Mass deportation of Azerbaijanis from Armenia took place several times throughout the 20th century, and sometimes some of them have been described by some authors as acts of

forced resettlement Population transfer or resettlement is a type of mass migration that is often imposed by a state policy or international authority. Such mass migrations are most frequently spurred on the basis of ethnicity or religion, but they also occur d ...

and

ethnic cleansing Ethnic cleansing is the systematic forced removal of ethnic, racial, or religious groups from a given area, with the intent of making the society ethnically homogeneous. Along with direct removal such as deportation or population transfer, it ...

. Prior to the

October Revolution The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two r ...

Azerbaijanis Azerbaijanis (; , ), Azeris (, ), or Azerbaijani Turks (, ) are a Turkic peoples, Turkic ethnic group living mainly in the Azerbaijan (Iran), Azerbaijan region of northwestern Iran and the Azerbaijan, Republic of Azerbaijan. They are predomin ...

had made up 43 percent of the population of

Yerevan Yerevan ( , , ; ; sometimes spelled Erevan) is the capital and largest city of Armenia, as well as one of the world's List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest continuously inhabited cities. Situated along the Hrazdan River, Yerev ...

. The Tatar (i.e. Azerbaijani) population endured a process of forced migration from the territory of the

First Republic of Armenia The First Republic of Armenia, officially known at the time of its existence as the Republic of Armenia, was an independent History of Armenia, Armenian state that existed from May (28th ''de jure'', 30th ''de facto'') 1918 to 2 December 1920 in ...

and later in the

Armenian SSR The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic (ArSSR), also known as Soviet Armenia, or simply Armenia, was one of the constituent republics of the Soviet Union, located in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Soviet Armenia bordered the Soviet republics ...

several times during the 20th century. Under Stalin's policies, approximately 100,000 Azerbaijanis were deported from the Armenian SSR in 1948.Grenoble, Lenore A
Language Policy in the Soviet Union.
Springer: 2003, p.135

Prior to the Revolution, Azerbaijanis had made up 43 percent of the population of Erevan, but approximately 100,000 were deported from the Armenian SSR in 1948 (Dragadze 1990:166–7).

Their houses were subsequently inhabited by Armenian repatriates who arrived in the Soviet Union from abroad.- Н. А. Добронравин, профессор, доктор филологических наук
: Около 53 тыс. азербайджанцев оказались переселены из Армении, в основном из горных районов, в Кура-Араксинскую низменность Азербайджана, где быстро развивалось хлопководство. Освободившиеся дома заселяли армяне, переехавшие в Советский Союз из-за рубежа. — Page 334 Azerbaijanis continued to live in the Armenian SSR until the outbreak of the

Nagorno-Karabakh conflict The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is an ethnic and territorial conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh, inhabited mostly by ethnic Armenians until 2023, and seven surrounding districts, inhabited mostly by Azerbai ...

in 1988–89, when practically all Azerbaijanis in Armenia left or were expelled concurrently with the expulsion/flight of Armenians from Azerbaijan. The deportation was done largely without bloodshed and it was partially in response to Armenians being forced out of Azerbaijan; it was also the last phase of the gradual homogenization of the Armenian republic under Soviet rule.

Beginning of the 20th century

As a result of Armenian-Azerbaijani interethnic conflict in the beginning of the 20th century, as well as Armenian and Azerbaijani nationalists' coordinated policy of ethnic cleansing, a substantial portion of the Armenian and Azerbaijani population was driven out from the territory of both Republic of Armenia and Republic of Azerbaijan. Starting in the middle of 1918, Armenian paramilitary forces under the leadership of General

Andranik Ozanian Andranik Ozanian, commonly known as General Andranik or simply Andranik (25 February 186531 August 1927), was an Armenian military commander and statesman, the best known '' fedayi'' and a key figure of the Armenian national liberation movem ...

destroyed Muslim settlements in

Zangezur Zangezur () is a historical and geographical region in Eastern Armenia on the slopes of the Zangezur Mountains which largely corresponds to the Syunik Province of Armenia. It was ceded to Russia by Qajar Iran according to the Treaty of Gulistan ...

(the southernmost part of modern-day Armenia). The British command, which had its own political objectives didn't allow Andranik to extend his activity to

Karabakh Karabakh ( ; ) is a geographic region in southwestern Azerbaijan and eastern Armenia, extending from the highlands of the Lesser Caucasus down to the lowlands between the rivers Kura and Aras. It is divided into three regions: Highland Kara ...

. Andranik brought 30,000

Armenian Genocide The Armenian genocide was the systematic destruction of the Armenians, Armenian people and identity in the Ottoman Empire during World War I. Spearheaded by the ruling Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), it was implemented primarily t ...

survivors from

Eastern Anatolia The Eastern Anatolia region () is a geographical region of Turkey. The most populous province in the region is Van Province. Other populous provinces are Malatya, Erzurum and Elazığ. It is bordered by the Black Sea Region and Georgia in th ...

in the Ottoman Empire, mainly from

Mush In multiplayer online games, a MUSH (a backronymed variation on Multi-user dungeon, MUD most often expanded as Multi-User Shared Hallucination, though Multi-User Shared Hack, Habitat, and Holodeck are also observed) is a text-based online social m ...

and

Bitlis Bitlis ( or ; ) is a city in southeastern Turkey. It is the seat of Bitlis District and Bitlis Province.Yerevan Yerevan ( , , ; ; sometimes spelled Erevan) is the capital and largest city of Armenia, as well as one of the world's List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest continuously inhabited cities. Situated along the Hrazdan River, Yerev ...

and Daralagoz, where they took the place of outcast Muslims in order to making Armenia's key regions ethnically homogeneous. Soviet Armenian historian and Bolshevik politician Bagrat Boryan charged that the ARF had not established state authority for the administrative needs of Armenia, but for the “extermination of the Muslim population and looting of their property”. According to data from Caucasian Ethnographical Collection of Academy of Sciences of the USSR, "the settlements of Azerbaijani population in Armenia had become empty." Nataliya Volkova writes that the ruling party of the

, the ARF-Dashnaktsutyun, followed a "policy of 'cleansing the country from outsiders'" which "targeted the Muslim population, especially those who had been driven out from Novobayazet,

Echmiadzin Vagharshapat ( ) is the 5th-largest city in Armenia and the most populous municipal community of Armavir Province, located about west of the capital Yerevan, and north of the closed Turkish-Armenian border. It is commonly known as Ejmiatsin ...

and Sherur-Daralagoz districts. Volkova writes:

In 1897, out of the 137.9 thousand people living in
Zangezur uezd The Zangezur ''uezd'' was a county (''uezd'') of the Elizavetpol Governorate of the Russian Empire with its administrative center in Gerusy (present-day Goris) from 1868 until its formal abolition and partition between the Soviet republics of A ...
, 63.6 thousand was Armenian (46.2 percent), 71.2 thousand was Azerbaijani (51.7 percent), 1,8 thousand was Kurdish (1.3%). According to agricultural census of 1922, the whole population of Zangezur was 63.5 thousand people, including 59.9 thousand Armenians (89.5%), 6.5 thousand Azerbaijanis (10.2%) and 200 Russians (0.3%).

Relocation from the Armenian SSR

The relocation of the Azerbaijani population during the Stalinist era happened after the establishment of the

. According to the First All-Union Census of the Soviet Union of 1926, Azerbaijanis made up 9.6% of the Republic's population (84,705 people). According to All-Union census of 1939, 130,896 Azerbaijanis lived in Armenian SSR. Results of All-Union census of 1959 show that this figure decreased to 107,748, although Azerbaijanis had one of the highest birth rates in the Soviet Union. The Soviet-era deportation of Azerbaijanis from Armenia and relocation of Armenians living outside the borders of the Soviet Union to Armenia, favoured by the Stalinist policy was the main factor of decrease in the size of Azerbaijani population. In 1937, Muslim Kurds were deported to Kazakhstan from border districts of Armenia with Turkey, immediately after appearance of the problem in USSR-Turkey relations, because of Turkey's denial of the Soviet Union's request for joint control of the

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

straits. In 1945 the Soviet Union presented a territorial claim to Turkish territories of

Kars Kars ( or ; ; ) is a city in northeast Turkey. It is the seat of Kars Province and Kars District.� ...

and

Ardahan Ardahan ( ka, არტაანი, tr; ; Russian: Ардаган) is a city in northeastern Turkey, near the Georgian border. It is the seat of Ardahan Province and Ardahan District. Azerbaijanis were potential “

fifth column A fifth column is a group of people who undermine a larger group or nation from within, usually in favor of an enemy group or another nation. The activities of a fifth column can be overt or clandestine. Forces gathered in secret can mobilize ...

s” in the case of conflict with Turkey and for this reason Stalin signed off Azerbaijani population's deportation from Armenian SSR in accordance with the Soviet Union's Council of Ministers’ Resolution No. 4083 from December 23, 1947. One clauses of the resolution stated: Details of resettlement were defined in the Soviet Union's Council of Ministers’ Resolution No. 754. The part of kolkhoz's (collective farm) moveable property was assigned and gratuitous transportation of this property to the new settlement was provided for the deported. The price of moveable property abandoned in Armenia was paid for in kolkhozes at places of the new settlement of Azerbaijanis. Some benefits were given to migrants and at the same time, permanent grants of 1000 rubles were given out per head of the family and 300 rubles per each member of the family. According to historian Vladislav Zubok, due to calls from

Grigory Arutinov Grigory Artemievich Arutinov or Grigor Artemi Harutyunyan (, ; November 7, 1900 – November 9, 1957) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Armenian SSR from 24 September 1937 to 12 March 1953. His tenure as first secretary was t ...

, the First Secretary of Armenian SSR's Communist Party's Central Committee, Stalin ordered to deport Azerbaijani population from the Armenian SSR to the Azerbaijan SSR. At the same time, he gave consent for the repatriation of 90,000 Armenians to settlements of the newly deported Azerbaijanis. The resettlement was not voluntary. According to Krista A. Goff, First Secretary of the Azerbaijan SSR

Mir Jafar Baghirov Mir Jafar Abbas oghlu Baghirov (, ; 17 September 1896 – 7 May 1956) was the communist leader of the Azerbaijan SSR from 1933 to 1953, under the Soviet leadership of Joseph Stalin. Early life Born in Quba of Baku Governorate in 1896, Baghirov ...

and Arutinov worked together to facilitate Azerbaijani relocation.''Krista A. Goff.'' Nested Nationalism: Making and Unmaking Nations in the Soviet Caucasus.
Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2021. At the time, the Kura-Aras lowlands in Azerbaijan were sparsely populated, infrastructurally undeveloped, and economically unproductive. Through resettlement of Azerbaijanis in the Armenian SSR to the Azerbaijan SSR, Azerbaijan would gain a labor force that could make the Kura-Aras region productive. For the most part, Soviet Azerbaijani officials chose to collaborate in the Azerbaijani resettlement. On some occasions, they accused Armenian officials of subverting the resettlement, on the grounds that they were obstructing the relocation of Azerbaijani migrants and not returning the migrants who came back to Armenia. Indeed, some Armenian officials did obstruct resettlement to keep Azerbaijani collective farmers producing in the Armenian SSR. Numerous reports were received of Azerbaijanis stating their unwillingness to leave the Armenian SSR. The Armenian SSR Interior Ministry reported in 1948 that some Azerbaijanis would even visit cemeteries and pray to the souls of their ancestors "to help them stay in their lands." On the other hand, some groups decided it was better to leave as, in the case of a war with Turkey, they were convinced they would be massacred by Armenians. According to

Thomas de Waal Thomas Patrick Lowndes de Waal (born 1966) is a British journalist and writer on the Caucasus. He is a senior fellow at Carnegie Europe. He is best known for his 2003 book '' Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War''. Li ...

, the Azerbaijanis of Armenia once again fell victims to the Armenian–Turkish question. According to Arsene Saparov, more than 100,000 Azerbaijanis were forcibly resettled to Kura-Aras Lowland of the Azerbaijan SSR in three stages: 10,000 people in 1948, 40,000 in 1949, and 50,000 in 1950. Krista Goff, however, has contested that based on the available documentation only a total of 45,000 were resettled through the period 1948-53. 1348221380 o-pereselenii-iz-zangezura

Nagorno-Karabakh conflict

According to the census of 1979, Azerbaijanis were the largest minority in Armenia making up 5.3% of Armenia's population (approximately 160,800 people). According to a 2003

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a United Nations agency mandated to aid and protect refugees, forcibly displaced communities, and stateless people, and to assist in their voluntary repatriation, l ...

report, Azerbaijanis were expelled from Armenia or fled out of fear following the anti-Armenian pogroms in

Sumgait Sumqayit (or Sumgait; ; , ) is a city in Azerbaijan, located near the Caspian Sea, on the Absheron Peninsula, about away from the capital Baku. The city had a population of 427,000 at the beginning of 2024, making it the List of cities in Azerb ...

and

Baku Baku (, ; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Azerbaijan, largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and in the Caucasus region. Baku is below sea level, which makes it the List of capital ci ...

of 1988–89.

Armenian nationalists Armenian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia * Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent ** Armenian diaspora, Armenian communities around the ...

, together with the Soviet republic's administration, were thought to have co-operated in driving Azerbaijanis out. According to data collected by

Arif Yunusov Arif Seyfulla oghlu Yunusov, () also known as Arif YunusQuote: ''my surname is being written as Yunus without asking, even though I'm still Yunusov according to my passport''. Original:/ref> (born 12 January 1955), is an Azerbaijani author, histo ...

, about 40,897 Azerbaijani families fled and 216 Azerbaijanis died (127 of them killed by Armenians) during the resettlements in 1988–1991. Soviet official statistics confirmed 25 victims from that list to be killed in the northern regions of Armenia, including the Gugark district, where 11 people were killed during the

Gugark pogrom The Gugark pogrom was a pogrom directed against the Azerbaijani minority of the Gugark District (now a part of the Lori Province) in the Armenian SSR, then part of the Soviet Union. The pogrom of Azerbaijanis in Gugark in March 1988 followed t ...

. The remainder of the Azerbaijani population was driven away from the country in 1991. By 2004, not more than 30 Azerbaijanis were living in Armenia.

Razmik Panossian Razmik Panossian (, born 1964) is a Canadian-Armenian historian and political scientist. Career An ethnic Armenian, Panossian was born in Beirut, Lebanon and raised in Canada in a family "engaged with rmeniancommunity affairs." He is fluent in ...

refers to this population transfer as the last phase of Armenia's gradual ethnic homogenization and an episode of ethnic cleansing that increased the country's ethnic Armenian population from 97% to 98%.After Independence
by Lowell W. Barrington. University of Michigan Press, 2006; p. 231. According to

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n human rights defender Sergey Lyozov, the mass deportation of Azerbaijanis from Armenia in November 1988 was one of the factors that turned the

into a "battle to the end" involving either physical extermination or total expulsion of an ethnic group. Changes in the demographic character were accompanied by a policy of renaming settlements and toponyms on the territory of Armenian SSR. In total, more than 600 toponyms have been renamed from 1924 to 1988 in Armenian SSR. Such alterations of toponyms continued in post-Soviet period. According to State Committee's superior Manuk Vardanyan, 57 toponyms were further renamed in 2006, with plans to rename a further 21 settlements in 2007. Azerbaijani cultural institutions in Armenia also suffered as a result of the expulsions. The Agababa-Childir and Daralagoz

ashig An ashik (; ) or ashugh (; ka, აშუღი) is traditionally a singer-poet and bard who accompanies his song—be it a dastan (traditional epic story, also known as '' hikaye'') or a shorter original composition—with a long-necked l ...

schools entirely disappeared in the wake of the expulsion of Azerbaijanis from Armenia.

Population statistics of Azerbaijanis in Armenia

Chronology

• 1947 - The Soviet Union's Councils of Ministers’ resolution about resettlement of Azerbaijanis from Armenian SSR to Azerbaijan SSR • 1947–1950 - Eviction of Azerbaijanis from Armenian SSR • November, 1987- Deportation of Azerbaijanis from Kapan and Meghri districts of the Armenian SSR • February 21, 1988 - Mass demonstrations began in Yerevan for the unification of Nagorno-Karabakh with the Armenia SSR • November, 1988 - Mass deportation of Azerbaijanis from Armenia

Number of Azerbaijanis in Armenia

Changes in the demographic structure of Yerevan

According to the

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

census of 1897,

, then a town called Erivan, had 29,006 residents: 12,523 of them were Armenian-speakers and 12,359 were Tatar-speakers. According to the

Brockhaus and Efron The ''Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopaedic Dictionary'' (35 volumes, small; 86 volumes, large) is a comprehensive multi-volume encyclopaedia in Russian. It contains 121,240 articles, 7,800 images, and 235 maps. It was published in the Russian Emp ...

Encyclopedia, Azerbaijanis (Tatars) made up more than 12 thousand (41 percent) of 29 thousand inhabitants in the city. According to the census of 1959, Armenians made up 96 percent population of the country and in 1989 more than 96.5 percent. Azerbaijanis then made up only 0.1 percent of Yerevan's population, this change was attributed to Soviet nationalities policies. Yerevan's population was changed in Armenians' favour by sidelining the local Muslim population. As a result of the

, the Azerbaijanis of Yerevan were driven away.

Notes

References

Bibliography

* * * * {{Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Modern history of Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic Ethnic cleansing in Asia Forced migration in the Soviet Union