The mass deportation of Azerbaijanis from the historical and ethnic lands of the Armenian SSR in 1948-1953 was the next stage in the policy of Armenians and their protectors to take advantage of the dominance of the Soviet Union at the end of World War II.

On 15 May 1945, Grigory Arutyunov, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Armenia, addressed a letter to Stalin, asking him to solve the issue of “the return” of Armenians living abroad to Soviet Armenia. On 6 June 1945, Stalin receives G. Arutyunov in the Kremlin. He hands Stalin a letter requesting the restoration of the borders between Armenia and Turkey, corresponding to the borders between these countries in 1914.

On 27 October Stalin again receives Arutyunov and tells him that the Soviet government’s territorial claims to Turkey are still in force. G. Arutyunov informs Stalin that more than 300,000 Armenians aspire to Soviet Armenia and asks him, primarily to “eliminate the glaring injustice”, i.e. to solve “the question of Nagorno-Karabakh and Nakhichevan”. At the end of the meeting, G. Arutyunov hands Stalin a document stating that the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Armenia submits for consideration by the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks a proposal to include the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region in the Armenian SSR.

On 21 November 1945, the Council of People’s Commissars (SNK) of the USSR adopted a resolution “On measures to return foreign Armenians to Soviet Armenia”. A week later, the Second Secretary of the CC of the CPSU (B) G. Malenkov sent a telegram to the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan M. Baghirov, outlining Arutyunov’s petition to Stalin for the annexation of Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia in order to learn his opinion on the matter.

On 10 December 1945 Baghirov wrote a reply telegram to Malenkov. Baghirov included in his letter an in-depth historical background on the history of Karabakh, beginning with the establishment of the Karabakh Khanate and concluding with the creation of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast in 1923.

The letter states that he has no objection to the inclusion of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region, except for Shusha, into the Armenian SSR, provided that the issue of the inclusion of the Azizbeyov, Vedi and Karabakhlar districts of the Armenian SSR, adjacent to the Azerbaijan Republic and populated predominantly by Azerbaijanis, into the Azerbaijani SSR is considered. Soon this issue was closed, and the attention of Armenians shifted to the problem of deportation of Azerbaijanis from Armenia.

According to the decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of 19 October 1946, persons of Armenian nationality returning from abroad to Armenia acquire citizenship of the USSR from the moment of their arrival in the Soviet Union. In 1946 alone, 50,900 Armenians immigrated to Armenia from Syria, Greece, Lebanon, Iraq, Bulgaria and Romania. In 1947, 35,400 Armenians arrived from Palestine, Syria, France, USA, Greece, Egypt, Iraq and Lebanon and settled in Armenia. The Armenian leadership explained the decrease in the number of Armenians resettled in 1947 compared to 1946 by the fact that Armenians who moved from abroad were mostly urban dwellers and it was impossible to settle them in mountainous areas. The immigrants wanted to live only in Iravan and its neighbouring areas. A total of 96,000 Armenians were resettled to Armenia from foreign countries in 1946-1949, most of whom settled in Iravan and neighbouring districts.

In early December 1947, Stalin received a letter from the First Secretaries of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan and Armenia, which stated a request that the USSR leadership should solve the issue of resettlement of 130 thousand Azerbaijanis living in Armenia to Azerbaijan. The letter, kept in the Archive of Political Documents of the Republic of Azerbaijan, has no signatures, no date or dispatch number.

On 23 December 1947, the USSR Council of Ministers adopted the Decree “Resettlement of Collective Farmers and Other Azerbaijani Population from Armenian SSR to Kura-Araz Lowland of Azerbaijan SSR”. The decree stated that 100,000 collective farmers and other Azerbaijanis living in the Armenian SSR in 1948-1950 should be resettled to the Kura-Araz lowland of the Azerbaijan SSR on a voluntary basis. According to the first paragraph, 10,000 people were to be resettled in 1948, 40,000 in 1949 and 50,000 in 1950. Paragraph 11 stated that the Council of Ministers of the Armenian SSR should be allowed to use the buildings and houses vacated by the Azerbaijani population in connection with the resettlement of the Azerbaijani population in the Kura-Araz lowlands of the Azerbaijan SSR to accommodate Armenians arriving in Armenia from abroad. Under the undefined category of “other Azerbaijani population” were meant Azerbaijanis living in the city of Iravan and surrounding settlements.

On 10 March 1948, in addition to the resolution of 23 December 1947, the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted the second resolution “On relocating collective farmers and other Azerbaijani nationals from the Armenian SSR to the Kura-Araz lowland of the Azerbaijan SSR”. In the 14-point resolution, the Councils of Ministers of the Azerbaijan SSR and the Armenian SSR were charged with the implementation of specific measures related to the resettlement.

The resettlement plan was finalized in the text of the resolution of the Council of Ministers of the Azerbaijan SSR dated 13 May 1948. According to this resolution, it was planned to resettle to the Azerbaijani population of Spandaryan and Stalin districts of Iravan city to the Azerbaijan SSR along with collective farmers.

Deported Azerbaijanis were resettled primarily in such districts as: Zardab, Ali Bayramli, Kurdamir, Goychay, Mirbashir, Salyan, Imishli, Sabirabad, Zhdanov (Beylagan), Yevlakh, Ujar, Saatli, which did not correspond to the climatic conditions of the areas they lived in Armenia. And this contributed to the fact that many settlers died of infectious diseases.

All deported people were accommodated in the private houses of local residents, in public buildings, as well as in uninhabitable buildings and barns. Of the 8,110 families resettled from Armenia in 1948-1950, only 3,232 were provided with housing. In 1950, it was decided to build 3,500 houses for the resettled, but in total only 470 houses were built. Only 1,488 families were provided with homestead farms. Although 5,000 houses were planned for 1951, a total of 3,074 houses were built and commissioned. In 1952, it was planned to move 600 households from the Armenian SSR to the KuraAraz lowlands, and this plan was even exceeded (124.6 per cent).

In 1948-1950, more than 1000 households of Azerbaijani families were forced to leave Armenia and resettle in different regions of Azerbaijan. And this happened as a result of pressure on the inhabitants of the predominantly Azerbaijani districts of Armenia.

Since 1951, the process of return to Armenia of a part of refugees of Azerbaijanis who remained homeless in Azerbaijan began. After Stalin’s death in 1953, there was a steady decrease in the intensity of the process of resettlement of Azerbaijanis from their historical and ethnic lands and the process of repatriation of the population with harsh living conditions to their former homeland accelerated.

In total, in 1948-1953, along with Azerbaijanis officially resettled from 24 districts of Armenia and the city of Iravan (more than 200 settlements), the total number of people who left their homes and moved to Azerbaijan unofficially was about 100,000 people. As a result of the deportation, the Armenian leaders completely cleared the districts of Ashtarak, Martuni (Ashaghi Garanliq), Karabakhlar, Abovyan (Eller), Echmiadzin and Hoktemberyan from Azerbaijani population.

As a result of deportation in 1948-1953, the Azerbaijani population of Iravan was halved. In 1939, 6569 Azerbaijanis were registered during the census in Iravan, and in 1959, the number of registered Azerbaijanis was only 3413 (the census was not conducted in 1949).

Along with the deportation of Azerbaijanis from Armenia, an operation was carried out to rename settlements. In 1947-1953 alone, the names of more than 60 Azerbaijani settlements were Armenianised.

In order to give a legal assessment of this situation, which is considered a historic crime against our people, and to convey it to the international community, on December 18, 1997, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Heydar Aliyev signed a decree “On the mass deportation of Azerbaijanis from historical and ethnic lands in the Armenian SSR.”

However, in publications published abroad, the deportation of Azerbaijanis from Armenia in 19481953 is still assessed as a fact of “resettlement”, according to the wording of official documents of that time.

Recommended literature:
 

1. Qurbanlı, Əsəd Canəli oğlu. Azərbaycanlıların Ermənistan SSR-dən deportasiyası tarixindən: 1947-1953-cü illər: monoqrafiya / Ə. C. Qurbanlı; layihənin rəh. Y. M. Mahmudov; elmi red. N. N. Məmmədzadə; AMEA A.A. Bakıxanov adına Tarix İnstitutu.- Bakı: Turxan NPB, 2018.- 168 s.
2. Azərbaycanlıların Ermənistan SSR-dən deportasiyası: 1948-1953-cü illər: sənədlər toplusu / Azərbaycan Respublikasının Milli Arxiv İdarəsi; məsul red. A. Ə. Paşayev.-Bakı: Zərdabi LTD MMC, 2013.-784 s.
3. Paşayev, Ataxan Əvəz oğlu. XIX-XX əsrlərdə ermənilərin azərbaycanlılara qarşı ərazi iddiaları, soyqırımları və deportasiyalar: arxiv sənəd və materialları əsasında / A. Ə. Paşayev; elmi red. Y. M. Mahmudov; red. E. Ə. Məhərrəmov; AMEA A.A. Bakıxanov adına Tarix İnstitutu.- Bakı: Çaşıoğlu, 2011.- 328 s.
4. Nəcəfov, Bəxtiyar İsgəndər oğlu. Düşmənin iç üzü: XIX-əsrin sonu XX-əsrin əvvəllərində Türkiyə və Cənubi Qafqazda erməni terrorizminin tarixi: monoqrafiya / B. İ. Nəcəfov III hissə: Deportasiya / red. N. Seyidəliyev.- Bakı: Çaşıoğlu, 2006.- 320 s.
5. Arzumanlı, Vaqif Minad oğlu. Tarixin qara səhifələri: Deportasiya. Soyqırım. Qaçqınlıq: monoqrafiya / V. Arzumanlı, N. Mustafa.- Bakı: Qartal, 1998.- 280 s.
6. Deportasiya: azərbaycanlıların ermənistan ərazisindəki tarixi-etnik torpaqlarından deportasiyası / tərt.: İ. Ö. Vəliyev, K. Muxtarov, F. Hüseynov.- Bakı: Azərbaycan Ensiklopediyası NPB, 1998.- 440 s.
7. Пашаев, Атахан Аваз оглы. Геноцид, депортации и территориальные претензии армян к Азербайджанскому народу: XIX- XX вв. / А. А. Пашаев; гл. ред. Я. М. Махмудов; науч. ред. Э. А. Магеррамов.- Баку: Элм и Тахсил, 2013.- 152 с.