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On the Maragha Genocide victims commemorative days, Panorama.am presents a series of testimonies of Maragha people.

On April 10, 1992, after a 3-hour artillery preparation, the subunits of the Azerbaijani regular army invaded the peaceful village of Maragha from the Azerbaijani Mir-Bashir (currently Tartar). The attack was not dictated by military necessity. Over 100 people became victims of the aggression – mainly women, children, and old people. Civilians were killed by the most cruel ways: they were partitioned, burnt alive, beheaded, thrown under tanks, or cut with axes. About 50 people were taken hostages, including 9 children. While in captivity, many Maragha residents were tortured, humiliated, and were a subject to an inhuman treatment. Many of them were later exchanged, but the fate of many is still unknown. In about two weeks, on April 22-23, Maraghawas again attacked, people, who had returned to the site of fire, had to leave the native town forever. Currently, Maragha is under Azerbaijani occupation. Baroness Caroline Cox called Maragha “contemporary Golgotha.”

The details of what happened in the once prosperous village 24 years ago, on 10 April 1992, still chill blood, making one doubt whether the perpetrators can have the right to be called human beings. The stories of the survivors, who currently live in the village Nor (New) Maragha, leave no doubt that what happened in the Karabakh village on that day completely matches the definition of genocide provided by a respective UN Convention. Back in 1997, the Armenian side submitted documents and facts about the tragedy in Maragha to the UN Human Rights Committee. The process could not be accomplished then. However, the Armenian side intends to introduce the Maragha dossier to international agencies once again in the frameworks of An Ordinary Genocide project.

The full materials on the topic can be found on karabakhrecords.info and maragha.org.

Tsovinar Grigoryan

I was in the village on April 10. My husband was on duty on the border. Early in the morning, he came and told us to leave because they would have to retreat and the Azerbaijanis would enter the village. I was then sixth months pregnant. And we all – my mother-in-law and sister-in-law with young children – walked on towards the neighboring village of Maghavus.

My friend was taken hostage. I have spoken with her sister-in-law, brother’s sister, who was in captivity with her. She said they had been very severely tortured, beaten, deprived of food, sold to each other, forced to work, raped. After exchange, she did not want to live any more, she was mentally incapacitated and could be brought back to life with difficulty. I can also remember Rita Mnatsakanyan, a former hostage. She was all in burns. They had put out cigarettes on her body. No wonder most of the survivors are not alive any more – they lived maximum a couple of years after the captivity.

When our people entered the village, they found everything utterly destroyed, burnt up, looted and many inhabitants killed. Beheaded corpses, heads, pieces of human body, remains in ashes, people smashed under tanks were scattered all around. They killed my mother and son at the same time. They cut off mother’s head, son attempted to run away but they caught him and killed, as well. This way, they eliminated many families… They didn’t even pity the old people. They threw one under the tank; he walked with a stick, had a poor eyesight and did not figure out what was going on.

The recent events in the village Talysh (NKR) also remind of “Maragha.” On April 2, 2016, Azerbaijani divisions, including armed cap-a-pie mercenaries, managed to invade the village. The atrocities committed by them and later photographed by reporters shocked the public. The Azerbaijani saboteurs shot elderly civilians Valera Khalapyan and his wife Razmella, and cut their ears. They also shot the aged and helpless MarusyaKhalapyan (born in 1924).