibozuk and savage/nomadic.

  3. How awesome that in an Armenian American paper we could have a Turkish columnist write about an Azeri who has spoken the truth and now is being villified by the nut cases in Baku and then an Azeri comments, begining his comments by stating he believes in Karabagh’s self determination! Wow, there is hope for peace. I wish i was as open minded as these two individuals are.

  4. Kerim:

    You can keep spinning all day long, and I will keep countering your spin.

    Brief recap:

    Armenians petitioned Moscow and protested – peacefully – to leave Azerbaijan starting around 1987.
    Azeris responded with violence and bloodshed.
    Azeris massacred defenseless Armenian civilians in Sumgait (1988), Kirovabad (1988) and Baku (1990).
    When Azerbaijan declared Independence from USSR in 1991, its legal mandate to govern NKAO ended.
    NKAO declared Independence a few days later, and became NKR.
    Azerbaijan responded by a full scale military invasion of NKR.

    We have covered all that extensively over the past several months.
    If you like, I can start re-pasting all my previous posts: it’s all on file.
    But I am sure there is no need: you know what my arguments were and will be.

    Your country, Azerbaijan, started the violence, bloodshed and war.
    Every subsequent act of bloodshed and violence – including those committed by Armenian military units – is on Azerbaijan.

  5. This incident further shows the extent of Armenophobia campaign in AXEbaijan.One thing should be very clear to the AXEbaijani mafia that we do not want to live with them EVER again.We can always be very good neighbors but never live together.Let them stay behind their borders & we’ll stay behind our borders & this way we’ll definitely avoid future conflicts.

    • VTiger I agree with what you’re saying except that you could use a more accurate description or definition for the country known as “Republic of Azerbaijan”. Since it is neither a republic (but a brutal dynastic autocracy of the Aliev and Pahayev mafias) nor has it anything to do with true historic/geographic Azerbaijan (which according to all millennia old historical maps and documents, including, Greco-Roman, Byzantine, other European, Perian, Muslim, Ottoman and Russian – NOT to mention Armenian ones has always been known to be a North-Western province of Iran-Persia SOUTH OF ARAX RIVER) I think the best name for the entity known as “Republic of Azerbaijan” could be “Khanate of Baku”, led, of course, by – NOT ‘president’ but – the little Ilham-Khan, son of ‘late beloved leader’ Haydar Aliev… .
      By the way the Baku Khanate is the only former Soviet entity with a dynastic regime which is at the same time one of the most corrupt and brutal regimes in the world with hundreds of journalists behind bar (second apparently only to Turkey in numbers!) and hardly any human rights according to even the BBC and the British Parliament despite all the psychophantic attitiude of the British governement itself which closely follows the BP (British Petrolium) line in its praise of the “wise-democratic prsident Ilham Aliev… (sic!)”.
      And yet the brain-washing in the Khanate of Baku is so complete that even a seemingly reasonable and (seemingly) partly enlightened character as our Mr Kerim – writing above – glosses over all these facts and compares this autocratic brutality to Armenia and Artsakh.
      And Mr Kerim please! The last time I was in Artsakh, just over 3 months ago, both the village ‘Khodjali’/Ivanyan and the town/city of Shushi (including its early/mid 19th century PERSIAN mosques) were standing upright – in fact the scale of building construction and the rebuilding of public spaces taking place in Shushi over the past 2 or 3 years are truly breathtaking. Almost all traces of the destructive war launched by Baku in the 1990s have disappeared and the other places you have mentioned are also being gradually developed as valuable agricultural lands. If Ilham Khan launches another destructive war perhaps Ganja’s (historic Armenian Gandzak and Shahumyan region of Artsakh) quarter million population will flee and the regime will force them to live under tents around Baku as ‘refugees from Armenian brutality’. You will then have to speak of 850K refugees! But will you blame the Armenians again? For what – for defending their right to life on their own land and for not wishing to be slaughtered and genocided?
      And Kwerim, as far as Ragip Zarakolou and his writing is concerned I think it would be better if you showed a little respect and had the decency first read a little about this great man and his devoted life long struggle against racist-nationalist Pan-Turkism (which is now the official ideology in the Baku Khanate) before you made comments about him or offered him advice about what he should write or say!

    • Bagratuni,I’m sure the AXEbaijani or the aliyev khanate intelligence services monitor this comment section.There is not a single day that this mafia khanate does not threaten us.This makes us more adamant & rigid in defending our rights & much more adamant that we will EVER accept living & sharing our lives with Azeris.Artsakh will not become an Israel with increasing population of Palestinians & daily increasing problems.
      As said before we can always become very good neighbors (of course once this hereditary father to son dictatorship is out & hopefully very soon) but NEVER live together.They stay behind their borders, we stay behind ours.
      Artsakh will NEVER EVER become another Nakhichevan.

    • {“(of course once this hereditary father to son dictatorship is out & hopefully very soon)”}

      VTiger:

      when Sultan Aliyev is deposed, things will go from bad to worse.
      Right now, despite his bluster he won’t do anything unless he is 100% sure he will win something. Him and his family live like royalty: it is a great life, why risk it ?

      After the Aliyev clan retires to Bahrain, radical Muslim fascists will gain power.
      Right now they are ruthlessly suppressed by the Aliyev regime.
      Musavat was the party that organized the massacres of Armenians in Sumgait, Kirovabad, and Baku.

      When they start running Azerbaijan, they will be far more reckless and will start a war – win or lose.
      All the more reason for all of us to do everything we can at this to help RoA and NKR become much, much stronger – by all metrics.
      While we are in a quiet period.

      All our infighting and bickering must stop.
      We have become too complacent after 20 years of relative peace.
      We have forgotten how perilously close we came to losing NKR.

    • Avery,I believe that when the corrupt sultan & his mafia start facing more revolts (there were some last week)similar to the current Arab countries, a civil war will start & the country will be further divided.This will definitely happen sooner or later.Mubarak had the strictest police & internal intelligence regime for 30 years.Assad same for 40 years.The corrupt sultan & his mafia are running a similar regime to Mubarak & Assad & are nearing the twenty years…so the kettle is boiling & it will soon erupt.
      There is not a single day that this regime does not brainwash its own people of Armenophobia & extreme hatred towards us internally & externally.All Azeri commentators as you know throw up the same lines given to them by the regime & funny enough at the same time like parrots with no creativity.For ex. the latest that’s running concurrently,that there are 30,000 Armenians still living in AXEbaijan…You see that in the press of the US,Europe & Turkey. Poor 50-100 Armenian women who had married Azeris & that remain…This Armenophobia in itself is a cause for war.Whoever that comes after the sultan & in case the country is not divided,there will be no difference in their relations & attitudes with us.The bottom line is that we do not trust them & will never want to live with them.
      The current status quo is in our favor & I daily pray that it lasts longer & longer until the common people revolt.Greed has no boundaries.

    • Avery,further to my earlier comment please read the here below & go to the site as well:
      “Several petitions echoing Azerbaijani government attacks on Karabakh rapidly collected tens of thousands of on-line signatures in recent days. The text of one in particular, titled “pay close attention on The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. 20% of Azerbaijan territory was occupied by Armenian military,” has a direct link to the Heydar Aliyev Foundation, a project headed by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s multi-billionaire wife, Mehriban Aliyeva. Unlike other “We the People” petitions, where the city and state of a majority of signers is typically posted, the anti-Armenian petitions, by and large, do not have any geographic identification.”
      http://www.armenianlife.com/2013/02/16/anca-asks-white-house-about-foreign-fraud-safeguards-for-%E2%80%9Cwe-the-people%E2%80%9D-petition-site/

  6. As long as the government of both Turkey and Azerbaijan are hostile towards Armenians then all are enemy’s. And yes im sympathetic and appreciative to brave Azeri’s like Mr. Eylisli .

    Remember, Talaat used to go to Armenian organizations and promise reforms and freedoms. All the while planning their mass extermination.

  7. It has been noted in some reports that Ekrem Eylisli’s pen name “Eylisli” was taken from the name of his home village in Nakhchivan, Eylis. But nobody seems to have noted that Eylis is the modern name of the formerly Armenian town of Agulis.

  8. Kerim,

    “First, let me say this. I am an Azeri who believes Nagorno Karabak proper should be recognized as independent, in exchange for the adjacent occupied territories that even Armenian government does not want.”

    If you get the adjacent liberated territories you will suffocate NKR in a few years and poison Armenia’s water resources. Did you know that you country poisoned water resources in NKR during the war? It is not what the Armenian government wants or does not want; it is what people of Artsakh want. Do you know any country who won the war and gave back land? Did you watch the video I posted?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZUWvi4RO_c

  9. Avery, I am sorry, sometime what you write here makes sense, but this particular thread is just silly. Look at it this way.

    You say: “The leader of Azeri pro-government party Muasir Musavat….”: concentrate on ‘leader’. ”

    Well, according to your logic, the leader of a pro-Democratic US party (mind you not the actual Democratic party) says that Japanese are American enemies, and therefore American leadership promotes the hatred of Japanese as official White House Policy. Another nice trick you reseort to is to use “the pro-government party”, whereas in all the news it was “a pro-government party”. You know how many of those are out there? Dozens! Also, never mind that the Western MEdia, and you, conviniently skip over the fact the Azeri government actually put him in his place and warned him with arrest.

    But once again, we have our Aylislis. Where are yours?

  10. Avery, I am sorry, but I have to respond to these too. It is puzzling to me how you feel justified in thinking thusly:

    “Armenians petitioned Moscow and protested – peacefully – to leave Azerbaijan starting around 1987.”

    Are you saying that all you wanted was our internationally recognized land? We are sorry. I am sure the US would be thrileld and highly supportive if the local hispanic population of a Texas town … if all they wanted was to “unite” with Mexico and blocked the administration of US law in their city. Are you serious?

    And then you say something even more baffling:

    “When Azerbaijan declared Independence from USSR in 1991, its legal mandate to govern NKAO ended.”

    What?! Where do you get this? What international law support this? Are you saying that all former Soviet Union republics lost their territorial definitions the moment they become independent? How about those dozens of autonomous republics within Russia? Did they automatically become independent?

    The thing is, my dear Avery, international law is international law. You cannot define it the way that suits Avery. According to all international laws, Nagorno Karabak has been and is Azeri land. De facto, it is not. But not for too long.

    • Kerim,unfortunately you live in another planet.Your quote:
      “The thing is, my dear Avery, international law is international law. You cannot define it the way that suits Avery. According to all international laws, Nagorno Karabak has been and is Azeri land. De facto, it is not. But not for too long.”
      Do you know about the UN Helsinki Final Act, namely non-use of force, territorial integrity and nations’ right to self-determination?

      Artsakh by force (Stalin) has been an Autonomous Republic within AXEbaijan with majority of Armenian population.Why was it an Autonomous Republic?

      Now read the last 5 words ‘nations’ right to self-determination’ & explain to me how Artsakh differs from Kosovo which was always part of Serbia?

      Your line:”De facto, it is not. But not for too long.” We’ll see.We’re a very patient race & we’ll see what will happen that ‘not for long’.

    • Kerim,

      Use your own basic common sense can you tell us since, when Axerbaijan was an independent county??And when all of sudden International laws become Axerbaijani laws??Have you ever thought, that why NKR and Nakhichevan became an autonomous republic in USSR??Have you ever thought that international laws would exist, for Axerbaijan, if USSR was alive today??

      USSR is dead so is Uncle Joe and Lenin and Soviet uncivilized constitutional and dictatorial laws. Both dictators including today’s Alieyev dynasty have common mentalities. Aliyev does not care for Artsakh, but repositioning his dictatorial grip over his brainwashed and uneducated sheikhdom population!!on. Remember your people still hold portion of Artsakhi land and we are very much determine to get them back to it’s proper owner, and on top of that it is situation of Nakhichevan Autonomous republic position, as of today, where USSR laws is not valid to hold Nakhichevan within INTERNATIONAL LAWS!!

      Kerim Khan, Just pray, at least, that you have a stolen name from Iranian Azerbaijan and have world tallest flag pole, where your Sultan repairing and measuring his pole every other day, in order to fool more Tatar- Turks and keep their moral high like his flag. Your rich sheikhdom has %40 poverty rate, and the Sultan and his gangs shipping free oil toward Western nations and Israel, just to get few more toy guns, printing anti-Armenian booklets, for your future coward “axers” rapists and snipers.

      It is time, for people like you to wake up and find the realities of fake Axerbaijani oil Sheikhdom!!

    • Let me add South Sudan & East Timor on top of Kosovo.These are 3 countries that lately have won their independence based on nations’ right to self-determination.

  11. Avery,
    This man Kerim is pulling your leg and has totally devoted himself to that end and not only to you but all of us here online at this forum.
    What´s hew driving at? Artsakh Nagorno karabagh IS NOT OUR MAIN ISSUE, though it forms part of the main-major issue of our Demand for Justice to great Turkley(their cousin or big brother) that has EVICTED THE ARMENIANS FROM THIER NATIVE LANDS.Witness AghtamaraMonastery in VAN Vaspouragan our oldest province in Western Armenia
    !!!!, witness Saint Giragosa(in Diarbakia) .He talks big.Tell him YOUR PEOPLE HAVE illegally Occupied Shaumian and Martakert AND ABOVE ALL NAKHIJEVAN!
    So what on earth are you talking about.
    We shall from now on press for yet other demands from Axeerbaijan as to OILFIELDS illegally usurped from 5 armenian families who started the oil industry in BAki…..
    So put this guy in place and tell him we mean business.It may take a bit longer than expected but then we Armenians are not to bend over EVER!!!!!!

    • Mr. Palandjian:

      thanks for the heads up, but Avery is not as dumb as is commonly believed.
      Granted, Avery is not as experienced and intelligent as most and proudly makes many mistakes, but is no Spring rooster either.
      And Avery has a couple of tricks up his sleeve: when they pull his leg, he pulls the pin and throws it.

      (….and when someone starts talking about themselves in the 3rd person, you know it’s time for Xanax…)

  12. Kerim:

    We have discussed all that before. I don’t mind repeating my previous posts – they are on file – but it is not very productive.
    I have covered NKAO under USSR and thereafter. If you are not familiar under what legal conditions NKAO was administered by Azerbaijan SSR when USSR was intact, then you need to study it.
    I have also covered UN Charters regarding Territorial Integrity and Self Determination Clause.
    But Azeris – not surprisingly – only remember the Territorial Integrity clause.

    You are an advocate for the Azeri side, and I give you credit for putting up a good fight vis-à-vis many of us Armenians on the comment pages of AW. As far as I remember, you have lasted the longest: I welcome your participation. It gives me and my compatriots the opportunity to present our side for the neutral 3rd parties to evaluate. Yours is a valiant effort, but I don’t think you are doing a very convincing job. Not that we are a lot smarter: our job is a lot easier, because facts are mostly on our side. It is much harder to manufacture and defends myths.

    But if you want to have a more or less intellectual discussion, you gotta stop making things up so blatantly, and throwing stuff out hoping nobody will catch your manufactured nonsense:

    _ you blatantly lied about being in Baku in 1990 (in another thread): claimed you were there and there were No pogroms of Armenians, hoping nobody would check. I caught you at it, using the sources you yourself had provided.
    You did not say “there were no pogroms”: that would be an understandable mistake. I too make lots of mistakes.
    You said “I was there, and there was no pogrom”: that was a blatant lie.
    _ in another thread, you claimed the Dadivanq church is supposedly Caucasian Albanian: [Sella] produced a link showing where the C.Alb was; nowhere near the church in question. Again, you just threw something out hoping nobody would check.
    _ in another thread you claimed you did not count the supposed 400,000 Azeris expelled from RoA (real figure is 170,000).
    _ in above post you deliberately twisted ‘leader’ to ‘some random’: read Bagratuni’s reply to you.

    I mean, it never stops. You keep manufacturing stuff and we try to be reasonable and reply to you with facts. You are almost like an individual version of what the State of Azerbaijan does: outright lies, omission or twisting of facts, blatant falsehoods, manufactured history, myths presented as facts, and on, and on – with no end in sight.

    For example, every January, Azerbaijan officially marks ‘Black January’: Fine. But the story magically begins on January 19th, when Soviet troops entered Baku.
    Not one word is said about what happened from January 12-19: Not a single word. In the magic Azerbaijani universe, the massacre of Armenian civilians in Baku, in response to which Moscow sent troops to Baku – never happened.

  13. Avery, it seems you take an admission of a factual error as a sign of being a liar. Specifically, after you had pointed out to me Thomas De Waal’s writings on the Armenian pogrom in Baku, I said, ok, I had been wrong. I admit it on his authority, which I respect. But, and this is the BUT you skip, is that that very same Thomas, in that very same book you quote, essentially cites your President Sarkissian admitting that Khodjali civilians were murdered as a tactical (and deliberate) move … to scare off Azeris from their homes in future assaults. And this should come no surprise. Another war crime, officially condemned by Human Rights Watch was in Kelbejar too: (Azerbaijan: Seven years of conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. Human Right Watch. 1994. pp. 35–54. ISBN 1-56432-142-8.). The bottom line is, you cannot cherry pick your facts. If you cite Thomas De Waal as a trusted authority, then you must also believe your Sarkissian to be a war criminal. It is funny that you accuse me of omitting relevant context, but you do that very same thing in that very same post.

    As for Kosovo, this is one of those instances where the exceptions prove the rule: their rarity is a testimony to the authority of the rule. As for Karabak using Kosovo as the model, the very same people who made the exception for Kosovo explicitly state that Karabak situation is different. But of course, none of this is news: superpowers always interpret rules as they suit them. Take Russia. The very same country which rejects Kosovo independence on territorial integrity grounds, has made Osetiya and Abkhasiya independent.

    I personally think that Karabak should be independent (within its traditional borders, since no country is justified in taking over the land of a hostile neighbor simply because they want a security buffer or because they thinkg it belonged to them 1000 year ago – I mean, they can but that is not part of ANY international law). And also, one must be careful so as not to abuse the self-determination clause just as one must be with the territorial integrity clause. What, eg, is to therefore prevent a local Mexican population of a Texas town wanting to self-determine themselves as being part of Mexico? Would Washington be like, “Of course, amigos! Here are the keys to the door. Adios!”

    Also, it is pretty clear that Karbaak is misusing the self-determination clause. Does anyone really believe that Karabak wants independence, and not unification with Armenia (Look, this ultimate goal is even visible on its flag). The thing is, your guys probably sat down in one room, and tried to come up with at least a prima facie justification within international law, and found the self-determination thing as your best option. Otherwise, your case would have been a garden-variety case of a territorial claim, for which international laws is very strict.)

    Anyways. I will tell you this. We all are biased. It is part of human nature to cherry pick context and facts. I think the difference between you and I is that I am aware of it and admit it, but you seem to think that what you say is the objective word of God. You are actually one of the posters here who is the least guilty of it. Many of your brethren here have such a black/white view of things that I feel strongly drawn to trying to “debunk” their positions. Them being an Armenian is almost incidental to this “obsession” of mine. And trust me, we have the same problem on our side, where most Azeris somehow have convinced themselves that there had never been such a thing as Ancient Armenia ever, etc. Why don’t I then go and argue with them? That is a good question. Partially because there are no such forums in Azerbaijan. So I commend AW. Which reminds me … I need to get a life. I will try to stay away, at least for a while.

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