Mammad Hasan Jafargulu oglu Hajinski (; March 3, 1875 – February 9, 1931) was an Azerbaijani architect and statesman. He also served as a

Minister for Foreign Affairs In many countries, the ministry of foreign affairs (abbreviated as MFA or MOFA) is the highest government department exclusively or primarily responsible for the state's foreign policy and relations, diplomacy, bilateral, and multilateral re ...

Azerbaijan Democratic Republic The Azerbaijan Democratic Republic (), also known as the Azerbaijan People's Republic (; ), was the first secular democracy, democratic republic in the Turkic peoples, Turkic and Muslim worlds. *Tadeusz Swietochowski. ''Russia and Azerbaijan: ...

(ADR) and the last Prime Minister of ADR.

Early life

Hajinski was born on March 3, 1875, in Baku. He graduated from ''Baku Realny School'' and then '' Petersburg Technical School'' in 1902 with an engineering degree. He worked at the construction of a Russian oil refinery being built by Azerbaijani businessman Shamsi Asadullayev before he moved back to Azerbaijan and was appointed the director of the construction department of Baku municipality. During the time he held this position, he made significant contributions to architectural improvements of Baku. Under his management, construction of Baku Seaside Boulevard gained a new impetus in 1910, when at his insistence, the Municipal Parliament passed a bill allocating 60,000 rubles for improvements. One of the notable designers employed by Hajinski was Adolph Eykler, the German architect who designed Baku's German Lutheran Church. The project was successfully completed in 1911. In 1913, he headed the municipality for a brief period of time.

Political career

Having secretly joined

Musavat The Müsavat Party (, from ''musāwāt'', ) is the oldest existing political party in Azerbaijan. Its history can be divided into three periods: Early Musavat, Musavat-in-exile and New Musavat. The party was prohibited from contesting the 1995 ...

party in 1911, Hajinski started his open political activities after Russia's

February Revolution The February Revolution (), known in Soviet historiography as the February Bourgeois Democratic Revolution and sometimes as the March Revolution or February Coup was the first of Russian Revolution, two revolutions which took place in Russia ...

of 1917. He also actively participated in establishment and operations of the ''Hummet'' newspaper. On March 22, 1917 Interim Executive Committee of Muslim Council was established and Hajinski was appointed its chairman. He participated in the Baku summit of

Caucasian Caucasian may refer to: Common meanings *Anything from the Caucasus region or related to it ** Ethnic groups in the Caucasus ** ''Caucasian Exarchate'' (1917–1920), an ecclesiastical exarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Caucasus re ...

Muslims and later in Moscow summit of Russian Muslims in May of the same year. He was subsequently elected a deputy to the Russian parliament from Azerbaijan. On November 15, 1917, he was appointed deputy

Commissar Commissar (or sometimes ''Kommissar'') is an English transliteration of the Russian (''komissar''), which means ' commissary'. In English, the transliteration ''commissar'' often refers specifically to the political commissars of Soviet and ...

of Industry and Trade (

Mammad Yusif Jafarov Mammad Yusif Jafarov Hajibaba oghlu (; , 1885 - May 15, 1938) was an Azerbaijani statesman. Early life Jafarov was born on , 1885 in Baku, in the Baku Governorate of the Russian Empire (present-day Azerbaijan). He was the younger brother of a p ...

) of

Transcaucasian Commissariat The Transcaucasian Commissariat was established at Tbilisi on 15 November 1917, as the first government of the independent Transcaucasia following the October Revolution in Petrograd. The Commissariat decided to strengthen the Georgian–Armenia ...

and from April 22, 1918, he served as the Minister of Industry and Trade of

Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic The Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR; 22 April – 28 May 1918) was a short-lived sovereign state, state in the Caucasus that included most of the territory of the present-day Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia (coun ...

Azerbaijan Democratic Republic

On May 28, 1918, when

(ADR) was proclaimed, Hajinski was appointed the

Minister of Foreign Affairs In many countries, the ministry of foreign affairs (abbreviated as MFA or MOFA) is the highest government department exclusively or primarily responsible for the state's foreign policy and foreign relations, relations, diplomacy, bilateralism, ...

within the new

Cabinet of Azerbaijan The Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Azerbaijan () is the highest executive body of Azerbaijan, the executive and governing body over the ministries and other central executive bodies under the president of the Republic of Azerbaijan. A ...

established by Prime Minister Fatali Khan Khoyski and held the office until October 6, 1918. When the second government of ADR was formed, he was appointed the Minister of Internal Affairs of Azerbaijan and worked in the position until February 15, 1920. As the Foreign Minister, on June 4, 1918, Hajinski along with

Mammed Amin Rasulzade Mahammad Amin Akhund Haji Molla Alakbar oghlu Rasulzade (31 January 1884 – 6 March 1955) was an Azerbaijani politician, journalist and the head of the Azerbaijani National Council. He is mainly considered the founder of Azerbaijan Democratic ...

signed a contract with the Turkish government on the provision of military assistance to Azerbaijan. On April 1, 1920, Hajinski was put in charge of forming the new cabinet of ADR. Intending to establish a coalition government he held negotiations with all fractions in the

Azerbaijani Parliament The National Assembly (), also transliterated as Milli Mejlis, is the legislative branch of government in Azerbaijan. The unicameral National Assembly has 125 deputies: previously 100 members were elected for five-year terms in single-seat co ...

including the

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

. By inviting the Bolsheviks to the new government, Hajinski hoped to slow down the advance of 11th Red Army which was already near the Samur bridge, on the Azerbaijani-Russian border and have the detachments of

Azerbaijani Army The Azerbaijani Armed Forces () is the military of the Republic of Azerbaijan. It was re-established according to the country's Law of the Armed Forces on 9 October 1991. The original Azerbaijan Democratic Republic's armed forces were dissolved a ...

relocate to Baku. Most of the Azerbaijani army units were on the frontline in Mountainous Karabakh fighting the

Dashnak The Armenian Revolutionary Federation (, abbr. ARF (ՀՅԴ) or ARF-D), also known as Dashnaktsutyun (Armenian: Դաշնակցություն, lit. "Federation"), is an Armenian nationalist and socialist political party founded in 1890 in Tifl ...

uprising. On April 22, Bolsheviks rejected Hajinski's offer and he notified the acting speaker of the National Assembly, Mammad Yusif Jafarov that the government was in no position to be formed. At the same time, Hajinski left the ranks of Musavat party and officially joined the

Bolshevik Party The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU),. Abbreviated in Russian as КПСС, ''KPSS''. at some points known as the Russian Communist Party (RCP), All-Union Communist Party and Bolshevik Party, and sometimes referred to as the Soviet ...

. With the invasion of the Red Army on April 28, 1920 Azerbaijan Democratic Republic ceased to exist.

Soviet Azerbaijan

During Soviet rule, Hajinski worked in the Agricultural Council of Azerbaijan. From 1923 on, he served as deputy chairman of the Transcaucasian State Planning Committee. He was later arrested on the order of

Lavrentiy Beria Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria ka, ლავრენტი პავლეს ძე ბერია} ''Lavrenti Pavles dze Beria'' ( – 23 December 1953) was a Soviet politician and one of the longest-serving and most influential of Joseph ...

, then the first secretary of the Transcaucasian region. After being tortured, Hajinski died on February 9, 1931, in a

Tiflis Tbilisi ( ; ka, თბილისი, ), in some languages still known by its pre-1936 name Tiflis ( ), ( ka, ტფილისი, tr ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Georgia (country), largest city of Georgia ( ...

prison.

Works

In 1912, Hajinski authored a book on architectural improvements of Baku published by the Baku local municipality.

References