The 1994 Baku Metro bombings was a series of terrorist incidents in

Baku Baku (, ; az, Bakı ) is the capital and largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and of the Caucasus region. Baku is located below sea level, which makes it the lowest lying national capital in the world an ...

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan (, ; az, Azərbaycan ), officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, , also sometimes officially called the Azerbaijan Republic is a transcontinental country located at the boundary of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is a part of th ...

. The first attack was perpetrated at the "20 January"

metro station A metro station or subway station is a station for a rapid transit system, which as a whole is usually called a "metro" or "subway". A station provides a means for passengers to purchase tickets, board trains, and evacuate the system in t ...

, while the second one took place between the "28 May" and "Ganjlik" stations. As a result of the first attack, 14 people were killed and 49 wounded. The second attack resulted in 13 people killed and 42 injured. The responsibility was assumed by Sadval, a Lezghin separatist movement, now defunct. Eleven indirect perpetrators of the first attack were charged: two have been sentenced to

life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence of imprisonment for a crime under which convicted people are to remain in prison for the rest of their natural lives or indefinitely until pardoned, paroled, or otherwise commuted to a fixed term. Crimes fo ...

and nine others to 15 years. The lone perpetrator of the second attack was also sentenced to life imprisonment.

The bombings

The first attack, a

suicide bombing A suicide attack is any violent attack, usually entailing the attacker detonating an explosive, where the attacker has accepted their own death as a direct result of the attacking method used. Suicide attacks have occurred throughout histor ...

, occurred on 19 March at the "20 January" metro station at 13:00

local time Local time is the time observed in a specific locality. There is no canonical definition. Originally it was mean solar time, but since the introduction of time zones it is generally the time as determined by the time zone in effect, with daylight s ...

. The time bomb planted under a seat in the head

railroad car A railroad car, railcar (American and Canadian English), railway wagon, railway carriage, railway truck, railwagon, railcarriage or railtruck (British English and UIC), also called a train car, train wagon, train carriage or train truck, is a ...

detonated when it stopped at the station, killing the immediate perpetrator Oktay Gurbanov. The lead railroad car was destroyed and the station's roof partially collapsed. Among the victims was Azeri jazzman

Rafig Babayev Rafig Farzi oglu Babayev ( az, Rafiq Farzi oğlu Babayev, 31 March 1937 – 19 March 1994) was an Azerbaijani jazz musician, composer, conductor, arranger, author of scores for films, and People's Artist of Azerbaijan (1993). Biography Rafig Baba ...

, whose workplace was near the station. The work of Baku Metro was temporarily suspended afterwards. The second attack was perpetrated on 3 July. The bomb (a remote controlled gelatine explosive, according to Azeri intelligence authorities) detonated at 8:30 a.m. local time when the train, having departed from the "28 May" station, was 500 m away from the "Ganjlik"

railway platform A railway platform is an area alongside a railway track providing convenient access to trains. Almost all stations have some form of platform, with larger stations having multiple platforms. The world's longest station platform is at Hubbali ...

. The majority of persons injured in that attack has been promptly released after medical assistance.

Investigation

Following the attacks, President

Heydar Aliyev Heydar Alirza oghlu Aliyev ( az, Һејдәр Әлирза оғлу Әлијев, italic=no, Heydər Əlirza oğlu Əliyev, ; , ; 10 May 1923 – 12 December 2003) was a Soviet and Azerbaijani politician who served as the third president of Azer ...

signed a decree on formation of the State Investigation Commission. During the investigation, Armenian intelligence officers, accused of involvement in the series of metro bombings in Baku as well as on Azerbaijani trains operating both in Azerbaijan and Russia, were taken into custody in

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

. The Russian citizens Kamo Fyodorovich Saakov, an

ethnic Armenian Armenians ( hy, հայեր, ''Romanization of Armenian, hayer'' ) are an ethnic group native to the Armenian highlands of Western Asia. Armenians constitute the main population of Armenia and the ''de facto'' independent Republic of Artsakh ...

, his wife Irina Alexandrovna Saakova and Anatoly Anatolyevich Ilchuk were arrested in July 1994, charged with preparations of the attacks. In August of the same year Saakov was sentenced to

and Ilchuk to 15-year imprisonment for preparation of diversion, contraband and illegal custody of weaponry. The investigation ended in early October 1995. On 29 November 1997, the Russian law enforcement bodies

extradited Extradition is an action wherein one jurisdiction delivers a person accused or convicted of committing a crime in another jurisdiction, over to the other's law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement procedure between the two jurisdi ...

to Azerbaijan the 30-year-old Lezghin Azer Aslanov, who was charged with planting a bomb in the second attack. According to Azerbaijani Prosecutor General's Office, Aslanov was taken prisoner by Armenian military in January 1994 while serving in the Azerbaijani army and was commissioned by the Armenian security service to plant the bomb in Baku. According to the former senior investigator and counterintelligence officer of the Ministry of Security of Azerbaijan, Lieutenant Colonel Ramin Nagiyev ( az, Ramin Nağıyev) (russian: Рамин Нагиев), who had served in the

Ryazan Ryazan ( rus, Рязань, p=rʲɪˈzanʲ, a=ru-Ryazan.ogg) is the largest city and administrative center of Ryazan Oblast, Russia. The city is located on the banks of the Oka River in Central Russia, southeast of Moscow. As of the 2010 Cens ...

military prosecutor's office during the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

and who investigated high-profile crimes in Azerbaijan including the 1994 Baku bombings and sent 180 terrorism cases to court by 1999, the 1994 Baku Metro bombings, the 1999 Ryazan apartment bombings, the 1999 Moscow bombings, and other terrorist actions were very similar and allegedly the these events received support from the FSK and later the FSB. The Russian citizen of ethnic Azerbaijani origin, Nariman Ramazanov (russian: Нариман Рамазанов), who was believed to be the mastermind of the bombing, was detained by Azerbaijani security services in June 1996, but was released back to Russia during a prisoner exchange shortly afterwards upon orders from the highest levels of the government of Azerbaijan. Nagiyev believed that high ranking Azerbaijani officials, such as

Ilham Aliyev Ilham Heydar oghlu Aliyev ( az, İlham Heydər oğlu Əliyev, ; born 24 December 1961) is the fourth president of Azerbaijan, serving in the post since 31 October 2003. The son and second child of the former Azerbaijani leader Heydar Aliyev, ...

, had been compromised by the

Kremlin The Kremlin ( rus, Московский Кремль, r=Moskovskiy Kreml', p=ˈmɐˈskofskʲɪj krʲemlʲ, t=Moscow Kremlin) is a fortified complex in the center of Moscow founded by the Rurik dynasty. It is the best known of the kremlins (Ru ...

.Alternate archive
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/ref> Both

Alexander Litvinenko Alexander Valterovich "Sasha" Litvinenko (30 August 1962 ( at WebCite) or 4 December 1962 – 23 November 2006) was a British-naturalised Russian defector and former officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) who specialised i ...

and

Yuri Felshtinsky Yuri Georgievich Felshtinsky (russian: Юрий Георгиевич Фельштинский, born 7 September 1956 in Moscow) is a Russian American historian. Felshtinsky has authored a number of books on Russian history, including ''The Bol ...

supported Nagiyev's allegations, too, and detailed their allegations in the book '' Blowing Up Russia'' which was banned in Russia.

Notes

References

* * Full text available a
Yuri Felshtinsky's web site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Baku Metro bombings Terrorist incidents in Asia in 1994 Terrorist incidents in Europe in 1994

Terrorist incidents in Azerbaijan Suicide bombings in Azerbaijan Mass murder in 1994 20th century in Baku Baku Metro Bombings, 1994 Terrorist incidents on underground rapid transit systems Attacks on railway stations Baku Metro Bombings, 1994 Building bombings in Europe Building bombings in Asia

The bombings

Investigation

See also

Notes

References