Talk:Sumgait pogrom/Archive 1

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A couple of comments. First of, not all the attackers were ethnic Azeris, at least one of them, Eduard Grigorian, was an ethnic Armenian. Further, it is important to note that Sumgait had a very high percentage of people with criminal past, in Soviet times people released from the penitentiary institutions were not allowed to settle in the capitals of the Soviet republics and they were usually settled in one of industrial suburbs, in case of Azerbaijan it was Sumgait. According to de Waal, every fifth Sumgait citizen had previous convictions.

Средний возраст горожан составлял двадцать пять лет, причем каждый пятый житель Сумгаита имел судимость. В период между 1981 и 1988 годами в Сумгаит вернулось более двух тысяч вышедших на свободу заключенных.

Also no mention of Azeri refugees from Kaphan district of Armenia, who arrived to the town just before the riots. This should be corrected. Grandmaster 19:25, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

All in good timing. This article is far from finished and far from perfect. How valid is the claim of the deaths of the two Azeris? I read that a Soviet military chief in the unit refute the claims which were presented originally by TASS. I'm not sure how well we can rely on the numbers provided by TASS and Pravda either since they had habit of being shoddy on details and concealing the damage done in humiliating cases; afterall we only found out about Chernobyl when we tuned into Turkish television. By the way the term is "in the Soviet 'era'" not times. --MarshallBagramyan 00:19, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

According to the rules, if you have an authoritative source to back up a certain statement, you include it to the article with reference to such a source. The death of two Azeris near Askeran is confirmed by a number of sources, I can provide you the links. Grandmaster 05:40, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

No, the deaths of those young men appear to be substanitated well enough in media sources. However, I was refering to the death count of the Armenian dead after the pogrom, according to Russian sources. I was explaining that since they always had a habit of either not reporting or under-reporting the news, the casualty account could also be grossly understated. I'll post more sources after this. --MarshallBagramyan 03:17, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Like Grandmaster said why is there no mentioning about the Azeri refugees from Kaphan district of Armenia, who arrived to the town just before the riots? This should be added. And why arent the number of deaths no added here? 26 Armenians and 6 Azeris, this should also be added. Baku87 15:58, 8 May 2006 (UTC)Baku87

This article isn't finished, there is a reason why its titled a "stub". I'll add more on to it and finish up within the next few days/weeks. I'm looking into their testimonies in regards to Azeris who came from Kapan and Masis, I don't know what their presense in the city has anything to do with the riots themselves. There was a testimony by a Georgian living in the city who claimed that many of the statements of alleged torture, rape, coming from those regions were direct provocations in order to encourage the riots to form. I'll check if there is any reason that we should the refugee exodus.--MarshallBagramyan 21:16, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Quote:

Forewarnings by Azeris sympathetic to their Armenian neighbors instructed them to leave their lights on that night; those who shut it off were assumed to be Armenian.

I think for accusation like this you need a better and more neutral source than Samvel Shamuratian. Grandmaster 17:07, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Well its not Samvel who is saying all this. Its part of a witness testimony. If you want, I can specify that as a footnote and give the exact wording and page number, the story is corroborated by several other witnesses also.--MarshallBagramyan 21:16, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

There’s too much speculation in those testimonies (or their presentation). I read some of them saying very dubious things, for example that the chief of local communist party organization led the gangs, while in fact he was trying to prevent the pogrom and tried to lead the crowd towards the boulevard away from the city center, but failed. I understand the state of people who gave those testimonies and that it is very hard to neutrally evaluate the events after what happened to them, so it is advisable to use the neutral sources only. For instance, there are a number of books, published in Baku, which presented the testimonies of Khojaly survivors, but I don’t think you would want me to include them into the article about Khojaly. Grandmaster 20:25, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

From what I understood from the witnesses' testimonies regarding that the First Secretary's role (his name was Muslimzade) was that he was carrying the Azerbaijan flag in the middle. Even so, his attempt to "lead the crowd in a different direction" doesn't really seem plausible nor feasible. Other reports said that he even directed where the gangs to go. When recieving a plea for help by some Armenians held up in a school he promised to send soldiers to help evacuate them. Two hours later the "soldiers" (in plain clothes) arrived with clubs, axes, and armature shafts saying they were their to escort them out of the school. An Azeri guard with the Armenians told the crowd that there were no Armenians and the roving riot moved in a direction the guard pointed out to them; showing that they were sent by Muslimzade himself. Not to mention that this account with leading the crowd is confirmed by others' testimonies including Georgians and Azeris who saw Muslimzade with the flag. The former adding that he saw Muslimzade subtly announcing in a speech that the government would look the other way; he later claims to see that Musilmzade was in a rioting crowd who were harassing two Armenians.

It depends on what the Khojaly survivors claimed. There are some books written by Armenians explaining the situation of Khojaly quite frankly and its a useful source. I'd suggest you to read Monte Melkonian's biography written by his brother Markar, called My Brother's Road who describes what went on in Khojaly and who committed what. If you want, I can even scan and send several of the pages for you.--MarshallBagramyan 22:38, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

You see, this is what I’m talking about. See de Waals book, it says something different about the role of Muslimzade. He was trying to take the crowd out of the city center to the seaside, this is confirmed by other sources too. He failed, but he had nothing to do with pogroms other than he was carrying the flag of Azerbaijan SSR. Grandmaster 10:21, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

The Azerbaijani refugees from Kaphan should be added and also the number of deaths on both sides (26 Armenians and 6 Azeris, if Im correct) Baku87 17:03, 11 May 2006 (UTC)Baku87

Unfortunately De Waal was unable to interview Muslimzade who, according to De Waal, is now a successful businessman in Azerbaijan; declining due to emotional problems related to Sumgait. I'll still add the reference as a speculation seen by eyewitnesses.

And yes, 32-34 was the official statistic given by Soviet government.--MarshallBagramyan 22:22, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

You can say that Armenian sources accuse him of leading the attack, while other sources don’t support the claim. If you look at it from a logical point of view, why would he want to lead the attack on Armenians? He had a successful career in the Communist party, he was the chief of komsomol of Azerbaijan SSR, and when he grew out of komsomol age, he was appointed a mayor of Sumgait. Some saw him as a possible future leader of Azerbaijan’s communist party. When the meetings started in Sumgait, he was at one of Russian resorts, and was ordered to return only after situation was out of control. After he arrived, he was immediately surrounded by the crowd, who gave him a flag and put him in front of the column. He was never known for his nationalistic views, neither before, nor after Sumgait. Sumgait ruined his career, I don’t think he would have ever really wanted that to happen. Grandmaster 05:37, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Well which sources don't support their claims? I mean the logic also doesn't fit in thinking that a popular figure of the Azeri government who is carrying the flag of Azerbaijan at the front of the line is going to be able to not only direct but also to take an armed, angry crowd in another direction. Do you find that plausible? Instead of taking the flag, according to you, wouldn't it be more realistic to at least attempt to litigate the crowd? And if that failed and the crowd charged, hurry back to Party headquarters and call for government support instead of mingling in with the crowd as they went on the rampage? Sumgait changed and exposed previously unknown attitudes in both Armenians and Azeris. Many Armenians were shocked that their own best friends, people they went to school or work with, who conversed with each other everyday, would ever partake in the events themselves.--MarshallBagramyan 02:23, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, Marshal, but your article now has very serious POV issues. It’s based completely on Armenian sources. What is this, for example?

They cited that the described methods, such as mutilating the breasts, would normally be prescribed to Muslims (Armenians are predominantly Christian, whereas most Azeris are Shia Muslim).

This method was very popular with Andranik, Armenian guerilla leader, who was responsible for extermination of many Azeri villages in the beginning of the century, and he was not a Muslim. As for Muslimzade, he was alone in the middle of a crowd, he tried to calm the people down, which did not work, and then tried to lead the people away from the city center. Not very smart, but that was his intention. See de Waal’s book: [1]

According to the same source, the rallies started as a protest to deportation of Azeris from Armenia. The refugees started to arrive to Azerbaijan on 25th January, I’ve got a number of sources to attest that. Another quote:

According to several Armenian witnesses, vodka and anasha, an Azeri term referring to narcotics such as opium, were also brought in truckloads and distributed to the numerically growing crowd.

This is all just hearsay and speculations. How could anyone bring narcotics in truckloads in Soviet times? So I attach a tag until the POV issues are addressed. Grandmaster 06:47, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Andranik would go around and mutilate the breasts of women? And who says this exactly? De Waal? It was the Muslim Ottoman Turks during the 1915 massacres that would grow infamous for carring out such deeds. But I never read if he had a source for that matter and that's why I dislike De Waal's habit of constantly attempting to balance out his book for our sakes, by only mildly criticizing the other side,always evening it out 50-50, and always consoling us that whatever one side did, the other one also did of equal or surpassed magnitude. I only rely on his sources in regards to the war itself, rather than the small, sparking incidents that are always mired in controversy. I appreciate De Waal's attempt to enter this foray and bring an unbiased look into it, but I don't like his style and I feel it hinders the progress of the book and raises more questions than answers.

This is not hearsay, this is eyewitness testimony. Do you have reasonable cause to discount it? De Waal was never in Sumgait to know what happend and even he uses this book as his source. So far, I have one Russian source and two citations by an Armenian published book. Some of the testimonies are from Georgians and Russians and the account on the drugs comes from the adjutant of the commander of the goverment troops; who reportedly said he saw "a panel truck drove up and distributed hashish, disposable syringes, and cases of vodka near the bus station" and were subsequently attacked by the mob when attempting to disperse the crowd. Other accounts attested hearing gunfire from the crowds. How many civilians owned sidearm pistols back then in the Soviet Union? Virtually none and yet government troops still confiscated several of them. If you have some sources that prove them wrong, then by all means introduce them and I'll remove the inaccurate POV. There were many anomalies that we say normally would never happen in the USSR but pointing out that just because it wasn't prevalent in the Soviet Union before doesn't necessarly mean it couldn't happen nor disprove it entirely. --MarshallBagramyan 17:47, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Those wordings are NPOV, and Bagarmyan contribution is exceptionally non-POV. If those are POV wordings, there are much worst wordings, wordings that you won't even find in the Armenian Genocide articles in the Khojali article. So spare us all this. Besides, you just provided another example of why De Waal is not a credible autor. The mutilation of breasts is a known method used against the Armenians, once massivly used during the Hamidian massacre and extended during the Armenian genocide which clearly preceded Antranik, and yes the mutilation of women breast and clytoris has been considered as a Muslim social structural forced male 'supremacy' used also during conflicts in some society. As for the mutilation of ears and other parts, De Waal lose any credibility left to him when he wrote: 'Both sides revived the practice of early 1900s employed by the Armenian guerrilla commander Andranik: chopping off the ears of enemy dead as war trophies. This is one of the examples of de Waal total ignorance and fabrication. And I hope he does find my words in Wikipedia since he has some explanation to do. The cutting of ears as trophy has first been recorded as a massive used with the Mongols who were cutting ears of their victims and presenting them as trophies and using them to count the number of people they have killed. This method was used by some psychopat paramilitary murderers recruted by Abdhul Hamid II, to count the numbers of Armenians they have killed, which was not enough because they will even cut the heads as trophies. This savagery was brought in the region by nomadic tribs and was widely used during the Armenian genocide. While De Waal doesn't back his fabrication (like many other of his), the mutilation of Armenians unlike his claims of Andranik who takes the credit, is documented in German, Austrian, American records. No wonder you use this single book, you can't find much of other references. Fad (ix) 18:16, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Eyewitness testimonies could be biased too, same as those who collected them. Again, your source is not neutral and cannot be considered reliable. I suggest using neutral sources only, otherwise I will have to use the same approach and include information from Azeri sources. I intentionally refrained from using Azeri sources in the articles about this conflict, as I want the articles I contribute to have some credibility. It is up to you, but I will keep the tag on, as the article has POV issues. All the stories about truckloads of narcotics, leaving the light on, or mutilating of bodies committed by Muslims only are not credible. As for Andranik and his guerillas, their crimes are very well documented in Azerbaijani archives, and those sources are as good as Shamuratian. De Waal does not say that Andranik first ever employed the practice of cutting ears, as Fadix suggests, he says that he employed that practice at a certain period of time in a certain region, i.e. in the Caucasus. And do you have any neutral sources to attest that guns were confiscated in Sumgait, or it is the same source? By the way, though not directly related to this topic, the same de Waal’s book contains very interesting testimony by none other than Igor Muradian, who told de Waal in an interview that they started arming people in Karabakh back in 1986. You may like or dislike de Waal’s book, but that’s Muradian’s own words, and not journalist’s fantasy:

По словам Мурадяна, летом 1986 года карабахцы с помощью дашнаков получили первую партию легкого стрелкового оружия из-за рубежа. Впоследствии поставки оружия стали осуществляться регулярно, причем "почему-то было много оружия чешского производства". Это оружие шло главным образом в Нагорный Карабах. "Все организации в Карабахе были вооружены. Все местные комсомольцы имели личное оружие". Это удивительное признание свидетельствует, что по крайней мере один армянский активист был уверен, что спор между двумя республиками мог перерасти в вооруженный конфликт. [2] Grandmaster 06:03, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

You are making the rules again. You don't still understand what NPOV is. He clearly stat the sources, one does not add a factuality disputed tag because he considers the source as not being the truth. As for testimonies of people, they can be presented in any articles. Neither MarshallBagramyan, neither I have opposed to them to the contrary. I was the one that requested testimonies of victims of Khojali be also included and you had problems with those I have presented and interpreted them yourself. Those are De Waal words: Both sides revived the practice of early 1900s employed by the Armenian guerrilla commander Andranik: chopping off the ears of enemy dead as war trophies. This is a clear exemple of dishonesty and total fabrication, an autor that write something such when there are reports, not in Armenia's national archive, but reports in German and Austrian archives (Ottoman allies at that time) and American archives of mutilations of the worst kind like cutting ears of Armenians by the thousands and thousands preceding Antranik during the Armenian genocide. As for the crimes perpetrated by Antranik, they are nothing compared to what happened to Armenians when Karabekir planned the destruction of an Armenia by penetrating the region with his army, or when General Halil decided to help the Tartars and as he write in his memoirs, tried to eradicate the Armenians to the last individual. It takes some face from De Waal part, which would disgust anyone knowing the history of the period to say something such.

If the article is based on a biased source, its factual accuracy should be disputed. I always suggested to use neutral sources and always adhered to this practice myself. As for Andranik, de Waal does not say that he was first ever person to employ this practice, but apparently he means that Andranik employed this practice in the Caucasus back in early 1900s. Indeed, he and his guerillas imported to the region practices they used elsewhere and which were uncommon for the region. Anyway, if you have problems with it, you should get in contact with him, but I don’t see any dishonesty here. And I don’t think that phrases like: They cited that the described methods, such as mutilating the breasts, would normally be prescribed to Muslims (Armenians are predominantly Christian, whereas most Azeris are Shia Muslim) comply with NPOV rules. So the tag remains for the time being. Grandmaster 15:05, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

NO! Using what you consider as a biased source does not qualify as factually questionable. Questioning the factuality of an article is not when someone interpret a source as being factually wrong. If that was the cases, every articles on Wikipedia will have this tag because someone will find one of the positions presented as being wrong. This tag is used when there is a misrepresentation of the source. If for example I say that Source A says B, and that it actually says C, then there is a dispute on the factuality of the article. As long as there is a cited source, the 'according to this this this and that happened' and that it really is an ' according to this' you can not use the tag. You still have a misconception on how Wikipedia works. But HERE AGAIN, I will not be the one reverting to the archaeic and childish stage by edit waring. I'll leave this to you. But then, don't go crying when another person has the same erronous representation of what Wikipedia is and start adding such tags in articles you think owning. The Khojali article has more serious issues but you haven't seen me obstinently adding back that tag. MarshallBagramyan is amazingly NPOV in his tones and has a clear understanding of Wikipedia policies. Many Azeris and Armenian contributors have a lot to learn from him. Comming to Antranik, Grandmaster, how much you think you know about the Azeri-Armenian conflict, don't bring me there, that period I master it to a T. You have no clue of what you are talking about believe me. Mutilation in the Caucasus was NOT brought by Andranik, in fact, the most rutless Pan-Turanist ideologists were Tartar immigrants who engaged in the worst types of excess and were recruted by the Ottoman army draged in the special organization and who signed their names by the number of people they have mutilated. The Kurds even have a song of praise for Andranik titled: 'Ustraneh Andranik Pasa' because he prevented the excess and prevented the massacres of thousands of Kurds. An important part of the stories of Antranik mutilation crimes have originated from people like Hassan Arfa and placed as neutral sources, when Hassan Arfa who passed as an Iranian General was a Tartar who had a role in the destruction of various Kurdish communities and was tanked by Ataturk himself who granted him Iranian Ambassadorship in Turkey. He even wrote a book about the Kurds in which he call them as savages and moraly inferiors to the Azeri and revert his role in the destruction of the Kurdish communities by accusing the Armenians and place Antranik as the responsable, when the Kurds praised that man for quite the opposit. Those are the sort of BS one find in the archive you keep talking about or Kazemzadeh who tried justifying the destruction of thousands of Armenians by creating stories of excess from bottom to top. While the claim of De Waal about Antranik isen't much sourced the mutilation of Armenians is, and YES even the Caucasus (The Ottoman had even gone as far as penetrating North Ouest Persia and commited the worst types of excess against the Armenians in as soon as 1915 and were helped by many fanatic Tartars). The entrance in Persia is documented in Western Press of that time too. So when De Waal claims something not much documented while he skip what is much documented and official history, his selectivity gives him away. Fad (ix) 16:43, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Mutilation of Breast, like I repeated, was more seen as Islamic fanatic doings. Armenian fanatics won't have much more reason to cut ones breast than cuting a finger or any other organs. But in some social structure where the Woman orgasm is seen as blasphemous cutting glands which were considered as 'pleasure glands' was predicative of mass crimes and showing the males supremacy and further giving a sentiment of superiority against the victim group. And here, that piece doesn't suggest that is the truth, but says what others have said about it, which IS NPOV. Breast mutilation like female genital mutilation (like mutilating the clytoris) is considered the doing of extremist fanatic Islamist. And that was what the source presented says. And I don't see what is POV there. Fad (ix) 16:57, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Also, like I already told you, stop making up rules, if we weren't in Wikipedia I would say stop pooping. Removing a tag is not vandalism, either learn the policies and guidlines or don't contribute at all. I should not use your standards and go add that tag on the Khojali article. Fad (ix) 17:00, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

See what I don't understand is why you don't see that I don't present their views as the all-correct, all-undeniable truth. If I was POVing and being biased, I would say that "the methods they described however are only applicable to only Muslims and not Christains". But instead, I allow it to balance on the testimony of several people, who COULD have been wrong. The same goes for the reports on the trucks bringing in alcohol and drugs. I don't write "alcohol and drugs were brought in by the Azeris" but instead attach that some people reported seeing trucks distributing that material and that can imply that they, once again, might be right or might be wrong. Its not presented as 100% fact but their testimony adds some information that was not originally released to the Western press and helps add to the quality of the article.

However, that does not necessarily mean their testimonies are false; and if they are corroborated by other witnesses then that means there is a certain weight to their claims. You were alive during the Sumgait, how often did you hear on television that Soviet authorities were allowing the IRC, Amnesty Intl., HRW, etc. in to investigate and speak to the witnesses? It recieved no analytical press coverage and all the media sources in the West simply quoted what TASS and Pravda said; that the act was committed by run-of-the-mill "hooligans" that were "stirred in nationalist euphoria". It was like "nothing to see here people, move it along, move it along, just some internal, generic ethnic strife, nothing special". The USSR sucked, quite frankly to say and pleaseopardon the informality, when it came to problems stemming from the interior and always managed to trivialize the events because they felt that the Soviet Union was too great and too immaculate to be troubled with such "minor" problems whether it was Sumgait or Chernobyl or the Soviet submarine accidents in the 60's.

I'm approaching the matter as objectively as I can, but you can find it many articles on Wikipedia, there is always information that speculates controversial events because it helps explain the ambiguities concerning the events. There is a 9/11 conspiracy page, a JFK conspiracy page and other articles which simply attempt to explain the events by introducing the circumstances which might help the reader connect the dots through their own interpretation.--MarshallBagramyan 17:11, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Please have a look here, the documents called Доклад члена Азербайджанской Чрезвычайной Следственной Комиссии Михайлова and Доклад члена Чрезвычайной Следственной Комиссии Новацкого (both in Russian). After Baku was liberated from dashnaks and Bolsheviks in 1918, Azerbaijani government started investigation of the crimes committed by them against the local population. The investigations were carried out by professional policemen, ethnic Russians. I can make a whole article based on these documents, and maybe even more than one. They include description of such crimes as mutilation of human bodies, and specifically mutilation of the breasts, which was done particularly in Zangezur area by Armenian guerillas (Mikhailov’s report concerns Zangezur area). I can add this to the article and say that while Armenian sources claim that such practice would normally be prescribed to Muslims, Armenian guerillas widely used such practice against Muslim population in the Caucasus. Grandmaster 06:07, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

The less we have the more we expend. The entire investigations are pretty much somed by British Consul Stevens, which clearly showed a lot more Armenian victims. The Alexandriopole investigation alone talked about the inevitable death of as far as 150,000 Armenians. Copying me again and telling that you can write various articles doesn't mean what you say are grounded. Major General Von Lossow on his first report for Transcaucasia testify the plan set for the complete extermination of the Armenians there (See: Türkei 183/51, A20698) he followed this with his other reports from May to July 1918. General Kress reports about the distortion of informations in Caucasia by the Turkish general Esad, Shevki and Nuri(who was the minister of Wars brother in law). The March report and the Turkish lines advance and the knowledge of their intention to go on and move to Baku by the help of the Tartars was pretty much known. Turkish General Mürsel who was the commander of the 5th division and for months was was planing the destruction of the Armenians in Baku, he personally informed Ernst Paraquin the German general, the Tartar preparations to eradicate every single Armenians in Baku once the Turks were to cross over. Erich Ludendorf writes about the Turkish army penetration in the Caucasus and writes: 'Turkey plunged into a war of muder and looting in the Caucasus.' Hohenlohe the Austrian Ambassador to Germany after recieving a dispatch reported the Turkish intention to annex the entire pieces and exterminate the entire Armenian population in that region. There are countless numbers of reports by various sources and they are not 'Armenian.' The Tartars recieved the help of butchers who were responsable of the Armenian genocide. You can shoot Armenian guerillas all you want, but there was a clear disproportion and what Andranik had done on that region was nothing to be compared with what has been done against the Armenians on that evry same region. And here is where De Waal lose his credibility. Fad (ix) 16:55, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely not. You should read those documents to understand the real scale of the violence. In addition to massacre in Baku, Armenian forces completely destroyed the town of Shamakhy, and much of the town of Guba. In additions to that, a large number of villages with Muslim population were also burned and population massacred. This was done by the orders of Shaumian, who was nominally a Bolshevik, but for some reason he sent dashnaks Amazasp and Lalayev to establish Soviet power in uyezds of Baku governance. It actually affected my ancestors as well, they were from Shamakhy and moved to Baku after it was liberated by Turks, because Armenian paramilitaries burned their house. Anyway, this discussion belongs to other article, my point was that Armenians used the practice of mutilating the bodies and it’s not something done by Muslims. In fact, the Muslim population of the South Caucasus never employed this practice, it was Andranik’s innovation. Grandmaster 17:38, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Grandmaster, you are unbelievable, I am telling you that the practice of cutting ears was known among Tartar and Sejuk nomads exposed as trophies and you are telling me that this sort of things were brought by Adranik. This is recorded as far as the literature goes. Richard Cobden in 1867 presented Walsh as witness of the ears presented as trophies which was confirmed, there was no Antranik at that time. The Armeno-Azeris conflict of 1905 has shown the worst sort of mutilations and here I am fair, from both sides. But the cutting of ears as trophies was defenitly done by Crimean Tartars preceding decades Antranik, they were one of the worst mutilators of Armenians in Eastern Anatolia. As for what you are referring above, I will just pretend that I haven't seen anything for your own sake and won't start out with what weant in Zanezour with the Tartars who were adviced to destroy the Armenian refugee camps survivors of the massacres in Eastern Anatolia and the fury it created among Armenian fanatics who took revenge by expelling and starting killing Tartars. Much of your claims are Azeris investigations, like it or not the massacre of Armenians in Baku alone has costed more life than the entire troubles that Armenians had done there and in its serounding and this according to the commission initiated by Tartars themselves. Or the incidences that followed the repelling of Tartars after they started destroying the Armenian refugee camp, from which most of the people there were orphaned children not aging more than 12 years old. After what happened in Alexandripole and Nuri and his butcher team without forgetting Halil of course leaving that region right on the center of the Caucasus. Definitly and this you can't deny, the massacre of Armenians in the Caucasus which intensified while butchers of the special organization were recycled to prusue their digusting embitions in the Caucasus. For eacu Azeri sources you will provide, I could easily provide over 10 German, Austrian and various other sources. Fad (ix) 22:04, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Ow wow.. here we can talk official but when its about occupied areas of Azerbaijan then suddenly we have to be neutral.. right. Baku87 22:14, 15 May 2006 (UTC)Baku87

??? Fad (ix) 22:40, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Guys...

Are we going to come to a solution to this? GM, please kindly list your concerns with this article below and hopefully we can come to some compromise. —Khoikhoi 17:12, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

My main problem is that the article is based on Armenian sources and not neutral ones. I myself always use unbiased sources to cover controversial topics like this, and I think it’s a reasonable approach. In this case we have a lot of hearsay and speculations included in the article, such as:

Forewarnings by Azeris sympathetic to their Armenian neighbors instructed them to leave their lights on the night of the 27th; those who shut it off were assumed to be Armenian. (note that we are talking about the city with 200 000 population).

They cited that the described methods, such as mutilating the breasts, would normally be prescribed to Muslims (Armenians are predominantly Christian, whereas most Azeris are Shia Muslim).

According to several Armenian witnesses, vodka and anasha, an Azeri term referring to narcotics such as opium, were also brought in truckloads and distributed to the numerically growing crowd.

This is all just not serious, and the inclusion is being justified by the fact that someone said it. So what? I can cite the Azeri sources that say completely the opposite, do we really need to include all the rumors and speculations from Armenian and Azeri sources? In addition to that, there are POV issues with presentation of the facts. Example:

The Sumgait Massacre was a three-day pogrom by Azeris directed towards the ethnic Armenian district in the seaside town of Sumgait, Azerbaijan, Soviet Union. On February 27, 1988, Azeri mobs formed into groups and attacked Armenians, etc.

It is well known that the attackers were of mixed ethnic origin, and one of the most notorious criminals was an ethnic Armenian Eduard Grigorian, who had 3 previous convictions, and among those convicted for the crimes in Sumgait were two ethnic Russians. So how can you say that it was all done by Azeris? Overall, the article needs work to address all those issues. Grandmaster 05:48, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

As long as the sources are provided and the 'according to' tone is preserved the article is OK. Sumgait in published works is more notable than Khojali, and Azeris are accused in those works. If this article should have such a tag, so as the Khojali article which tone is much less neutral than this one. Fad (ix) 16:58, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Khojaly article is based on neutral sources only, this one is not. See the difference? Grandmaster 17:38, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

You still have a misconception of what neutral is. Neutral as it is defined for an encyclopedia excludes sources. Sources support or not positions, and regardless of its origine the term neutral does not apply in the same context as an encyclopedia. I was the one requesting that Azeri witnesses in Khojali be included, but you seemed to not want that because somehow it was contradicting your preconcieved position about the event. As for Khojali article, read the first lines and now visit the Armenian genocide article and visit the first lines, don't you see anything wrong with the Khojali article? And here, it is only the beggining Grandmaster. This article is obviously more neutral than Khojali Massacre, it even has a context. What you say if I add on the other article an entire section about the context and the shelling for weeks, or add Azeris victims testimonies about how the OMONs were serounding them and were intercepted with the population at night? MarshallBagramyan worth a barnstar for the way he can separate himself from his Armenianess and tone things like this. Fad (ix) 22:40, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

No, the difference is little.Your argument of "neutral" sources predicates that since the publisher is Armenian, then the article's neutrality is compromised and that publisher is lying. Thus, the anthology of testimonies in the book are most probably adulterated, or even worse, that they are fabricated and exaggerated to certain extents. You have to show more solid proof that there is some reason to cast a doubt on the testimonies' stories. Furthermore, many of these depositions were the same ones given to the Soviet court that heard the witnesses' statements on the events of Sumgait.

I'm being very careful with the wording and format for this article. Instead of saying "Truckloads of drugs and alcohol were brought in to Sumgait", I attach "According to some..." which implies that the statement is somewhat unconfirmed but will help clarify the article. Instead of saying that "Armenians would never slice the breasts off women, only Muslims would", I instead write the witness's statement and his reasons on why he doubted the accounts were probably false. Then, I introduce a Russian source that states that one of these men were indeed provacteurs and were flat out lying. This article cannot be any more neutral than the way it currently is.--MarshallBagramyan Fad (ix) 16:42, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Mediation

User:Grandmaster has asked for mediation regarding this article, would the rest of you guys be amenable to that? - FrancisTyers 10:32, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Francis, I oppose, what mediation? This is an issue of misconception of what neutral means in Wikipedia. As long as the sources of the staments are clearly placed, there is no NPOV issue there. He request removal of sources because according him those sources are biased, he still fail to understand that Wikipedia is not here to establish what the truth is bu present coverages. If he thinks other sources are missing he can add them he is welcome to do that, but removing positions when they are sourced is simply not the Wiki way of doing that. Fad (ix) 14:31, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok, but WP:NPOV is not the whole story, we also have to note Wikipedia:Reliable sources. Grandmaster can you list some specific complaints ? - FrancisTyers 14:46, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

True, but Wikipedia:Reliable sources doesn't fit there. If there was a cases where source A say that B said C and that B denies having said it or that source A cite a work and that this citation is not found in that work, then Grandmaster might have a point. Grandmaster is requesting the removal of a material and not its clarification, when the author who added it sourced it in the talk page. Grandmaster has never requested that the author place the source on the main article he requested its deletion. If I was to use his logic, I will go on and delete the entire Turkish government section in the Armenian Genocide article under the pretext that it is not a neutral source or that it is unreliable. Grandmaster has yet to understand some important guidelines and policies in Wikipedia before requesting a mediation, you can not request a mediation before trying anything before or really for once trying to stop wanting to be always right and carefully listening what the other is saying. This, Grandmaster hasn't done. Now, sending this article in its early life on mediation is not the right thing to do. And, most probably, a mediation hasn't much chance to be approved as of yet, just too early. Fad (ix) 15:24, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

First off, this not a formal mediation, but rather an informal one. Francis was helping us out at Nagorno-Karabakh and Khojaly pages, and I thought that he could help us on this one as well. I think we will only benefit from participation of a neutral contributor. I very much appreciate efforts of Khoikhoi and hope he will continue providing his input, but I think that since Francis is the person who’s been involved in these issues from the beginning he can help us too, so I asked him to join the discussion. Now as for my concerns here, I summarized some of them in the section above, but I can copy it here as well:

My main problem is that the article is based on Armenian sources and not neutral ones. I myself always use unbiased sources to cover controversial topics like this, and I think it’s a reasonable approach. In this case we have a lot of hearsay and speculations included in the article, such as:

Forewarnings by Azeris sympathetic to their Armenian neighbors instructed them to leave their lights on the night of the 27th; those who shut it off were assumed to be Armenian. (note that we are talking about the city with 200 000 population).

They cited that the described methods, such as mutilating the breasts, would normally be prescribed to Muslims (Armenians are predominantly Christian, whereas most Azeris are Shia Muslim). It is known that Armenian guerilla employed this practice in early 1900s.

According to several Armenian witnesses, vodka and anasha, an Azeri term referring to narcotics such as opium, were also brought in truckloads and distributed to the numerically growing crowd. How can you transport truckloads of narcotics in Soviet times? Where would you have got it from in such quantities?

This is all just not serious, and the inclusion is being justified by the fact that someone said it. So what? And I can cite the Azeri sources that say completely the opposite, do we really need to include all the rumors and speculations from Armenian and Azeri sources? I commented on each of these paragraphs above, I can do it again. In addition to that, there are POV issues with presentation of the facts. Example:

The Sumgait Massacre was a three-day pogrom by Azeris directed towards the ethnic Armenian district in the seaside town of Sumgait, Azerbaijan, Soviet Union. On February 27, 1988, Azeri mobs formed into groups and attacked Armenians, etc.

It is well known that the attackers were of mixed ethnic origin, and one of the most notorious criminals was an ethnic Armenian Eduard Grigorian, who had 3 previous convictions, and among those convicted for the crimes in Sumgait were two ethnic Russians. So how can you say that it was all done by Azeris? Overall, the article needs work to address all those issues. Grandmaster 19:20, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

That's ridiculous, do you realise that you want to remove primary sources? You claim that you only used neutral sources. Oh boy, you really don't change. Helsinki Watch which you cite rely mostly on testimonies, testimonies are primary sources and you can't remove them. As for the attackers of course add them, afteral, you were the one that didn't wanted Azeri witnesses testimonies on the Khojali massacre because they contradicted your position. Fad (ix) 20:17, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Grandmaster that it is better to take non-partisan sources to write articles on such contentious issues. I'm sure this is covered by many. The other option would be to include the Azeri POV (per NPOV), but then we'd probably end up with the article contradicting itself. Grandmaster, I think it would help if you provided some of the non-partisan sources that you'd like to use. At least so that I could look over them. If you look at the Khojaly massacre page, we use only non-partisan sources there. I think it would be appropriate here too, unless we attribute them to Armenian POV. - FrancisTyers 20:02, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Francis, I can add testimonies included in books not written by Armenians if that is his problem. Testimonies are considered as primary source, more when those were about the same used during the investigation. Like I said, if I were to use this logic I would delete the Turkish government section of the Armenian enocide page under the pretext that it is not a non-partisan source. Helsinki watch which is used as primarly source in the article on Khojali massacre bases its reports on testimonies, using this logic we would have to remove those too. Fad (ix) 20:17, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I have the depositions of the witnesses which were published inThe Sumgait Tragedy; Pogroms against Armenians in Soviet Azerbaijan, Volume I, Eyewitness Accounts, edited by Samuel Shahmuradian, forward by Yelena Bonner, 1990, published by Aristide D. Caratzas, NY. They are deposition, and they are used in works writen by 'non-Armenians' if that is the problem. Now we use this primary source or those that use them? Don't you see the problem here? Fad (ix) 20:23, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

There is no problem. The depositions are primary sources, the reports by Human Rights Watch are secondary sources. Wikipedia articles should use a combination of both primary and secondary sources. For this article it would be appropriate to use non-partisan secondary sources. We can include the perspective of both sides (after all, that is NPOV), but it is important that the article not rely solely on primary sources. Relying solely on secondary sources is not so bad. - FrancisTyers 20:28, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Francis, I'll provide secondary sources coming from Western media press but nearly all of them are devoid of witness testimonies. The information I have provided so far is not introduced as fact, but as what several witnesses saw and is widely supported by others' testimonies. --MarshallBagramyan 22:29, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

We even have a template:

- FrancisTyers 20:30, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Both Samuel Shahmuradian and Yelena Bonner are ethnic Armenians. The difference between HRW collection of testimonies and the work of these people is that HRW was not using it for propaganda purposes, while I cannot say the same about the aforementioned people. I’ll check other sources tomorrow. Too late now. Grandmaster 20:33, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

The difficulty in writing this article is that this occurred during the Soviet era where interior problems were considered to be humiliating to the Soviet government and hence were always toned down to portray it as a non-event. This happened in Chernobyl in 1986, in the numerous nuclear submarine accidents in the 1960s, in World War II, right up until the end of the USSR. Read the dozens of media articles from ProQuest and all you hear is simple summaries: that they were nothing but simple "hooligans" who were under the influence of nationalism who caused all this violence. The Soviet media reporting was always whitewash and they almost always underreported news damaging to the country's state.

His main problems with the articles relies on two notions: that the publisher of the book on the Sumgait testimonies is Armenian and hence compromises the neutrality of the source and 2) if something seemed impossible to happend in the USSR, then it most probably was. Nevermind the fact that the latter is a complete logical fallacy but the testimony I have relied on so far, come from a Georgian citizen living in the city.

And GM constantly bringing up the identity of three of the culprits does not invalidate the claim that this was a pogrom carried out by the Azeris. Just as the Armenian Genocide was carried out by Turks, there other ethnic groups such as Circassians and Kurds who took part in the massacres and in the very same logic, just as how the Holocaust was carried out by the Nazis, various ethnic groups also did their bidding including the French, Italians, and Ukranians. The fact that Grigorian was half-Armenian and was brought up from his childhood by his Russian mother after his father died really trivializes and invalidates the claims that this was a pogrom carried out by "various nationalities" and not just Azeris. Out of the 83 people who were arrested and charged by the Soviet court, 79-80 were Azeris. Nevermind the fact that witnesses reported seeing over 400 of these "hooligans" alone on Feburary 29. GM, factually establish that their intentions are for "propaganda" purposes and we can go on from there. People who report crimes against a specific ethnic group does not necessarily present to you the option of calling them liars and propagandists.--MarshallBagramyan 21:00, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

It is enough to see examples I pointed out above to see that this source is not impartial. If we add inflated death toll, etc it’s obvious that they have their own agenda. I don’t really know of any other good source, but according to the rules “the obligation to provide a reputable source lies with the editors wishing to include the material, not on those seeking to remove it”. Despite this, I still searched the HRW website for information. HRW has no specific report on Sumgait, but the report called “Playing the "Communal Card": Communal Violence and Human Rights” confirms the death toll, that contradicts the figures, provided by Armenian sources, see below:

Pogroms in Sumgait, Azerbaijan, in February 1988 had claimed at least thirty-two lives, mostly Armenian. [3]

Another reference to these events is in the letter of HRW director, she mentions the same figure of 32. [4]

And comparison of Sumgait with holocaust is not valid, I never compared Khojaly massacre with it, these are different things. The government of Azerbaijan SSR was not involved in the massacre in Sumgait and the region was part of the USSR. Also if you want to see how Armenian sources misrepresent the facts, see this letter of the Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which met harsh criticism of HRW. [5] I'm not saying that only Armenian side is guity of this, therefore I suggest finding neutral sources to cover these events. Grandmaster 11:15, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

You are not wanting to understand, you go on what you have in mind and you don't give a thing of what others are saying. True there were reports of the HRW about Khojali and not much for Sumgait. Khojali happened after the fall while Sumgait not. HRW report when they are allowed to report, if they are not allowed in, they can't say much. Besides, the Armenians opened a corridor and reporters were permitted in following the Khojali tragedy, and the refugees were soon after in Azeri controled area. Where were Sumgait victims interviewed? The investigation wasn't even permitted to end. Besides, and this you can't deny and is recognized. Armenia is a freer country than Azerbaijan and observers are more allowed in than Azerbaijan. Maragha massacres of Armenians in Azerbaijan was silenced because unlike Khojali the press wasn't allowed in, the only coverage we had about the incident was from the CSI which got in there without reporting themselves to the Azeri autorities, the same goes to what happened to Armenians in Kirovabad. But yet, Sumgait tragedy is more notable in published works and the positions less contradictory. And about your shooting that it is an Armenian source. Dude, HRW relies on Azeris refugees to draw their reports, I shall then remove every accounts which relies of victims testimonies, but there would not be much left of the Khojali Massacre article then. Do you have any reason to believe that the depositions are fabricated? You are acting like a POV warrior.

OK then, you want non-Armenian authors here they comes.

The first hint of a nationalist political agenda did not emerge until May, when protests against Sumgait trials mushroomed from about 1,000 people to roughtly 100,000 in few days. Azerbaijani intellectuals also began orginizing themselves, opposing Armenian scholars' arguments about Karabakh in a document signed by 250 scholars. ...As reported in the Azerbaijani press, Sumgait officials were to be held responsible for the violence there;... The attitude of the republic's political leaders was covertly discriminatory rather than openly chauvinistic. (from Modern Hatreds: The Symbolic Politics of Ethnic War p. 66 by Stuart Kaufman)

Here page 52: There is evidence that both the 1988 Sumgait abd the 1990 pogroms were organized by groups including government officials, but the officials seem merely to have facilitated the pogroms and then ensured that the police stood aside.

Here page 57: A Russian resident of Sumgait reported hearing repeated statments by Azerbaijani such as: "The Turks had it right, they killed them all."

This book discribes what most scholars believe about the situation.

Here another work: But even after Sumgait slaughter, Moscow continued to insist on maintaining the status quo, thereby, in fact, supporting Baku's position. The central press said nothing about the events in Transcaucasia, but attacked Armenian 'extermists' or spoke about the 'equal responsability' of both sides. (Farewell Perestroika: A Soviet Chronicle by Boris Kagarlitsky p. 69)

Here another source about the different estimates of the death toll: Not until the loosening of Stalinist rigidities under Mikhail Gorbachev was there a pogrom - of Muslim Azeris against Christian Armenians in the new industrial city of Sumgait in February 1988 - in which 31 (by official count) or anywhere from 350 to 600 Armenians were killed in the course of three days. (Pogroms: Anti-Jewish Violence in Modern Russian History by John Doyle Klier, Shlomo Lambroza)

George Soros in his work The Gorbachev prospect accuses Aliev heading and local mafia he was controlling to be responsable.

Joshua Searle-White in his book 'The Psychology of Nationalism' compares Sumgait with other riots and takes the claim of 2 Azeris killed as this: In all of these riots, for example, the chain of events seems fairly clear: One group is alleged to have killed members of another group. In retaliation, people whose ingroup members were killed then take revenge, not on those in the outgroup who actually did the killing, but on other members of the group. ...Similarly, in Sumgait, allegations have been made that the rioters had lists that told them where Armenians lived, so they could be easily found. Some have suggested that the Soviet government was behind these riots, either by hiring Armenian thugs to spark the riots (As I was told in Azerbaijan) or even by taking incarcerated Azerbaijani criminals out of a prison and using the KGB to bus them to Sumgait.

In any cases, local autorities and Azeri autorities as well as the Soviet autorities were accused, Alieve too was accused controling the local mafia of having his share in the responsability. The Sumgait pogrom is much more included in notable books than Khojali even thought it had less HRW or such organizations coverage. Never wondered why? If we were to rely on the reports you want (Soviet official investigation), nothing really happened in Chernobyl. Fad (ix) 16:42, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

You know the rules. The sources must have no bias, and it’s not my invention. I agree with Francis, we need a reliable secondary source. In Khojaly article we did not include any eyewitness testimonies, even though they were collected by impartial organizations such as HRW and Memorial, we even did not include the position of the Azerbaijani side, and did not even say that the massacre was committed by Armenian forces. I did everything possible to present the issue in NPOV fashion. I expect the same approach here. If you want to make a credible article, you can use fewer words but make sure that each sentence is well balanced and does comply with NPOV rules. I found a neutral source for Black January in Baku, which was again an HRW report, and I’m sure there should be something somewhere about Sumgait too. So that’s your task, to find reliable impartial sources for this article. Grandmaster 19:13, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Those books above, says about the things that is in the article. Neutrality doesn't apply to primary source, you are misinterpreting the word 'neutrality' in the context of an encyclopedia. Neutrality refers to the coverage of an event by presenting every significant positions, which I don't disagree. Fad (ix) 19:46, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Neutrality applies to the source that the primary source is taken from. Grandmaster 17:12, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

It was the official translation, I don't quite get what is your point here. And no, you still don't get what neutrality means, as long as the source is there and that it is presented as according to a position, you can not restrict the uses of a source which exist. The book exist and is the official translation, as far as I am aware, you never questioned the existance of that book, did you? Fad (ix) 22:11, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

It’s not about neutral point of view, it’s about reliability of sources. According to Wikipedia:Reliable sources, you should check "Do the sources have an agenda or conflict of interest, strong views, or other bias which may color their report?" Your sources have bias. Grandmaster 12:45, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

That's plain racism, why don't you use the same standard on the articles created by Baku87? It is a published book, the official English language translation of the depositions, do you have any evidences that they are mistranslated? This is not a report, this is simply a translation of a primary source, it isen't like it is comming from a KKK report. 16:35, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Why is it racism? You don’t call racist controversial remarks in this article such as attribution of certain deeds exclusively to Muslims, which are not only factually inaccurate, but are also of a racist nature, but talk about racism when your partisan sources are challenged. Francis also supported the use of non-partisan secondary sources in this article, would you call him racist too? And I’m not responsible for what other users do, I’m responsible only for my own actions. Grandmaster 19:35, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Well yes, racism, you can not dismiss sources on the basis that its translator is Armenian. The book has a publisher and the last time I have checked this English language publisher doesn't publish KKK materials. As for secondary sources, I have provided more books here than you have ever in the Khojali massacre article. Also, Islam isen't a race, neither in its original definition nor the modern definition applied to ethnicity. And again. Francis also hasn't said that the source should be removed, so don't attribute things to people which they have not personaly said. I also, haven't seen you say anything about Baku87 created article which you yourself edited about March Massacre alluding to Guba and 3000 Jews being allegedly killed. You can hardly claim I suffer of double standards since I myself have added sources from 'other sides' in articles and have not bragged them as unworthy references in an encyclopedic article like you do simply because translators happen to be Armenian. Why don't we delete Hilberg research from articles related to the Holocaust on the basis that he is a Jew? Don't you see how ridiculous and discriminatory are your remarks? Fad (ix) 20:50, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Armenian is not a race, but an ethnicity, and objecting to the use of a biased source is not racism. I suggested using sources that are not related to the parties of the conflict, the same way as we did in Khojaly article. I understand that you prefer to present the issue from an Armenian point of view and include such dubious statements as attribution of certain deeds to Muslims only, which is discriminatory and factually inaccurate, but according to the rules we should use reliable sources only. I suggest we wait for Francis to clarify his position. As for the March massacre, I did not make any significant contribution to that article, and it needs a lot of work, so I did not object to your tags either. As for the Jews being killed by Armenians in Guba in 1918, such statement was indeed made by a mountain Jew community leaders in Azerbaijan and Israeli embassy promised to investigate the issue. See here: [6] It’s a Jewish source, after all, and should be OK with you. And also, since referring to the sources representing the sides of the conflict is fine with you, it should be OK citing Rovshan Mustafayev as a source. He’s as good as Shahmuradian. Grandmaster 10:07, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

You see, this is entrly the point, today.az should be OK with me, but a book published by a 'neutral' editor should not. Look Grandmaster, I will not spoonfeed you, there are limits in repeating things to you since you refuse to understand what neutrality means. And yes! Armenians are not a race and I contend it, but alluding some characteristic such as a group who should not be trusted is a 'racial' characterisation, which is racism. And no, claiming that mutilating breasts is believed to be more proper to Muslim fanatics is not factually wrong, we've been there already. Armenian guerillas will have no priority on mutilating breasts than cutting ones head, neither a finger, but Moujaidins or Islamist guerillas will. That is the entire point and there is nor something factually wrong neither discriminatory there. If a newspaper such as today.az is a credible source even though the information has not been corroborated by any other sources, a book published by an acceptable editor is. Don't forget that those are simply about the same things as the depositions. Also, no, I disagree, we should not wait Francis, that you are in the wrong there is no doubt about, we don't filter informations on Wikipedia on the sole basis of ones ethnicity, this is not how it works, and never had Francis agreed with that, if we do filter, than any reports from HRW should also disapear.

I'm truly at odds at what is stopping me from writing this article. So far you haven't specified what exactly bothers you GM which, if you continue to do so, will prompt me to continue to write it. I can understand that the claims may seem offending but that's what they remain until collaborated by other sources. I would say that you had legitimate concerns over the quality of this writing but it appears quite neutral as I don't present any of the disputed claims as 100% proof. I'm not going to wait for Francis to come and hold our hands on something so trivial so if you have your concerns, list them now or else I'm moving on. --MarshallBagramyan 23:20, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I really don't have much time to spend on this, but I concur with Grandmaster that currently the article does not comply with the NPOV policy. There is also uncited information. I understand that this is a work in progress and I think you would make greater gains by working together instead of fighting about sources (for now). Grandmaster, just add the stuff that HRW quotes and attribute it to HRW. I think they are more reputable and notable than "some" witnesses. Any further questions, ask on my talk page. - FrancisTyers 23:32, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

If its really necessary, I'll list his name, his nationality (he was Georgian), heck even his address in Sumgait. Otherwise, this article relied solely on the Pravda and Izvestiya's headlines completely whitewashes the events and doesn't reveal anything to explain the background information. 1 witness - unreliable, 2 witnesses - weak, 3 witneses - shaky information, 4 witnesses - coincidence, 5 witnesses - slightly reliable, 6 witnesses - slam dunk? Why is that the testimonies of the Khojaly survivors are given more indepth weight and credibility than Sumgait's? Just because their testimony was given to HRW and not a taped Soviet Supreme Court interview which eventually was compiled into a book by an Armenian?--MarshallBagramyan 23:44, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Francis, the conflict is not about whatever or not the curent article contains POV, but rather Grandmaster request to not use testimonies on the bases that they come from Armenians, or that the official translator of the depositions happens to be an Armenian. This is the point... this is why I said that if we were to use Grandmaster standard we would have to delete the HRW reports about Khojali on the bases that the witnesses were Azeris and that the translators were Azeris too. He uses double standards, he has no problem with the uses of an Azeri newspaper as reference in the March massacre, which provides not a single records about Guba and find it valid to use the speech of an Azeris parlemantarian talking about such a massacre or a man who use terms such as 'monsters.' The article can be neutralised sure, but Gransmater wants to filter sources, when Armenian sources satisfy him they are OK, but when they don't they should be removed. Fad (ix) 01:21, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

You cannot compare this article to that about Khojali. I did not use any testimonies, provided by Azerbaijani side, even though they were collected by HRW and Memorial. And those organizations did a very professional job, working on both sides of the conflict, not just one. And of course I did not use any such sources, published by Azerbaijani side. Your sources are not as good. Unfortunately, the only reference to Sumgait events I found in HRW documents is about the death toll, which I will definitely include. I’m sure that there should be something else somewhere, but I think my colleagues want to use only the sources that present Armenian point of view. Grandmaster 04:27, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

You were the one not including Azeris testimonies in the Khojali article, while I proposed this myself even before this article was created. Your interpretation of the Khojali tragedy was different than those testimonies so it was convinient for you to not include them, you present this as if you did this in all impartiality which is not the cases at all. Human right organizations uses people testimonies, the HRW draws its reports based primarly on testimonies of people, in the cases of Khojali they were Azeris and the translators were Azeris, you are using simply double standards. You will hardly find any international organizations coverages in tragedies having happened in the Soviet Union because of access restrictions and if you have ever studed war crimes beyond Armenian crimes against Azeris you would see that there are crimes of millions where the reports were silenced starting with the famine in Ukraine, or German war prisoners following the Second World War, the Soviet union has always tried to minimise tragedies, you should try finding any report of the period from the HRW about Chernobyl and see yourself. Also, it is pretty much convinient for your to present the official numbers of victims from the supposed Soviet Investigations, but then, you have attempted to do everything to discredit the Azeris government first official figures for Khojali and haven't even left a single number space for its inclusion. And I repeat, if you are so concerned about the sources, I haven't seen you say anything about the March Massacre, which besides its unencyclopedic title (without even saying that there are at least 6 counted official March massacres in the literature, and not a single including massacres against Azeris), contains as sole sources an Azeri newspaper and a parlementarian from Azerbaijan and a member of the Azeris Academia of science who uses words such as 'monsters' and I have seen you go all mad over the skepticism about the breast mutilation in this article. At least, I haven't shown such double standard and have been consistant. Have you seen me delete authors like Halacoglu in the Armenian genocide article, I even added them myself. Fad (ix) 04:56, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

There are researches by authoritative sources for anything that happened in the USSR. You just need to use neutral sources, complied by neutral authors/researchers. I already explained my position, and so did Francis. We can go back and forth endlessly, but you either adhere to NPOV principles or you don’t. In the latter case you won’t be able to claim that the article complies with NPOV criteria. I don’t think there’s much to discuss here. Grandmaster 11:16, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

And also, the death toll numbers provided by HRW are pretty much the same as the official ones, and HRW is not the organization, known for its support of the Soviet regime. In fact, it was created to observe the human rights violations in the USSR. Grandmaster 11:19, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

No, Francis point has nothing to do with yours, stop talking in the name of others, his point was about the neutrality of the article, while your point is about deleting sources on the basis that they are Armenian witnesses or translators. And true, we can go back endlessly, and if you pay attention, you will see that you never addressed my point but always made me repeat myself, you never want to listen. The NPOV criteria of sources is a concept you made up, it is the reliability of the sources which you are mistaking with NPOV, and the reliability refers to what is reported and not the language used, a report by principale IS a position. As for the USSR, no you are entirly wrong. How many Soviet Sources can you find about the famine in Ukraine which according to many sources made as much victims as the Holocaust? Also, about the HRW, true the HRW provided recycle the same figures as the investigation(but they also say at LEAST) and just mention in in another article, but when have they ever interviewed the victims? They don't have any report published about it. Add those figures, and I hope you won't have a problem with the first official figures for Khojali being added in the Khojali article then. Fad (ix) 16:21, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

I’m not mistaken anything. The article has problems with both reliability of sources and NPOV. And also, if you check the book at Amazon.com, Shahmuratian is the editor of the book, not the translator, the translator is Jones Steven. I don’t know what your purpose in misrepresenting the facts is, you repeatedly said that only the translator was Armenian, while in fact it is written by an Armenian author. The book is compiled by Zorian institute, and the way they advertise the book speaks for itself. Quote: These events marked the beginning of a premeditated plan to depopulate Azerbaijan of Armenians, and eventually of Russians and Jews. [7] Do I need to note that currently hundreds of thousands of Russians and Jews live in Azerbaijan, while population of Armenia is 98% Armenian? And premeditated plan in 1988? If they misrepresent the facts in this small advertisement what can you expect from a book? As for HRW numbers, if they find those provided by Soviet authorities reliable, then they are. Again, HRW is known for defending the human rights in the USSR and never supported the Soviet regime. They would not help Soviets cover up the facts. As for Khojaly which you repeatedly keep bringing up, the first official number was 2, and not the one you mention. The number grew as the bodies were recovered. If you want to include it you can. And Francis suggested using non-partisan secondary sources, but you prefer not to listen. Check the discussion above. Grandmaster 21:22, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

I REPEAT, if you are concerned about the reliability of the sources, you would have a problem with the March Massacre, which you edited but said NOTHING about the reliability. And make your mind, either you are questioning the neutrality of the article, either you are requesting some sources to be filtered. So yes! You are mistaking everything. About the translator, you were the one shooting Armenians to discredit the sources with your prejudicial tone, my main point had nothing much to do with the translators ethnicity but your logic about 'he, she is an Armenian.' He could have been a chinese it could not have changed my point a bit. The publisher is not Zoryan, the published is Aristide D. Caratzas, don't mistaken compilators with publishers. IS IT NOT THE DEPOSITION? YES! Do you have any evidences that those primary sources are tainted? NO! Don't try to get the support by twisting your position and bringing the articles neutrality when the entire issue is about your request to exclude sources. About your second point, more you post more it becomes clear how prejudicial and biased you are. Armenia is the most homogenous republic in the region with reasons that have little to do with ethnic cleanings of minorities. Armenia was build by the slicing of every pieces with considerable Muslim population, the only exception being Zankezour. On top of that, that tiny pieces recieved 175 thousand Ottoman Armenians, as well the Armenians that were expulsed from Nachikevan, Ardahan, Kars, etc..., a considerable portion of Armenia at that time were refugees, homogenising that region. Armenia also faced the energy crises and an exodus, over a million Armenians from Armenia have left the republic since the fall of the Soviet Union. When you don't have any national feeling toward a country and that you are jobless, there is over 5 times more chances that you leave that country. This is why minorities are the first to leave under similar conditions than the majority. In no way can you compare Armenia with Azerbaijan. Armenia from the declaration of the republic to now has always been classified before Azerbaijan on human right, freedom of speech, freedom of press, education (national IQ is a good indicator there too, Armenia national IQ is one point behind Israel, and Azerbaijan is 6 point behind Armenia). Azerbaijan has a dictatorial regime, and its regime is considered a lot more repressive than Armenia. Azerbaijan multiculturalism has been founded on various factors like Petrolium.

As for the expulsion of Russians and Jews, dude, don't make me start posting what followed with the Armenian pogroms in Azerbaijan, that you are denying this, picture you as simply a nationalist.

As for Khojali, the official figures were about 150, I cited two books which maintained those, have you seen me edit warring on that? As for Francis request, I have cited here various works which you call non-partisan, and the only reason I don't start editing is article is because I am entry fed up with this Armeno-Azeris discussions. Fad (ix) 22:02, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

So far this article I have worked to adhere to Wikipedia's NPOV policy and as Fadix notes, you so easily waved off to Baku87's article on a massacre of Azeris/Jews in 1918-1920 that was relying solely on one heavily biased source. I have given the sources on this page and have described them in the article not as fact but personal opinions of the witnesses.

If you don't properly express justifiable grievances for this article (I still am marveling as to what REAL issues you have with Shahmuratian's book) then I'm going to remove the NPOV tag and continue writing this. You're not contributing anything to this POINTLESS discussion and holding it up for no apparent reason. This article will rely on several more media sources but hitherto, witness testimonies are primary sources and cannot be discounted unless we use your same standards and reduce the the entire Khojaly page to a few sentences. Also, De Waal, the author you enjoy citing so much, relies HEAVILY on the accounts of this book in Chapter 2 of the book. If De Waal is good enough to give citations on events in Nagorno-Karabakh with this book , then its certainly good enough for this article.

HRW never gained access into the USSR nor investigated and spoke to Armenian victims to give a true and accurate assessment of the event. They simply took the number given by Soviet authorities and wrote a paragraph about it. You CANNOT honestly compare the Soviet era with the post-Soviet era of Khojaly.--MarshallBagramyan 00:23, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

I’m questioning both the neutrality of the article and reliability of your sources. The way it’s written now contradicts NPOV rules, and it’s based on unreliable sources too. Whoever is the publisher of the book, it is written and edited by the Armenian side and is not a neutral source. Thy way it’s advertised shows clearly that it’s published for propaganda purposes. Even that short advertisement contains blatant lies. And the article on March massacre has nothing to do with this one, I did not write it and I don’t have to check the accuracy of each of 1,500 000 articles here. If you have problems with it, it’s you who should raise the issue. I’m not interested in that topic for the moment. As for HRW not having an access to the USSR, they have a report on Black January, that was before the collapse of the USSR. And they don’t dispute the official numbers too, while they always opposed to any misrepresentation of information by the Soviet authorities. The reason is that they consider the official numbers to be accurate. As for de Waal, he does not have to adhere to the Wikipedia rules about reliability of sources, since he’s an independent journalist and not a Wikipedia contributor. But we are in a different situation. I see no point in continuation of this discussion. This is my last posting here unless you change your approach to the issue. You can write whatever you want in your article, but the disputed tag will remain until the article is written in accordance with NPOV rules and is based on neutral sources. Grandmaster 12:26, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

You obviously demonstrate that you have no real concept of the NPOV issues and are only disputing the claims because you think the information is not reliable, not because there is any reasonable grounds for it. HRW possesses reports but they did not make individual assessments and actual analyses in regards to events that were only remotely covered in the article. I count at least 4 contradictions in this message of yours ranging between your practice on Wikipedia and your abysmmal failure to adhere to the same standards that you are preaching to me and Fadix to continue about.

I see no propaganda in the summary of the book. The fact that many Azeris knew what was going to happen to Armenians is enough proof to disspell that this event was not something arbitrary. The article DOES RELY ON PRIMARY SOURCES which invaldiates the accuracy of the tag that you placed on this article. The tag WILL be removed.--MarshallBagramyan 20:07, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Oh sure, lets compare then, shall we. We would consider the Khojali massacre article one of those from the 1.5 millions which you were closely involved in.

The Khojaly Massacre was the killing of a large number of ethnic Azerbaijani civilians in the town of Khojaly on 25 February 1992. The massacre was committed by the ethnic Armenian armed forces, reportedly with help of the Russian 366th Motor Rifle Regiment. This is approved by Memorial Human Rights Center, Human Rights Watch and other international observers.The official death toll provided by Azerbaijani authorities is 613 civilians, of them 106 women and 83 children.[1]

AND THIS IS NEUTRAL?

Just to compare, here is the Armenian genocide corresponding section.

The Armenian Genocide (also known as the Armenian Holocaust or the Armenian Massacre) refers to the forced mass evacuation and related deaths of hundreds of thousands or over a million Armenians, during the government of the Young Turks (Committee of Union and Progress) from 1915 to 1917 in the Ottoman Empire. Some aspects of the event are a matter of ongoing dispute between parts of the international community and Turkey. Although generally agreed that events said to comprise the Armenian Genocide did occur, the Turkish government rejects that it was genocide, and claims that the deaths among the Armenians were not a result of a state-sponsored plan of mass extermination, but of inter-ethnic strife, disease and famine during the turmoil of World War I. The article has been tainted later by Armenian POV pushers, but this is about what is endorsed by veterans.

It is widely known that the Armenian genocide is much, much less controversial than the Khojali massacre, which BTW is not called massacre by everyone and even not even footnoted by most. That article right on the lead takes a position, the position being that there was a mssacre, the massacre was commited and that various other organizations recognize it as such, when I referred to at least one other international organization which disagree and has been there just after the reported massacre unlike HRW. Also, after citing the word massacre as a mantra it provides the Azeris officials second official figures (which of course the first being entirly missing) and this after reciting the word massacre to mislead the reader into believing that that much people were massacred when the Azeris autorities accuses the Armenian sides of the deaths from frozen bites and colds in a region next to what the Armenian side was controling and was still under the juridiction of the Azeris army.

There is then, the March massacre which you have edited twice, haven't you not? You even defended what was there, when the article could even be considered as delete material. Also, if a declaration prepared by Azeris and Turkish representing sides as an answer to an Armenian genocide declaration is notable enough to be included in the Khojali massacre, I don't see how the depositions from the witnesses and victims should not be included. So, spare us all this NPOV talk, and I am not covering your various contradictions there. Fad (ix) 16:52, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Tag

I agree with Marshall. I read the whole article, it is very well referenced, and it's probably even too neutral (at the expense of the Armenian side). If we add a tag here, we will have to add a tag on the Khojalu page.--TigranTheGreat 03:46, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can see the same Armenian and pro-Armenian sources were used, such as Shahmuratian and Caroline Cox. I never used such sources on Khojaly, so you cannot compare it. I restored the tags, and they shall remain until the article is properly referenced from reliable neutral sources. Grandmaster 06:04, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

If you use De Waal and Cornell, we can use Cox. The article is factual, with opinions properly attributed. The tags shall be kept out, or we will put them on the Khojalu page. --TigranTheGreat 07:57, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

If you can prove any connection of de Waal and Cornell to Azerbaijan, we can discard them. And I find no problem with attaching tags to Khojaly, if you prove that any citations there are taken from partisan sources. You cannot claim neutrality and use partisan sources at the same time. Grandmaster 08:35, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Btw, so far I have not included de Waal quotes in any of the articles. But you guys did. Grandmaster 08:36, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I meant Cornell and de Waal in general. I do not want to discard them, because we don't discard sources that are biased, as long as they are considered "reputable"--every source is biased, and we would as well exclude everyone. I already showed a connection between Cornell and Azerbaijan (he got honorary doctorate degree from Azerbaijan Academy of Sciences--that already looks *very* suspicious). De-Waal is more subtle, yet his whole book uses the tone of "Armenians disregarded Azeri feelings, and the main fault of Azeris were that they couldn't defend their own land." That kind of stance smells of bias. Yet, we do not exclude it, and we shouldn't exclude Cox.

It is premature to put a tag here, without discussing and making good faith attempts to solve what you consider is POV. I personally see no POV here--we don't assert views, we attribute them. And Khajolu massacre--well there are facts that are omitted there, which would be very helpful (i.e. the military significance, etc.)--TigranTheGreat 08:50, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

What I want to know GM is what exactly troubles you so much. We're working with resources that we should be lucky to have on an internal Soviet issue. I've neutralized this article to the very meaning of the word and have taken utmost consideration to present the views equally. If we simply followed your method of writing this article it would appear something like this:

MOSCOW Several people were killed in the weekend's ethnic rioting between Azerbaijanis and Armenians in the industrial center of Sumgait, a Soviet Foreign Ministry spokesman said Wednesday..."There were several victims. Not many, but several," Gennady Gerasimov said. He said the official toll figures may be released later."

You know, not much, just some of your own run-of-the-mill ethnic rivlaries. Anyways, that's ethnic cleansing for you, now are you ready for some World Cup action?!!

The books and sources I have offered provide a unique and much more clarified version than reported by the media but here you are practically telling me to go along with the very truthful versions conveniently provided by TASS.--MarshallBagramyan 18:31, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

You know that according to the rules we should use only neutral unbiased sources. Neither Sahmuratian, nor Cox are such sources. I never refer to Azeri sources in any articles, and Armenian and pro-Armenian sources should be used either. I only claim this article to be based on neutral sources. This has been already discussed, but I don’t see anything changed. Grandmaster 18:38, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Using your logic, I can thus exclude much of the material that is put on Wikipedia because no matter how much they protest it, an author or anyone for that matter can and will hold personal views on the issues they write about. You're telling me that every single source used on the Iraq War page are completely neutral and have no personal stake and no belief, for example, on whether the war was correct or not? Pro or anti, writers are still capable of telling the truth when citing the right sources. Likewise Shahmuratian, who is only the editor of the book, has compiled depositions including even the same ones given to the Soviet courts. He hasn't written a personal story about his personal opinions but a collection of witness statements recorded from March 1988 to 1989. They are not coming from Armenian newspapers or websites. Your justifications for favoring the removal of the book are unconvincing and again, illogical, and unhelpful. HRW's only statement regarding Sumgait is this:

"The most brutal of these events was the anti-Armenian pogrom in Sumgait, Azerbaijan, which took the lives of thirty-two Armenians, wounded hundreds more, and intensified the fears of ethnic Armenians living in other parts of Azerbaijan."

That's about it and for an encylopedia article that's fairly short and unhelpful. Likewise, Cox's book is fully referenced and the reference to the rapes, for example, come from the Wall Street Journal or some other reputable Western source, I forget which one exactly. On the NK War page, the contradicting accounts by Khojaly survivors from Helsinki Watch were originally found in Cox's book. --MarshallBagramyan 20:16, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Once again, Marshall, the rules require to use only unbiased sources. Don’t tell me that Shahmuratian or Cox are such sources. I could have made the article on Khojaly more detailed, and I will definitely expand it in the future, but every single line I included in it comes from a reputable source, which no one can accuse of partiality. I expect the same approach in every article on controversial topics, related to the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Grandmaster 19:13, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

There is no such rule in Wikipedia. That's your single-most erroneous misconception about Wiki policies, which you have kept repeating on other pages as well. If it were the rule, we would exclude all sources. The requirement is to use reputable sources, not unbiased. We shouldn't use partisan sources (like Azeri, or Armenian), but non-Armenian reputable sources are fine.--TigranTheGreat 01:03, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

And Shahmuratian is not an Armenian source, is it? Grandmaster 19:11, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

He is only one of several sources. And Marshall gave a good explanation for using him. The article doesn't use his opinions/interpretations. It uses official documents compiled by him. And the quotes taken from his book are mostly attributed to Armenian witnesses, which is unavoidable, since Armenians were the ones being slaughtered. The reader then can judge whether the Armenians were telling the truth or not--TigranTheGreat 22:23, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

We should use sources with no bias according to the rules. Check this: [8] Also it would be good to cross-reference the info. If it is reliable, it would appear in more than one source.

Check multiple sources

Because conscious and unconscious biases are not always self-evident, you shouldn't necessarily be satisfied with a single source. Find another one and cross-check. If multiple independent sources agree and they have either no strong reason to be biased, or their biases are at cross purposes, then you may have a reliable account.

Shahmuratian is not Human Rights Watch, known for its impartiality, so we cannot rely on accuracy of his book. Grandmaster 07:55, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Your quote says nothing about "only use unbiased sources." (and it would be absurd if it said that). It says "use more than one sources," which is generally a good idea, and we are doing that here--we are not using just Shahmuradyan. And by the way, about the "cross-reference" thing, alot of what Shahmuradyan says, De-Waal says the same. So, we got a reliable account.

And by the way, your quote actually goes against your position--it says that we shouldn't rely on one source since sources sometimes contain hidden POV. Which means we can't blindly trust Cornell, De Waal, or even HRW (and copy their opinions, as you usually do), as they too may contain hidden POV's.--TigranTheGreat 21:22, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course, but when they all say the same thing, we can rely on them. And sources like HRW have a reputation for their impartiality, they are among the most reliable. Also, we are talking about reliability, Shahmuratian has an obviuos bias, while the bias of others needs proof. So Shahmuratian should not be used here at all, unless Azeri sources support what he says (their biases are at cross purposes). You should also "ask yourself: Do the sources have an agenda or conflict of interest, strong views, or other bias which may color their report?" I think the answer in case of Shahmuratian is obviuos. Grandmaster 05:31, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

You are truly blowing Shamuratian's role in this out of proportion. Shamuratian is simply the compiler and editor of the work, he contributes nothing to the book except a brief introduction in the beginning. There is a preface and prologue by Yelena Bonner and Gerard Libaridian but that's about it in terms of their contribution to the book. This book is no different that a compilation of survivors from other massacres.

And obviously Azeris contradict the Armenians' statements. How often do criminals who commit a crime admit the guilt to what they did? To say that the statements from the same people who did the rioting go against the victims' claims sounds logical doesn't it? That would be like saying that evidence provided by a prosecution team is disputed simply because the defendant's version is different. Of course their going to deny the Armenians' version and just blame it on nationalist hooliganism. Andrei Shilkov, the Soviet journalist for Glasnost, provides a much better account of the events and confirms much of the Armenians' accounts. Besides, some of the statements in the book are not even by Armenians, they include several Russians, a Georgian and I believe a few Azeris also.--MarshallBagramyan 18:34, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Quotes from the article:

“cited that the described methods, such as mutilation of the breasts, were unusual actions to be prescribed to Armenians who are Christain (Azeris are predominantly Shia Muslim)”.

What does it mean: “unusual actions to be prescribed to Armenians who are Christain”? It means that only Muslims commit such actions? That is a pure racist stuff, how can you claim that the article is NPOV?

Their initial skepticism may also have stemmed from events of the Hamidian massacres and Armenian Genocide where Armenian women were known to have been subjected to such acts by the Muslim Turks of the Ottoman Empire.

What do the allegations of massacres in other countries have to do with Sumgait? It is nothing but a POV push. The main source of info is again Shamuratian, which is not neutral and has an obvious ethnic bias. I restore the tag until the issues I mentioned are resolved, if the tag is removed again, I will ask for the admin intervention. Grandmaster 09:53, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Um, no, it means the charges being made against Armenians were ridiculous. What is so difficult in comprehending that Shahmuratian's words are only from pages 1-11 and that his miniscule contribution doesn't go beyond that? He's only an editor yet you are making all these dumbfounding accusations as if he's the author. The rest of those words are, for example, others' not Shahmuratian's. This for example comes from the Georgian Pkhakadze: "he added that in Kafan there is a dorm for Azerbaijani girls and Armenians broke in there and raped all the girls and cut their breasts off, which I didn't believe, of course because that's a purely Muslim thing to do, to cut the breasts off women who are loose". Those words are not mine and thinking about it, it makes sense. And far from allegations, such actions were taking place by the Ottoman Turks as they were made famous by newspapers and world leaders at those times. Go ask for it if you really want to but what's written in this article is far more neutral and unassertive than what I've seen you contribute to.--MarshallBagramyan 18:30, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

The charges against Armenians are ridiculous? So are the charges against Muslims. You can’t accuse representatives of a certain religion or ethnicity of holding an exclusive license to committing certain type of crimes and claim that the article is NPOV. You don’t have to repeat stupid claims of some silly man, even if he indeed said so and it got printed in a propaganda book. The passages above are indeed racist and the article has serious problems with neutrality, and the same is true for the choice of sources. It might be interesting for you to know that the gangs of Andranik did exactly the same thing as the article accuses Muslims of in the Caucasus. And if you have any problems with my contributions, don’t hesitate to bring it up on the relevant talk page, I’m always ready to work out any problems with other contributors. Grandmaster 20:17, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Because it doesn't make sense. I'm not saying that it didn't happen, I'm saying its difficult to understand why it would have happend then, if it did. Up until 1988 relations between Armenians and Azerbaijanis were neutral. To say that that Armenians broke into a maternity ward and began slaughtering, slashing breasts off and raping women out of hatred against the Azerbaijanis when the Karabakh movement was still in its infancy (tensions had hardly been raised) is difficult if not downright illogical to conclude. We're all human, we're all capable of doing many things. However, that's not enough to prove that's what happend. The "silly" man's comments can be taken with a grain of salt (skeptically) as just an unverifiable source but when other witnesses corroborate then there comes the possibility that the allegations may have been false. Reading it over, I can see some problems with the wording but we're living in a delusional state if we walk and mimic the same lines as everyone else. During the Armenian Genocide and the Hamidian massacres, the same accounts were widely circulated throughout not only the region, but also the entire world which quite logically, may have lead people to doubt the claims. Keep in mind, the article never states that the Kapan claims as false since its not up to Wikipedia to decide what is true or false.; it merely says A said this, but B (and many more) said that claim was false.

You raised the spectre of Andranik's deeds several months ago but you didn't adduce any evidence to support it (besides De Waal).--MarshallBagramyan 22:07, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

If we include the Azeri allegations about Kapan in this article, it is necessary to include the opposing view--even if you personally find it ridiculous. That's the basis of NPOV--we report opinions without dismissing them as unlikely. Amusingly, you used precisely the same argument on the Nakhichevan page when including the ridiculous Azeri response to the destruction of Armenian monuments. Obviously you remember the rules when they suit you, unfortunately we need to remember them all the time.

Plus, Marshall is right--there is something funny about the Azeri accusations, which basically say that all of a sudden Armenians woke up one morning and decided to cut Azeris' breasts, without any provocation? Obviously there is a fabrication, and the opposing quotes should be included to balance it. [removed inappropriate comment. - FrancisTyers · 13:10, 7 August 2006 (UTC)]

Also keep in mind that we are not saying all Muslims do such things--the quote in question merely suggested that Christian Armenians generally haven't done such brutal acts throughout their history, which is true. And it doesn't suggest all muslims are predisposed to brutality--it has more to do with the Turko-Tataric culture of the region, which is naturally less advanced that the native civilizations of the area, and still not too far from its nomadic heritage. It has nothing to do with racism or race, just pure cultural anthropology.

And Andranik was a heroic figure of highest integrity, who himself forbade any atrocities by his soldiers. Your baseless statements are repetitions of the regular Turko-Azeri falsifications, and hence do not deserve much attention. If Andranik killed some Muslims, they definitely deserved it, as they were massacring their Armenian neighbors.--TigranTheGreat 01:00, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Once again, the claim is stupid, and the person voicing is not notable to have his opinion mentioned. It is enough to remember the March Massacre of 1918 in Baku to see that Armenians are more than capable of brutally killing innocent people in large numbers, and even Walker admits that. The claim is pure racist, and comes from an Armenian source anyway. Plus, any attempts to relate Sumgait events with any alleged massacres anywhere else is POV and violate the neutrality rules. Grandmaster 12:23, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Tigran, I suggest you re-read your post and reflect on whether it was truely appropriate. The tone is reminiscent of a paper in "Anthropology" journal from the turn of the century. - FrancisTyers · 13:10, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Mest Butilation

Konstantin Pkhakadze, a Georgian who lived in Sumgait at the time and attended the rallies, cited that the described methods, such as mutilation of the breasts, were unusual actions to be prescribed to Armenians who are Christain (Azeris are predominantly Shia Muslim). One of these refugees, for example, was later identified not as the "peaceful resident of [sic] Kafan he made himself out to be; instead he was a convicted recidivist, now a sponger, with no permanent address...and no family whatsoever."

I've removed this, as it seems irrelevant to the article and contains original research. Don't add it back in. - FrancisTyers · 13:03, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

According to the refugees who had fled from Kapan and arrived in Sumgait, Armenians had killed and raped women and sliced their breasts off. Similar acts were also said to have been occurring to Azeris in Nagorno-Karabakh itself. However, some of these allegations were discounted by witnesses as fabrications, charging the speechmakers as provocateurs.

I've removed this because it is unsourced and only tangentially relevant. - FrancisTyers · 13:05, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

According to several Armenian witnesses and later on several Soviet military personnel, alcohol and anasha, an Azeri term referring to narcotics such as opium, were also reported to have been brought in trucks and distributed to the Azeri crowds...

How is this relevant, what point is it trying to make? - FrancisTyers · 13:06, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Armenian POV and undue weight

1) Contains an external link to: http://sumgait.info/sumgait/sumgait-eng/sumgayit-victims-eng.htm - This is of course not acceptable for clear and obvious reasons. 2) Seven (7) references to Armenian author Shahmuratian, Samvel -- this is a definition of "undue weight". 3) In addition to Shahmuratian, another ethnic Armenian author is featured: Malkasian, Mark. Only once is an Azeri author cited, and even then in co-authorship with a Russian author. --adil 21:46, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

once again, the link is extreme POV and unacceptable. --adil 07:26, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

No its not, its actually extremely informative. Artaxiad 16:03, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

If you check the archives, I raised this issue long ago, the problem is still not resolved. The sources used are not neutral and not third party, as required by the rules. Grandmaster 17:53, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Shahmuratian, just to reiterate because you have a habit of always forgetting, is the editor; it's dishonest of you to continuously paint him as an author especially when you have not even read the book. Other sources cited in this article use the book too, negating your assertion that it somehow lacks authenticity or reliability. Out of 47 citations, seven are from the Shahmuratian compilation (which only tell us things we already know) and the rest are more than neutral.

Don't make me hold your hand to explain everything to you again, it becomes tiring. --MarshallBagramyan 20:12, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

right now, the problem is with sumgait.info, a racist Armenian chauvinistic site. And it should be removed from Wikipedia. --adil 05:31, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Where did I paint Shahmuratian as an author? It is not a third party source though, which is the problem. Grandmaster 05:54, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm reverting your last edit, Adil. It's an obvious removal of information. -- Aivazovsky 16:51, 5 April 2007 (UTC)