Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

The US New Jersey state's Assembly last Friday issued a commemorative resolution that recognizes March 31 as Azerbaijani Remembrance Day marking the 95th anniversary of the Azerbaijani Genocide, Azerbaijan Society of America said on Tuesday.

The resolution, signed by the Assembly Speaker, was personally presented by State Assemblyman and Deputy Democratic Majority Leader, Thomas P. Giblin (D-NJ), to the President of Azerbaijan Society of America, Tomris Azeri.

The resolution highlights that the genocide of March 1918, in which more than 20,000 innocent Azerbaijani people lost their lives, was an event that represents one of the most condemnable atrocities in world history.

The New York State Senate after the adoption of Resolution 3784 in March 2012 became the first state ever to recognize the Genocide of Azerbaijanis in law. The resolution also recognized March 31 as Azerbaijani Remembrance Day.

Earlier, the Azerbaijani youth association operating in Germany appealed to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon over March 31, the Day of Genocide. The association called on the UN and other international organizations to acknowledge the fact of genocide against Azerbaijani civilians that occurred in the early 20th century and support the fair position of Azerbaijan by rejecting the policy of double standards.

The members of the Armenian Dashnak party in concert with Soviet Bolsheviks massacred about 20,000 innocent Azerbaijani people, including the elderly, women and children, starting on the night of March 30, 1918.

Armenian Bolshevik troops led by Stepan Shaumyan massacred thousands of people, burnt Islamic shrines and confiscated the 400-million-manat estate of Baku residents. Tezepir Mosque was bombed, and one of the magnificent architectural buildings, Ismailiyyeh, was burnt down.

The genocide policy pursued against Azerbaijanis was not limited to Baku. Armenian dashnaks killed 8,027 Azerbaijanis, including 2,560 women and 1,277 children, in 53 villages of Shamakhy, 110 km west of Baku, on March 31. Also, 16,000 Azerbaijanis were murdered in 162 villages of Guba, northern Azerbaijan. The Armenian dashnaks burnt thousands of villages in Lenkeran, Mughan and Nagorno-Karabakh as well and killed thousands of people there.

Special Investigation Commission set up by the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic on July 15, 1918 collected a great number of documents and submitted them to the government. In 1919, the Azerbaijani parliament made a decision on marking March 31 as the day of Azerbaijanis' genocide.

Though this date was essentially forgotten during the Soviet times, relevant investigations on the tragedy were carried out and books were published after Azerbaijan gained independence from the USSR in 1991.

President Heydar Aliyev issued a decree on March 26, 1998 to commemorate March 31 as the Day of Azerbaijanis' Genocide.

Since then, every year Azerbaijanis living in countries around the world mark March 31 as the Day of Genocide.