Activists from the “community” from 12 Russian cities attended the event. As we can see, certain circles in Russia are trying to escalate a game that, in reality, has already ended.
But let’s take a look at the entire news item, eagerly spread by the “community” on its Telegram channel. So, a certain “Deputy Head of the Community for Relations with Citizens of the Russian Federation and Russian Organizations, Andrey Sergeyev, in his address, thanked his fellow countrymen for their efforts in the consolidation of Karabakh Russians and Orthodox Christians, who have been forced to live in Russia after the expulsion of the entire Christian population from Karabakh in September 2023.”
“Karabakh should not be part of Azerbaijan, considering everything that has happened! We have no moral right to tolerate the injustice and cruelty towards the peaceful population of the ‘Nagorno Karabakh Republic’ (quotation marks – ed). Everything our children and elderly people faced during the nine-month ‘blockade,’ arranged by official Baku before the eyes of the entire world, and the military actions launched, in violation of all peace agreements, are nothing short of ‘crimes against humanity, a blatant violation of all moral and ethical principles,'” he stated.
Sergeyev is shocked that “activists from the Russian community of Azerbaijan were also involved in this, shamelessly posing for the camera while blocking the only lifeline — the Lachin corridor.” In his speech, Andrey Sergeyev also remarked: “For each of us, the sacred Karabakh land is our homeland! There is no doubt that the Karabakh Armenians and Russians will definitely return to Karabakh, which has historically been Armenian.”
There were many other provocative statements made, but I will limit myself to what I’ve already mentioned. The essence and goal of this provocation are clear. First of all, the choice of venue for this event was not accidental. It serves as an indicator of how, at a time when relations between Azerbaijan and Russia are cooling, certain forces within the Russian intelligence services have decided to resort to such provocations. Let me immediately point out that this is an empty stunt.
I’ll start by noting that according to the 1989 census, there were 1,922 Russians living in the then Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) of the Azerbaijan SSR. However, there’s one “but.” On the territory of the former NKAO, there was only one village with a predominantly Russian population — Kurapatkino in the Khojaly district, where about 800 people lived before the war (mostly Molokans). In 1992, due to Armenian aggression and occupation, the village was deserted, and soon after, likely out of a great affection Armenians had for Russians, it was renamed “Gevorgavan.” Most of the village’s residents moved to Russia, while others relocated to Baku. So, where is the remaining portion of the 1,922 Russians living in Karabakh according to the 1989 census? The answer is obvious: the lion’s share of them were government and party officials from Azerbaijan, as well as members of the Special Management Committee and military command sent from Moscow. They didn’t stay in Karabakh once the conflict began.
And one more thing. In August 2023, a statement was issued by the Republican Council of the Russian Community of Azerbaijan in response to the attempt by the “pseudo-Russian community” of the Karabakh region to play a political card. “There is no territorial unit called ‘Nagorno-Karabakh’ in Azerbaijan. There is one Russian community in Azerbaijan, which was registered by the Ministry of Justice in 1993 and currently has more than 120,000 members. Our organization is recognized by all international structures and has been actively operating for 30 years. If there are ethnic Russians in Karabakh who wish to join the Russian community of Azerbaijan, they should contact us to apply for membership. We are ready to respond to their requests and provide all the necessary information for this,” the statement emphasized.
As we can see, certain forces in Russia, who orchestrated this provocation, managed to present themselves as even more Armenian than Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who has repeatedly stated that he recognizes Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, including Karabakh. I would also like to mention that the main figure behind the anti-Azerbaijani provocation in Moscow, Andrey Sergeyev, attempted to give the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict a religious character, which is monstrous and immoral. After all, unlike ethnically homogeneous Armenia, Azerbaijan is home to Russians, Ukrainians, Jews, Lezgins, Talysh, and representatives of many other nationalities. Sergeyev believes that “we have every right to initiate the necessary processes and demand the fairest solution, including the well-deserved return to our free homeland.” And here I will repeat — in this sense, he turned out to be more Armenian than Armenia’s second president, Robert Kocharyan, who today stated that “the only viable option for Armenians to return to Karabakh is to hold onto the November 10, 2020 statement,” while admitting that even the possibility of achieving anything by clinging to this lifeline is “extremely small.”
To sum up, I would like to remind the organizers of yet another anti-Azerbaijani provocation in Moscow (and of course, this is not Andrey Sergeyev, no, he’s just a pawn in the game of Russian intelligence services) that the Declaration on Allied Interaction between Azerbaijan and Russia has not been cancelled. The first point of this document states: “The Russian Federation and the Republic of Azerbaijan build their relations on the basis of allied interaction, mutual respect for independence, state sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability of the state borders of the two countries, as well as adherence to the principles of non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, peaceful settlement of disputes and non-use of force or threat of force.”
Clearly, those who organized the provocation in Moscow continue to operate with narratives from the conflict in southeastern Ukraine. After all, a picture emerges of imposing a Donbas scenario in the Karabakh region. It worked once; will it work again? This, to put it mildly, is a mistake. And the sooner those responsible for it are put in their place, the better it will be for the present and future of Azerbaijani-Russian relations.
Elchin Lasizada
Caliber.Az
