Memory of victims of Sumgait pogroms honored in Paris with a minute of silence
On February 23, at one of the most important cultural centers in Paris, at the Théâtre de la Ville, Armenian duduk player Levon Minassian together with his sister, singer Roselyne Minassian gave a concert. Musicians who had specially arrived from Armenia accompanied them. The concert was dedicated to the memory of the victims of the Sumgait pogroms.
According to Information and public relations department of Armenian Foreign Ministry, Théâtre de la Ville was overfilled: More than 1,000 people honored the victims of the crime with a minute of silence.
According to the report, the concert included works by Komitas, as well as Armenian folk songs. The French audience admired the excellent performance of the Armenian musicians.
On 26-29 February 1988 in terms of actual complicity of local authorities and inaction of the USSR government mass pogroms of civilians were organized in Sumgait city of Azerbaijani SSR, accompanied with unprecedented brutal murders, violence and pillaging against the Armenian population of the city. Armenian pogroms in Sumgait were carefully organized. At the meetings, which began on February 26 in the central square, city leaders openly called for violence against the Armenians.
On February 27 protests which were attended by hundreds of rioters turned into violence. Armed with axes, knives, specially sharpened rebar, rocks and cans of gasoline and with the pre-compiled lists of apartments where Armenians lived the rioters broke into the houses, turning everything upside down there and killing the owners. In the same time, people were often taken out to the streets or to the courtyard for jeering at them publicly. After painful humiliations and torture the victims were doused with gasoline and burnt alive. On February 29 army troops entered Sumgait but without an order to intervene. Only in the evening, when the mad crowd began to attack the soldiers the military units took up decisive steps.
The exact number of victims of Sumgait pogroms is still unknown. According to official data, 27 Armenians were killed; however there is ample evidence that several hundred Armenians have been killed in the city in three days. There is also evidence that the riots were coordinated by the Azerbaijani KGB. Executioners of Sumgait were subsequently declared as national heroes of Azerbaijan.
Documentary “Ordinary Genocide: Sumgait 1988.”