UNREST IN THE CAUCASUS AND THE CHALLENGE OF NATIONALISM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91B00776R000600150001-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 44
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 16, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: August 1, 1988
• Content Type: MISC

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Intelligence
Unrest in the Caucasus and. the
Challenge of Nationalism
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STAT7
/DD.l AEG
LOGGED
Top Secret
SOV 88-10059CX
August 1988
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~l Intelligence
Unrest in the Caucasus and the
Challenge of Nationalism
This paper was prepared by
of Soviet Analysis, with contributions from
STAT
.qTAT
STAT
SOYA.
Comments and queries are welcome and may be
directed to the Chief, Domestic Policy Division,
SOv
Top See.et
SOV 88-10059CX
August 1988
STAT
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Challenge of Nationalism
Unrest in the Caucasus and the
Summary This year's continuing unrest in the Caucasus is the most extreme example
Information available of the nationality tensions that have surfaced under glasnost. Soviet
as of 25 July 1988 difficulty in stabilizing the situation reflects the strength of nationalism,
was used in this report.
the limits of Moscow's control over its various republics, and divisions
within the leadership on the merits of accommodating long-suppressed
regional aspirations. The Caucasus unrest has also become a lightning rod
for conservative opposition to Gorbachev, whose Politburo critics have tried
to exploit the conflagration for political purposes.
Violent unrest in the Caucasus region has deep roots:
? Enmity between Armenian and Azeri factions has existed for hundreds
of years, and the 1920s settlement subordinating Nagorno-Karabakh-
Armenia's cultural and religious center-to the Azerbaijan Republic has
been a continual, albeit long-muted, source of Armenian frustration and
concern.
? Azeri animosity toward the Armenians has been intensified by political,
economic, and demographic trends that have adversely affected the
political status of Azeris and increased the gap in living standards
between Azerbaijan and Armenia. In particular, the rapid expansion of
Azerbaijan's young adult population has put enormous strain on the
republic's capacity to provide adequate jobs, housing, and education.
Azeri frustration has found an outlet in attacks on Armenians.) 25X1
While glasnost was the catalyst that brought these tensions to the fore, the
subsequent train of events can be attributed to Moscow's vacillation on the
central issue of reunifying Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia:
? Moscow's initial failure to discourage Armenian aspirations led Arme-
nian nationalists to press their demands; its subsequent hard line-by
dashing heightened expectations-radicalized the movement. Wide-
spread civil disobedience erupted, with control over the protests passing
into the hands of more outspoken and uncompromising protest
organizers.
? Subsequent Soviet steps-economic and nationalistic concessions to
defuse irredentist demands, a strong military presence to discourage
violent demonstrations, leadership changes to regain control over republic
party activities-were only partly successful.
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SOV 88-10059CX
August 1988
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the Kazakh riots in late 1986.
? By mid-June, Armenian and Azerbaijan party organizations aligned
themselves with their ethnic constituents, when the two republic soviets
formally took diametrically opposed positions on the territorial issue.
level party leaders.
o ow's-fence'sit-ting ha-s-reflcte a~division within the-Politburo on the
'ssue-of_how to_handle-nationality_p blem g eyally na he_situationin
the Caucasus inparticular~. The conservatives, led by "Second Secretary"
Ligachev and KGB Chief Chebrikov have favored a hard line on national-
istic aspirations, including maintaining the status quo in the Caucasus.
They have voiced concern that Gorbachev's reforms could undermine
political control in the republics, a view probably shared by many lower-
Gorbachev probably believes that regime tolerance of greater ethnic
diversity and regional autonomy would result in greater commitment of the
non-Russian population to his broader programs of economic and political
revitalization. He and his reform allies assert that the relative insensitivity
of the conservatives has been a major factor heightening ethnic tensions.
Ligachev, in particular, may be faulted for insensitivity to ethnic concerns.
In addition to taking a hard line in the Caucasus crisis, he reportedly had a
hand in replacing the Kazakh party boss with a Russian, a move that led to
n_ret-rospect, Gorbachev may have miscalculatezi'the iimpact of glasnost.
(His actions and_speeches_duting the past years-sug-he may have be ne
Cundul-y-optimistic-tha-t diverse interests of n tional -groups can be accom-
rm6dated an reconciled within-the fram-ework-of-t-he-Soviet-unitar tate )
Glasnost has led. to an expanded discussion by minorities of lega,
economic, and cultural rights, as well as a greater public discourse on the
past "wrongs" perpetrated against them. Since the beginning of the year
there have been major nationalist demonstrations in nine of the 15
republics and numerous smaller incidents elsewhere. Gorbachev has now
had time to see the aggressively independent form nationalistic aspirations
have taken; while he does not want to crush the spirit of these movements,
he cannot be confident of the regime's ability to control their direction.
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Despite the protracted tussle within the Politburo over how to handle the
situation in the Caucasus, the leadeiship has now acted decisively in
rejecting-the-demand-ofRNagerno-Karabakh_to_secede_from-Azerbaijan.
The Supreme Soviets Presidium on 18 July labeled this proposal both
"unconstitutional" and "undesirable." The regime is using a large-scale
military and police presence to reestablish order and has sent a Central
Committee representative to Nagorno-Karabakh to put the oblast under
Moscow's de facto direct control, at least temporarily.
While instigating this crackdown, Moscow also appears to be groping
toward a long-term plan that just might prove acceptable to both sides.
This would be some new administrative arrangement whereby Nagorno-
Karabakh is not transferred to Armenia but is given some degree of
genuine autonomy in Azerbaijan, perhaps accompanied by some measures
to give national groups living outside their national "homelands" expanded
cultural and economic rights. The party leadership clearly prefers to place
changes in Nagorno-Karabakh's status in the broader context of changes in
nationality policy in general.
A major problem Gorbachev faces is that working out the details of this
plan may take some time-requiring endorsement by a Central Committee
plenum and probably approval of constitutional amendments by the
Supreme Soviet. With passions at fever pitch, it has been difficult to sell
the plan even to those concerned parties who would in calmer times be
amenable to compromise.
Gorbachev-has-succeeded-for-no_w_in_bringing the region back to a
`elatively-norma-l-state-of affairs,but if order u avels again~he will"become
more-vuine`rable to'conservative criticism and challenges to fiis leadership
Perhaps more important, a regime failure to maintain control in the
Caucasus might embolden nationalists in other republics and raise serious
problems for regime stability. Even if Moscow placates the Armenians by
making some further concessions, this precedent could also stimulate other
already restive minorities to press their demands-more agressively and set
the stage for communal violence in Azerbaijan.
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Top Secret
Communal Violence Erupts in Azerbaijan 8
The Regime Tries To Dampen the Fire 11
May Demonstrations Lead to an Impasse' 11
E. Restless Nationalities: Catalogue of Ethnic Tensions in a 37
Multinational State
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Top Secret
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Challenge of Nationalism
cities in 1986.
Minority resentment has been simmering for decades
in the multinational Soviet state, but glasnost has
permitted it to surface. Massive demonstrations and
communal violence in Armenia and Azerbaijan have
presented General Secretary Gorbachev with his most
explosive test since taking office three years ago. They
constitute the largest, most violent, and most protract-
ed unrest in the Soviet Union since Stalin's death-
eclipsing Georgian riots in 1956, strikes in Novocher-
kassk in 1962, and nationalist riots in several Kazakh
alesce in a powerful anti-Moscow lobby.
The unrest in the Caucasus is the most extreme
example of nationality tensions throughout the USSR
that could jeopardize Gorbachev's efforts to revitalize
the Soviet system through economic and political
reforms. Throughout Soviet history, regime concern
to maintain Russian hegemony over non-Russian ar-
eas has been a major impediment to the kind of
liberalization Gorbachev advocates. Soviet leaders
have feared that relaxing censorship-glasnost-or
opening up the political system at lower levels-
"democratization"-would unleash separatist tenden-
cies of disgruntled minorities. Soviet nationality poli-
cy was founded on the co-optation and conciliation of
national minority elites by Moscow, thus preventing
any convergence of elite and popular interests in non-
Russian areas. But glasnost and "democratization"
have created conditions for these two groups to co-
Armenian-Azeri animosities go back hundreds of
years an are eep y rooted in religious and ethnic
tensions. Armenians are fiercely loyal to their Ortho-
ox church-they adopted Christianity in the fourth
century, nearly 700 ears before the Russians. The
Azeris are predominantly Shi'ite Muslims iw Srm
grates tote region in the 12th century. The ttwo
groups have lived in close and uneasy proximity to
each other ever since, with both groups claiming the
contested Nagorno-Karabakh region. Karabakh
through the centuries remained semiautonomous un-
der the rule o Armenian rmces even when t -Fe rest of
Armenia was under Persian and Turkish to a age
rmemans also consider the region a cultural center,
and it is the native land of many Azerbaijani writers
In 1828 the Russian Empire annexed the eastern
regions of Armenia-the area of the current Soviet
republic-that had been under Persian control si e 25X1
1639. After centuries of perceived cnlt,iral iscrimi-
nat of n and economic backwardness, the Christian
Armenians remaining under Turkish control looked to
Russia's Orthodox czars for protection from the Mos-
lem Turks and Persians throughout the 19th century.
Relations with the Turks worsened after the Russo-
Turkish War of 1877-78 and, at the turn of century,
thousands of Armenians fled the pogroms in Turkey.
Many accounts contend that Turkey in 1915 deported
the entire Armenian population because it feared
Armenian collusion with Russia, with which Turkey
had been at war since August 1914. Armenians
believe that 1.5 million of their countrymen were
killed. Many Armenians reportedly fled to the area
under Russian control, while others scattered
throughout the Middle East, to Europe, or the Ameri-
cas. 25X1
When the Czarist Empire collapsed in 1917, both
Armenia and Azerbaijan existed for two years as
independent republics. However, their mutual hatred
made it easier for the Red Arm% to establish Soviet
-mss
hegemony in the Caucasus in 192(L when both repub-
lics were incorporated into the USSR. Armenians, in
particular, fearful of Turkey and seeing union with
Russia as a "lesser evil," did little to resist incorpora-
tion into the USSR
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The Bolshevik takeover left Azerbaijan in control of
Karabakh. But the Armenians regarded it as rightful-
ly theirs both because of ethnic composition (over-
whelmingly Armenian) and because of its special
place in their national history. At first, Moscow
awarded Karabakh to the Armenians, but when Tur-
key expressed opposition to a large Armenian republic
on its borders, Lenin in 1921 agreed to reduce the size
of Armenia. In 1923, Stalin shifted Karabakh (re-
named Nagorno-Karabakh) and Nakhichevan'-
another disputed territory-back to Azerbaijan.
Nagorno-Karabakh was given the status of an autono-
mous oblast (AO) within Azerbaijan. (C NF)
Since that time, irredentist sentiment has periodically
surfaced among Armenians. For decades nearly every
party meeting and public gathering in Armenia and
Nagorno-Karabakh has reportedly, actively but quiet-
ly pressed for reunification of the oblast with
Armenia:
? Armenian nationalism started to mount in the mid-
1960s after a massive demonstration of the 50th
anniversary of the alleged Turkish "massacres."
The Yerevan-based underground "National Unifi-
cation Party," founded in 1966, clandestinely
broadcast a radio appeal and passed out leaflets in
1969 calling for the return of Nagorno-Karabakh.
The. party's leaders were jailed during 1968 and
1969, but apparently were able to circulate nation-
alist manifestos from prison.
? In the 1970s, there were reportedly frequent clashes
between Armenians and Azeris in areas where the
borders of the two republics joined, and even some
pitched battles between Armenian nationalists and
Azeri police. At least 15 advocates of secession were
arrested in 1974. When an Azeri accused of mur-
dering an Armenian youth in Nagorno-Karabakh
received a light sentence in 1974, Armenians report-
edly killed the judge and the accused.
Ethnic tensions have been exacerbated by demograph-
ic pressures (see inset). During 1923-79 the number of
Armenians in the region fell from 94 percent to 76
percent, and the number of Azeris rose to 23 percent
(see table 1). Azeris, who have a high birthrate, have
moved to Armenian agricultural areas, including
Demographic Trends Strengthen Ethnic Identity of
Azeris and Armenians
Azeris are the least migratory of the Soviet Turkic
people. In 1979, 86 percent of Azeris lived in Azerbai-
jan. Demographic shifts in Azerbaijan reflect a gener-
al process of consolidation of Soviet minority nation-
alities in their home republics over the last
generation, thus dramatically reducing, the extent of
ethnic mixing in Soviet republics. Non-Muslim com-
munities in Azerbaijan particularly Russians and
Armenians-have been rapidly shrinking. Between
1959 and 1979, there has been a steady migration of
these groups out of Azerbaijan. The percentage of the
indigenous population in Azerbaijan has increased
dramatically from 68 percent in 1959 to 78 percent in
1979 as a result of high Azeri birthrates and out-
migration. This ethnic consolidation has strengthened
national feeling among Azeris.
A similar consolidation has taken place in Armenia.
Armenians leaving Azerbaijan-as well as other re-
gions-are moving into Armenia. The rate of increase
of ethnic Armenians in Armenia between 1959 and
1970 has been significantly higher than their general
increase in the Soviet Union as a whole: 42.3 percent
versus 27.7 percent. Between 1970 and 1979 the
corresponding increases were 23.4 percent (in Arme-
nia) and 16.6 percent (in the Soviet Union).
Nagorno-Karabakh, while Armenians have been mi-
grating to Yerevan and other urban regions. Arme-
nians apparently feared that Azeri immigration would
lead to Azeri consolidation of control in Nagorno-
Karabakh, a process that- went on in Nakhichevan'
between 1914 and 1979. Nakhichevan' was 52 percent
Armenian in 1914, according to an Armenian samiz-
dat document, and the remaining 48 percent was
composed of Kurds, Persians, and Azeris. By 1979
Nakhichevan' was only 1.4 percent Armenian, and
the Azeri population had risen to 94 percent. Many
Armenians believe these trends reflected a conscious
Azeri policy to drive out other nationalities and to
force assimilation on those who remained.
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Table 1
Population by Nationality of Nagorno-Karabakh
AO and Nakhichevan' ASSR
Population Percent of
Total
17,995 13.8
110,053 84.4
1,790 1.4
Note: Percentages do not add to 100 because of a minute distribu-
tion of other nationalities in these two areas.
Population Percent of Population Percent of
Total Total
27,179 18.1 37,264 23.0
121,068 80.5 123,076 75.9
1,310 0.9 1,265 0.8
The impact of Gorbachev's reform policies of glasnost
and perestroyka was initially felt in discontent over
longstanding national and environmental concerns:
? In 1986 a group of 350 Armenian intellectuals sent
an open letter to Gorbachev protesting pollution
from a chemical plant and "leaks" from a nuclear
power plant.
? On 17 October 1987, several republic and local
party officials joined about 2,000 environmental
demonstrators protesting pollution in Yerevan.
? Public protests apparently stopped further nuclear
power expansion in Armenia, according to an offi-
cial announcement made in December 1987.'
At the same time, glasnost made it easier to express
Armenian irredentist sentiment. A petition reportedly
circulating among civil servants in several government
offices in Yerevan addressed the problems of tradi-
tionally Armenian areas that were currently under
Georgian, Turkish, and Azerbaijan control. In 1986,
Igor Muradyan, a young economist in Yerevan,
formed a committee to promote the reunification of
the Nagorno-Karabakh and Nakhichevan' with Ar-
menia. By August 1987 the group had reportedly
gathered 75,000 signatures. On 18 October-one day
after the large environmental protest-an estimated
1,000 people in Yerevan protested "incidents" in
Nagorno-Karabakh, where Armenians reportedly
clashed with the Azerbaijan KGB. According to a
Western press account, Muradyan's group met with a
low-level official in Moscow in November. In early
January 1988, another delegation met with Petr
Demichev, First Deputy Chairman of the USSR
Supreme Soviet Presidium, who reportedly said he
considered their demands "neither anti-Soviet nor
nationalistic." A third delegation met with V.
Mikhaylov, director of the Central Committee subde- 25X1
partment for nationality relations, in early February
and reportedly received an even warmer reception.
Abel Aganbegyan, an Armenian who is a senior
Gorbachev economic adviser, told Armenians abroad
in late 1987 that the way was being paved for
economic and possibly political reunification. 25X1
Armenian Expectations Build Up
These signals of encouragement from officials in
Moscow apparently convinced Armenians in Nagor-
no-Karabakh AO that Moscow was willing to accede
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to their desires, a perception that gave momentum to
the movement for reunification with Armenia. Posters
and open letters supporting the switch appeared in the
Nagorno-Karabakh capital, Stepanakert, on 11 Feb-
ruary 1988, and public meetings began on 13 Febru-
ary. On 20 February, 110 Armenian deputies of the
Nagorno-Karabakh soviet, in the absence of the 30
Azeri deputies, passed a resolution asking Moscow to
redraw the boundaries. Demonstrations demanding
union with Armenia were also mounted in Nakhiche-
van' and Agdam, the region adjacent to Nagorno-
Karabakh.
The Nagorno-Karabakh demand fell on fertile ground
in Armenia. In Yerevan, where demonstrations were
already growing over the construction of a new chemi-
cal plant near the capital, denunciations of "environ-
mental genocide" quickly mingled with claims that
"Karabakh is ours."
The Politburo's Initial Hard Line Backfires
After news of the escalating unrest reached Moscow,
where a Central Committee plenum was in progress,
Politburo candidate members Georgiy Razumovskiy
and Demichev, with responsibilities for party organi-
zational work and cultural policy respectively, hastily
flew to Nagorno-Karabakh on 20 February. They
were followed by Politburo candidate members Vladi-
mir Dolgikh and Anatoliy Luk'yanov, responsible for
energy and internal security organs respectively, who
went to Yerevan on the 23rd.
The arrival of Razumovskiy and Demichev coincided
with the Politburo's adoption on 21 February of a
hard line at odds with the earlier positive feedback the
Armenians thought they had been given. Perhaps
alarmed by the growing ground swell of support in
Yerevan for union of Nagorno-Karabakh with Arme-
nia, the Politburo apparently hoped to stem the tide
with a firm rejection. Armenian party leader Demir-
chyan confirmed on Armenian television on 22 Febru-
ary that the Central Committee had issued a resolu-
tion turning down the Armenian nationalist demands,
saying that a revision of the territorial boundaries in
the region would be "contrary to the interests" of both
Armenians and Azeris. The official TASS announce-
ment of Moscow's decision, published on 23 February,
criticized disturbances incited by "extremism" and
called on Armenian and Azerbaijan republic party
organizations to safeguard order.
Moscow apparently also assumed a personnel shakeup
would help. On the same day the Central Committee
decree was announced, Azerbaijan party leader
Bagirov ordered the removal of Boris Kevorkov, the
Nagorno-Karabakh party chief since 1976.
the party committee initially balked,
voting overwhelmingly for reunion with Armenia and
retention of Kevorkov. Razumovskiy, however, over-
ruled the committee and dictated Kevorkov's replace-
ment by Genrikh Pogosyan, another ethnic Armenian
but one who Moscow presumably hoped would be
more pliable. While temporarily acceding to this
pressure, the Nagorno-Karabakh party committee, at
a plenum held on 17 March, adopted a resolution
again calling for the incorporation of the oblast into
Armenia.
The harsh Central Committee decree, after earlier
tolerance, was the spark that ignited widespread
communal violence in Nagorno-Karabakh. It appar-
ently led to a de facto general strike in the oblast and
to violence there and in neighboring regions. Rumors
of casualties and deaths quickly reached Yerevan and
were confirmed on Armenian television by Dolgikh on
23 February. A videotape reportedly made by Hare
Krishnas at this time shows large crowds in Stepana-
kert jeering Demichev and local leaders who appealed
for calm.
The Central Committee decree also radicalized the
protests in Yerevan. Observers likened the increasing-
ly massive and unprecedented demonstrations there to
the Polish Solidarity demonstrations in the Gdansk
shipyards in 1980. The size of the crowds in Yerevan
grew to close to a million, with the uninhibited influx
of thousands from throughout the republic. Emotions
ran high, and one prominent representative from
Nagorno-Karabakh-the head of its dramatic the-
ater-called for a "national liberation movement."
Demonstrators carried banners admonishing that
"self-determination is not extremism"-a reference to
the Central Committee decree-and that "Karabakh
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is a test of perestroyka." Workers at Armenian
television and radio stations reportedly went on strike
to protest "unobjective" reporting and ran several
programs strongly supporting Nagorno-Karabakh's
demands. They carried an appeal by the head of the
Armenian Apostolic Church, Vazgen I, who reported
that he had sent a telegram to Gorbachev calling the
demands "natural, legal, and constitutional."
Having initially supported the Politburo's hard line-
at least publicly-party leaders in Armenia appeared
to have little authority over the demonstrators. Protest
organizers increasingly took charge of events, impos-
ing their own discipline on the demonstrations. The
protest resulted in the creation of a skeleton organiza-
tion in Yerevan-the Karabakh Committee-draw-
ing heavily on those involved in the earlier protests
and prominent intellectuals with nationalist views (see
appendix A).
Figure 2. Catholicos Vazgen I blesses Armenian
worshipers after church services in Yerevan,
Armenia's capital.
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Figure 4. Protesting Armenians
march through Lenin Square in
Yerevan on 24 February.
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vM v
Figure 5. Thousands of demon-
strators gather in the main
square of Kirovakan, an Arme-
nian city north of Yerevan, dur-
ing a rally on 25 February pro-
testing violence against fellow
Armenians in neighboring
Azerbaijan.
Figure 6. Igor Muradyan, one
of the leaders of the Karabakh
Committee, which organized
demonstrations in Armenia,
speaks to an estimated crowd
of a million gathered in Yere-
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Gorbachev's Shift Toward Conciliation Brings
Momentary Calm
Realizing its loss of control over the local situation,
Moscow began to play for time. The Politburo team
immediately accepted the suggestion by one of the
protest organizers for a direct meeting with Gorba-
chev, who clearly wanted to head off developments
that could have adverse implications for his reforms.
The Armenian envoys who met Gorbachev, writers
Zori Balayan and Silva Kaputikyan, said he was well
briefed and assured them he wanted a "just solution."
He reportedly acknowledged the peaceful nature of
the demonstrations and emphasized his personal sym-
pathy with the desire to reunite Nagorno-Karabakh
with Armenia, but said the Central Committee would
have to decide that issue at a special plenum. He
promised to provide a "preliminary response" to the
demands on 26 March 1988.
On their return to Yerevan on 27 February, the
Armenian envoys asked the demonstrators for pa-
tience. In a radiobroadcast, Kaputikyan called for
trust in Gorbachev. "He knows about and under-
stands our problem and wants to resolve it personal-
ly," and "we must do our utmost to ensure that no
harm" is done to him. She quoted him as saying that
the Central Committee had been wrong to describe
the demonstrators as "extremists" and unveiled three
concessions proposed by Gorbachev: greater guaran-
tees for the Armenian language, the transmission of
Armenian television to Nagorno-Karabakh, and the
reconstruction of a historically important monastery
in the region. These guarantees were subsequently
confirmed in a 24 March Politburo decision. In a
further effort to lessen tensions, Gorbachev made a
public appeal, which was read over Armenian and
Azerbaijan media on 26 February. In. it, he eschewed
the charge of "extremism" and promised a fair hear-
ing once "passions cooled." Armenian party leader
Karen Demirchyan also appealed for calm and strong-
ly implied a party commission would be set up to
investigate the demands.
Moscow's strategy worked. The organizing committee
agreed to a month's suspension of demonstrations and
to make up for the weeklong work stoppage. Although
not all demonstrators were enthusiastic about these
calls, by the evening of 27 February organizers had
persuaded nearly everyone in Yerevan to return to
work.
Communal Violence Erupts in Azerbaijan
Just as Moscow saw the situation stabilizing in Yere-
van, events took a dramatic turn for the worse in
Azerbaijan. Communal violence that had been sim-
mering there since 20 February burst to the surface
on 27 and 28 February, when major riots broke out in
Sumgait, an oil center of 220,000, close to Baku.
The Sumgait Riots. Public disclosure by a top Soviet
prosecutor on 27 February on Baku radio that two
Azeri youths were killed in a rayon adjoining
Nagorno-Karabakh apparently provided the match to
ignite the disturbances. Officials later confirmed that
the violence in Sumgait was in fact a pogrom directed
by the Azeris against the city's 16,000 to 20,000
Armenians. According to TASS, 32 people were
killed (26 Armenians and six Azeris) and 197 injured,
including more than 100 policemen; rioters committed
12 rapes and more than 100 robberies; 80 were
arrested. in contrast,
reported over 500 dead, including several Russians.'
Armenians contacted in Sumgait and others arriving
in Moscow say gangs of Azeris stormed through the
city, hunting down and killing Armenians or their
Azeri protectors. Small groups broke into apartments
and stopped cars, demanding to see the resident's
documents. If an Armenian was discovered, he was
knifed or worse. In an emotional scene outside Mos-
cow's Armenian church on 8 March, a weeping
elderly man told a crowd of 300 Armenians that
members of their community in Sumgait and sur-
rounding villages had been taken to safety to large
Islam played a key role in organizing the attacks. The existence of
many underground organizations connected with the Sufi brother-
hood-an extremist fundamentalist sect-makes it plausible that a
group like the Children of Islam could have been established,
especially given the close connection between nationalism and
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official buildings guarded by troops. Another spoke of
pillage, rape, and murder directed against Armenians.
According to one widely circulating story, initially
coming from an Armenian in Sumgait who talked by
phone to a Western press service, a family of seven
was killed in the riots. Others reported killings of
pregnant women and babies, and flaying people alive.
Some of these charges, not reported in Soviet media,
have been acknowledged by Soviet officials in inter-
views with Western reporters.
Background of Azeri Frustrations Over Falling
Status. The rioting in Sumgait was touched off by the
upsurge of Armenian protest over Nagorno-Kara-
bakh, but was conditioned by an Azeri sense of
victimization that had been building up for some time.
While the Azeri population has grown rapidly over
the last decade, Moscow investment policy has in-
creasingly concentrated on modernizing enterprises in
the European parts of the country rather than in less-
developed areas like Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan also ex-
perienced declining investments in its oil industry as a
result of the priority given to development of the
energy sector in western Siberia. Living standards
declined in Azerbaijan, and the gap between real per
capita consumption in Azerbaijan and Armenia grew.
Economic dissatisfaction was further aggravated by
dramatic population growth particularly in the age
group seeking employment. In the last decade Azer-
baijan has experienced a youth bulge (20 percent or
more of the population in the 15- to 24-year-old age
group), which could not be easily absorbed (see table
This problem was compounded by the general lack of
labor mobility. Azeri youth, even when well trained,
showed little inclination to move to labor-short Slavic
regions. According to Soviet media, there are 250,000
people in Azerbaijan who are "not employed in social
production"; one-fourth of these live in the city of
Baku. These economic problems were particularly
Table 2
Azerbaijan Youth Bulge
noticeable in Sumgait-focal point of the rioting-
where many Azeri youth lived in squalid, barracks-
like conditions.'
At the same time, Azerbaijan's political influence in
Moscow had dwindled. The career of its native son,
Geydar Aliyev-who had been made USSR First
Deputy Premier and CPSU full Politburo member in
1982-took a downturn under Gorbachev. He was
suddenly retired in October 1987, following sharp
media and official charges of widespread corruption
in Azerbaijan during his tenure as republic party boss
from 1969 to 1982. Aliyev's successor, Bagirov, had
also come under fire from Moscow for complacency
toward corruption and nepotism. Another native son,
Nikolay Baybakov-an ethnic Russian-was removed
in 1985 from his post as chairman of the USSR State
Planning Committee (Gosplan), where he had great
influence on resource allocation.
These developments, which contrasted with the con-
tinued prominence of Armenians in high political
positions, were probably read by Azeris as part of a
deliberate attempt to reduce Azerbaijan's political
' According to the Soviet media, Sumgait is called Komsomol'sk-
on-the-Caspian, the "City of Youth." Housing shortages are acute
with more than 10,000 living in "shantytowns" without water,
sanitation, or gas. Nearly 18,000 are on waiting lists for apart-
ments, but it could take up to 15 years to get one. Press reporting
indicates an annual influx of 10,000 people-mostly young-to
Baku and vicinity hoping for higher paying positions and a better
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clout. Thus, the Azeris' belief that the Russians were
siding with the Armenians, with whom they share
religious and cultural ties, was reinforced.
The Regime Tries To Dampen the Fire
The Sumgait riots apparently reinforced already ex-
isting concerns in Moscow about giving in to the
territorial demands. The leadership, however, contin-
ued to temporize on this issue. The Central Commit-
tee convened a special conference on 9 March-in
keeping with Gorbachev's promise to the demonstra-
tors-and instructed'the Secretariat to make recom-
mendations on the dispute. On 18 March, while
Gorbachev was returning from Yugoslavia, "Second
Secretary" Yegor Ligachev presided at a meeting
with Azeri and Armenian intellectuals and separately
met a delegation from Nagorno-Karabakh. The Sec-
retariat apparently focused on problems in economics,
social, and "spiritual life" without addressing the
territorial demand.
Events in late March, however, made clear that the
leadership was moving toward a rejection of Arme-
nian demands for the return of Nagorno-Karabakh. A
harsh Pravda article on 21 March called the idea of
reunification "antisocialist" and inspired by "foreign
radio voices." In a clearly orchestrated move, the
USSR Supreme Soviet responded on 23 March to
calls for law and order from Supreme Soviets in all
the other republics. The next day, the Politburo
unveiled its package of economic and cultural conces-
sions designed to win over Armenian moderates. It
called for increased spending on housing and social
infrastructure; provisions for transmission of Arme-
nian television throughout the AO; restoration of
historic and cultural sites; and increased investment in
industry, agriculture, and road construction; but
failed to provide a formal decision on the territorial
issue]
Along with these cultural and economic concessions,
the regime took steps to control if not prevent further
unrest:
? It disbanded the organizing committees in Armenia
and Nagorno-Karabakh on 24 March-arresting
several protest leaders, notably former political pris-
oner Paruir Ayrikyan-and banned demonstrations
in Armenia and Azerbaijan.
In the face of the large show of force, the activists
called off the demonstrations planned for the 26th and
called a stay-at-home strike. Their appeal was only
partially successful in Yerevan and with the exception
of several small demonstrations and a large peaceful
march on 24 April, the city remained calm and the
workers on the job until mid-May. Meanwhile, in
Nagorno-Karabakh a general strike began on 25
March, paralyzing all industry in Stepanakert and the
region, but it petered out on 5 April. Thus, by
combining a massive display of force with limited
concessions, Moscow brought the unrest in Armenia
and Azerbaijan under temporary control, but failure
to resolve the critical territorial issue virtually guaran-
teed that ethnic tensions would surface again.
May Demonstrations Lead to an Impasse
The trial of 80 Azeris for the March 1988 killings in
Sumgait was the catalyst for the May disturbances.
When the first Azeri was convicted on 16 May and
sentenced to 15 years hard labor, both sides went to
the streets, with 100,000 Armenians turning out in
Yerevan to protest that the court had been too lenient,
and roughly an equal number of Azeris in Baku
protesting that it had been too harsh. Baku's appoint-
ment of an Azeri as prosecutor in Nagorno-Karabakh
also sparked new strikes and demonstrations there in
early May.
The continued detention of Ayrikyan on 15 May also
became a focal point for demonstrations in Yerevan.
Communal violence on 11 May in the Armenian town
of Ararat, resulting in injuries and the torching of an
Azeri home, was a contributing factor in Baku dem- 25X1
onstrations. The demonstrations in Baku were also
tinged with violence and with the expression of anti-
Russian as well as anti-Armenian sentiment. Riots
reportedly broke store fronts and burned several cars.
Protesting youths carried signs demanding "Death to
Armenians and Russians" and called for the deporta-
tion of all Armenians, Jews, and Russians from
Azerbaijan.
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,Lop necrer
holding back angry Armenian crowds in mid-
May in a resurgence of unrest sparked by new
Meanwhile, in Yerevan, the strike-organizing com-
mittee continued to function despite its official ban,
and hundreds of thousands of Armenians demonstrat-
ed in late May and early June to promote their
irridentist demands. Armenian officials tolerated in-
creasingly large demonstrations in Yerevan despite
the 24 March ban on public protest. Reportedly a
half-million Armenians poured into the streets of
Yerevan to honor a three-day strike starting 13 June
to bring pressure on the Armenian Supreme Soviet,
scheduled to meet that week, to vote in favor of the
transfer of Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia.F___1 25X1
In Baku, anti-Armenian riots on 10 and 11 June led to
the shooting death of an Azeri policeman by an
Armenian, and security forces were moved in to seal
off the Armenian quarter of the city. 25X1
rioters shouted slogans and 25X1
Purging the Republic Party Leaders. Moscow reacted
to the renewal of disorders by simultaneously ousting
Armenian First Secretary Demirchyan and his Azer-
baijan counterpart, Kyamran Bagirov. On 21 May,
republic party plenums in Azerbaijan and Armenia,
presided over respectively by Politburo members Li-
gachev and Aleksandr Yakovlev, removed the two
leaders. By replacing both leaders at the same time-
giving them honorable retirements for "reasons of
health"-and replacing them with natives rather than
Russians, the central leadership hoped to appear
evenhanded and to avoid a repetition of the December
1986 riots in Kazakhstan after the appointment of a
Russian as party boss.
The change in leadership, however, had little impact.
A general strike in Stepanakert that began on 23 May
continued for three weeks, despite Ligachev's reported
admonition to Azerbaijan party officials to bring a
halt to the disturbances by the end of May. Strikers,
vowing "to endure until the end," created food short-
ages and practically shut down the city,, according to
the Soviet press. Some 4,000 Azeris fled Stepanakert,
fearing for their lives, and Armenian vigilantes pa-
trolled the city against anticipated Azeri attacks.
called the 80 Azeris currently on trial for killing 32
people in Sumgait "heroes.25X1
Raising the Ante on the Territorial Issue. Moscow's
continued fence-sitting on the territorial issue led the
Supreme Soviets of both republics-under growing
pressure from their populace-to pass resolutions
supporting their respective claims on Nagorno-
Karabakh:
? The Armenian Supreme Soviet voted unanimously
for annexation on 15 June. The new republic leader
Suren Arutyunyan, Demirchyan's successor, ad-
dressed the session to support the decision, thus
making good on the public promise he made two 25X1
days earlier to a throng of a half-million Armenian
demonstrators that the Supreme Soviet would take
"positive" action.
? The Azerbaijan Supreme Soviet responded when it
met on 17 June by voting unanimously against the
transfer of the Azerbaijan region, calling Armenia's
demand for a change in the status of Nagorno-
Karabakh an interference in Azerbaijan affairs.
The negative vote confirmed a decision made on 13
June by the republic's Supreme Soviet Presidium
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and was in line with assurances new party boss Abdul
Vezirov, Bagirov's successor, had made to Baku dem-
onstrators on the same day.
Building to the Presidium's Resolution
This set the stage for the discussion of nationality
issues at the CPSU conference in late June. In his
report to the party conference, Gorbachev strongly
hinted that no territorial shift would be accepted,
indicating that boundary changes were "antidemocra-
tic." He raised the possibility of expanding the
oblast's rights within the context of an overall re-
appraisal of the constitutional status of "autonomous"
regions and the need to show sensitivity to ethnic
minorities throughout the USSR. The reaction of
Azerbaijan leader Vezirov, in his speech at the confer-
ence, indicated a willingness to accept such a redefini-
tion of oblast rights.
The Armenian populace, however, was deeply disap-
pointed that the conference had failed to endorse the
territorial shift. Nationalists in Yerevan called for an
immediate open-ended general strike, which closed
down most transport and factories. Moreover, several
thousand demonstrators crossed a Rubicon of sorts by
taking the provocative step of closing down the Yere-
van airport for several days in early July. Not surpris-
ingly, given traditional regime sensitivity to maintain-
ing communications and transport for security
reasons, 3,000 internal security troops and cadets
were called in to reestablish order. They were report-
edly met with a hail of rocks and bottles; one Arme-
nian youth was shot and killed by a soldier from
Moscow's security forces, and 36 citizens and police
were injured in the clash.
The decision by Nagorno-Karabakh soviet on 12 July
to secede from Azerbaijan further fueled tensions.
Azerbaijan leaders quickly denounced the act as
unconstitutional. Along with increasing violence and
ongoing strikes, this action forced Mosow's hand.
Creation of New Bodies To Deal With Nationality
Issues
Moscow's heightened attention to nationality prob-
lems is reflected in changes in party and government
organizational structure. Gorbachev indicated in his
speech at the party conference on 28 June, that
relations between nationalities will be the purview of
the Council of Nationalities of the USSR Supreme
Soviet, suggesting that this body will hold regular
meetings on nationality issues and wield real power
in implementing decisions.
Additional changes include the following:
? Soviet officials have reported that the Central
Committee has now established subdepartments-
in either the party work or propaganda depart-
ments-on nationality issues in Moscow and the
republics. The growing role of the Supreme Soviet
was again affirmed at the 18 July session; the
Council of Nationalities was tasked with organizing
a commission tofurther investigate the Nagorno-
Karabakh problem and propose solutions.
the 25X1
Supreme Soviet created its own Nationalities Com-
mission last January. Similar commissions have
been set up in Armenia, Azerbaijan, and several
other republics.
? The USSR Academy of Sciences has created a new
center for nationality problems within the Institute
of Ethnography. At a press conference of Soviet
ethnographers on 24 March, scholars confirmed
that special committees were being set up at govern-
ment bodies and nongovernmental organizations to
ensure the rights of ethnic minorities and adequate
representation in all governing bodies and other
institutions.
On 18 July, the USSR Supreme Soviet Presidium met
and for the first time definitively rejected the demand
that Nagorno-Karabakh be separated from Azerbai-
jan. After an unusually heated and frank debate, the
oblast's request for incorportation into Armenia was
? A demographer told that 25X1
the commissions will be similar to the People's
Commissariat for Nationality Affairs headed by
Stalin in the 1920s; he also reported that "clubs"
for specific nationalities may be opened in large
cities. Other reports suggest a Ministry of National-
ity Affairs might be created.
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"unanimously" turned down as both "unconstitution-
al" and "undesirable." In the debate, the representa-
tives of the three affected regions stood fast on their
earlier positions. The Nagorno-Karabakh party leader
maintained that "secession" was the only solution; the
Armenian president said his representatives have no
claim on Nagorno-Karabakh but supported its right
to join Armenia; and the Azerbaijan president said
that Nagorno-Karabakh's move to secede from Azer-
baijan was not justified politically, economically, or
legally. Gorbachev attacked the Armenians for their
uncompromising stance and said that "the full force
of Soviet law" would be used against extremists
agitating over the irredentist issue. He implied that
corrupt local officials had exploited the situation to
divert attention from their shortcomings and said that
the failure to act resolutely now would have "far-
reaching consequences" that would threaten pere-
stroyka. Politburo member Lev Zaykov reminded the
participants at the session of the inviolability of
borders as a sovereign right of every republic, which
cannot be changed without its consent. At the same
time he called for criminal investigation of those
"antirestructuring forces" and "corrupt clans" who
played an "inflammatory" role in the unrest.
While the Presidium closed off the transfer option, it
did not close the door to some concessions to the
Armenians. Gorbachev acknowledged that there were
major problems in Nagorno-Karabakh and criticized
the Azeris for their neglect of Armenian grievances.
25X1
The Presidium resolution accused the Azeris of failing
to guarantee Armenian rights in Nagorno-Karabakh,
proposed a Supreme Soviet commission to study the
Nagorno-Karabakh problem and to look for a way to
normalize the situation, and designated on 25 July a
representative from the Central Committee and Su-
preme Soviet-Arkadiy Volskiy, head of the Secretar-
iat's Machine-Building Department-to "cooperate"
with local officials in working out problems. F_____1 25X1
The difficulty in resolving the upheaval in the Cauca-
sus has been compounded by several factors: the
leadership's own division over policy; the continued
alignment of Armenian and Azerbaijan party organi-
zations with their populations even after the change in
leaders and the growing polarization resulting from
earlier communal violence; involvement of foreign
supporters on both sides; and concern about spillover
of protest into other national republics.
Leadership Differences
One of the most serious obstacles to successfully
surmounting the crisis has been a cleavage within the
leadership over how best to deal with the situation.
Both reformers and conservatives are attempting to
exploit the issue for their own political ends, as
reflected in the sharply differing positions appearing
Conservatives, led by ideology secretary Ligachev and
KGB chief Chebrikov, have believed from the outset
that there should be no change in territorial status.
On a broader plane, they have voiced concern that
glasnost and "democratization" could lead to political
instability in the republics, and they are undoubtedly
pointing to events in the Caucasus as proof. The
development of unrest in the Caucasus has provided
them with ammunition in the political struggle over
the scope and pace of reform.
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Figure 13. An injured girl is
carried on a stretcher through
the crowd of about 100,000
demonstrators and a double
row of Soviet riot police in Ye-
revan in early July.F----]
Figure 14. Armenians demon-
strate with posters-one read-
ing "Karabakh was, is, and will
be Armenian!"-in an Arme-
nian cemetery in Moscow on 5
July, after Soviet security
troops violently broke up a
strike at Yerevan airport.
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Ligachev appears to have taken advantage of the first
wave of demonstrations to launch an attack on Gorba-
chev's reform agenda:
Ligachev's calcu-
lation that the unrest had weakened Gorbachev
politically was the impetus for his support of the
scathing critique by Nina Andreyeva of perestroyka
that appeared in Sovetskaya Rossiya on 13 March.'
? Circumstantial evidence points to Ligachev's spon-
sorship of the Politburo's initial hard line on Arme-
nian demands in February.
he played a key role in formulating the
Central Committee resolution that characterized
Armenian claims as "extremist." He chaired the
Secretariat investigation mandated by the 9 March
conference that resulted in a decision essentially to
ignore the Armenian territorial demands. He alleg-
edly has been close to Viktor Afanasyev, Chief
Editor of Pravda, which also took a hard line on the
unrest in March and blamed the West for interfer-
ence. Reportedly, Ligachev was the only Politburo
member to oppose the frank television documentary
on recent troubles in Nagorno-Karabakh, Sumgait,
and Armenia-aired in late April-which had a
mildly pro-Armenian tone.
? Moreover, when Ligachev visited Baku to install
Vezirov on 21 May, he reportedly promised the
Azerbaijan Central Committee that the oblast
would remain subordinated to Azerbaijan-two
months before the Supreme Soviet endorsed this
position. he may
have presided over a Secretariat meeting in early
June that again rejected demands to shift the
region.
5 On 14 March, Sovetskaya Rossiya published an article by a
Leningrad academic, Nina Andreyeva, sharply critical of restruc-
supporter on the newspaper who then expanded it. The response
came in the form of a Pravda editorial on 5 April-reportedly
dictated by Gorbachev and Yakovlev-which attacked the An-
dreyeva letter as a "manifesto of the antirestructuring forces."
the Sovetskaya Rossiya editors and
possibly Ligachev were reprimanded by the Politburo. Some reports
claim Gorbachev threatened to resign, isolating Ligachev. Others
claim Ligachev had supporters, including Politburo members
Chebrikov, Andrey Gromyko, Mikhail Solomentsev, Vitaliy Vorot-
? Ligachev on several occasions has charged the West
with trying to stir up nationality problems in the
USSR, and has implied that foreign intelligence
centers rather than indigenous problems were to 25X1
blame for ethnic unrest in the USSR.
KGB Chief Chebrikov lined up with Ligachev. In a
tough speech in April, he warned against Western
security service instigation of nationalist problems in
the USSR, a theme he has stressed for some time and
one that in effect delegitimizes the expression of
nationality grievances by labeling them a manifesta-
tion of imperialist subversion. While acknowledging
that the socioeconomic situation has to be improved to
resolve nationality tension, he revived the "extremist"
imagery of the initial Central Committee decision in
his allusions to the Armenians and dismissed the idea
of territorial shifts as "antisocial."
The concerns of Ligachev and Chebrikov are not
isolated. They apparently reflect the attitudes of a
large segment of the political elite:
what may be good about glasnost for the Russian
Republic may have completely different results
among non-Russians. some Cen-
tral Committee members view glasnost as an open
invitation for nationalist unrest throughout the
USSR and Eastern Europe.
? Ukrainian party boss Shcherbitskiy said that re-
gional party bosses in his republic were calling him
to demand a crackdown.
Gorbachev and his allies can respond to conservative
accusations that his policies fueled the unrest with the
countercharge that the relative insensitivity of the
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noted that 25X1
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conservatives has been a major factor in heightening
ethnic tensions. Ligachev
was behind the appointment of a Russian as Kazakh
party boss, the action that touched off the December
1986 riots there. Since he evidently was also behind
the initial hardline approach to the Armenian de-
mands, which exacerbated the crisis, he could again
be faulted for miscalculations.
Despite his decision to go along with rejection of the
transfer option, considerable evidence indicates that
Gorbachev has sympathized with Armenian demands
more than most of his colleagues:
? He has consistently avoided impugning the motives
of the Armenian demonstrators, even at the 19 July
USSR Supreme Soviet Presidium meeting. On 15
March, during his visit to Yugoslavia, Gorbachev
publicly underscored that the demonstrations had
not questioned Soviet power or socialism, in appar-
ent contrast to Chebrikov's subsequently expressed
view. The Armenian Supreme Soviet Presidium
chairman, in fact, quoted this at the July meeting.
? On other occasions Gorbachev has said that the
developments in Nagorno-Karabakh are primarily
the result of historic neglect of previous leaderships
who for decades ignored problems in ethnic relations
and allowed them to pile up. Ligachev and Chebri-
kov have essentially blamed "foreign devils" for
nationality disturbances.'
? During talks
OGorbachev said not only that he believed the
Armenian demands to be just but also that oppo-
nents of his reforms were exploiting Armenian
grievances to discredit him. He went so far as to
accuse the conservatives of engineering the unrest in
Azerbaijan, including using "common criminals to
carry out a pogrom" and "violent demonstrations."
6 Gorbachev has not been entirely consistent, however. In talks with
Willy Brandt on 4 April as reported in Pravda, he complained that
"certain Western circles are trying to meddle in our internal
affairs, to aggravate problems from outside, and to engage in
Leadership differences were reflected in the differing
lines taken by Soviet newspapers in reporting develop-
ments in the Caucasus. From the outset there were
strong indications that reporting on the crisis was a
sensitive political issue. Yakovlev's reported muz-
zling of Moscow News on the Caucasus unrest in late
February may have been intended to prevent the
liberal journals from providing ammunition to con-
servatives already primed for a crackdown. By late
March, however, with the Andreyeva controversy
acting as a catalyst, a number of central newspapers
published sharply differing analyses of events in the
Caucasus. Pravda took a particularly conservative
line, like that of Ligachev and Chebrikov, warning on
21 March that the crisis was the work of "self-
proclaimed" protest leaders who were egged on by
"Western radio voices. " It accused them of "intoler-
able" civil disobedience that has "a clear antisocia-
list tinge. " In contrast to Pravda's hard line, Komso-
molskaya pravda and Izvestiya reported a more
balanced view, highlighting the historic neglect of
nationalities issues and inequities and official unre-
sponsiveness to social and economic problems in
Nagorno-Karabakh. Reflecting a position closer to
Gorbachev's, Izvestiya explicitly dismissed the asser-
tion that foreign interference played a major role in
the agitation and showed understanding of the resent-
ment felt by Armenians.
The fluctuations in regime policy toward the Arme-
nians over the past five months have probably reflect-
ed the shifting balance of forces within the Politburo
during this period. The initial hard line, for example,
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may have reflected Gorbachev's reluctance to risk a
second defeat in the wake of his loss of momentum the
previous fall over the Yel'tsin affair. As conflict
within the leadership mounted in March and April to
the level of open polemics (with the publication of the
Ligachev-sponsored Sovetskaya Rossiya article and
the Gorbachev-sponsored Pravda rebuke), signs began
to emerge that each faction within the leadership
acted to protect the demonstrators whose demands it
supported.
sus issue became widespread in the period, leading
Baku rioters in May shouted
slogans against Gorbachev and his wife, and that
during the riots on 10 and 11 June pictures of Iranian
leader Khomeini and Ligachev appeared in the crowd
and some demonstrators called for Ligachev to re-
place Gorbachev. In late May, demonstrators in Ar-
menia publicly urged that Ligachev be removed.
Thus, the Caucasus unrest evidently became deeply
enmeshed in leadership politics in Moscow, making
the outcome of the conflict more difficult to predict
and potentially more destabilizing politically.
Although the leadership has now reached agreement
on the basic issue of Nagorno-Karabakh's administra-
tive subordination, other issues remain contentious:
? Conservatives like Shcherbitskiy and even Gorba-
chev allies and political centrists like Lev Zaykov
opposed further moves to upgrade Nagorno-Kara-
bakh and made no reference to more concessions.
? Gorbachev and reform advocates, like Primakov,
appear intent on pushing the idea of upgrading
Nagorno-Karabakh to an autonomous republic
within Azerbaijan and trying to minimize the
amount of force used to contain the unrest. This was
indicated by the comments of Minister of Internal
Affairs Vlasov, a Gorbachev protege, who played
down the need for force by saying that no special
security measures on Nagorno-Karabakh will be
taken if the law is not violated there.
? Given these different orientations and the unpre-
dictable nature of events in the region, it appears
certain that debate on the specific situation in
Nagorno-Karabakh and on the broader nationalit
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issue will remain on the Politburo's agenda 25X1
Complicity of Armenian and Azeri Officials
A second, but no less serious, problem is the partisan-
ship of the party organizations not only of Nagorno-
Karabakh and Sumgait, but also of the Armenian and 25X1
Azerbaijan Republics. The crisis revealed a major
Achilles' heel for Gorbachev: his failure to get tight
control over local party organizations in the hinter-
lands. When Gorbachev needed their assistance most, 25X1
he found he could not rely on either Baku or Yerevan 25X1
leaders to cool the passions of the population. The
replacement of the two republic first secretaries in
May did not initially result in greater obedience to
Moscow. The two new leaders aligned themselves
with their respective populations, championing their
demands.
Complicity in promoting the grievances of their popu-
lar constituency has been most blatant on the part of
the Nagorno-Karabakh officials, who have defied 25X1
Moscow's wishes on more than one occasion during
the crisis. Like his predecessor, oblast party chief
Pogosyan, who was appointed in late February, has
openly sided with the Armenian populace in the
dispute. the Azerbaijan 25X1
plenum in May discussed removing Pogosyan-but
could not find a "suitable replacement" (that is, no
one who would carry out the bidding of the Azerbai-
jan leadership against the interest of the Armenians in
Nagorno-Karabakh).
Several officials in Sumgait were fired under circum-
stances that suggested complacency toward, if not
active involvement in, the events that led to the
slaughter of Armenians there. The head of the Sum-
gait party was expelled from the party for "nonparty
behavior" in failing to prevent the riots. The chief of
police and the city's mayor were also fired. In July, an
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Azerbaijan newspaper reported the retirement of the
Deputy Minister of Interior and the transfer of the
ministry's staff department head, presumably because
of their mishandling of the ethnic clashes in the
republic
At the republic level, even before unrest in the
Caucasus began in February, both Demirchyan and
Bagirov were in political trouble (see appendix Q. The
demonstrations in Armenia gave rise to suspicions in
Moscow that Demirchyan was encouraging the pro-
tests in hopes they would provide him with an insur-
ance policy against removal. As a 21 March Pravda
article ominously noted, the issue of ceding Nagorno-
Karabakh to Armenia previously arose "when Arme-
nian leaders found it advantageous to distract the
public's attention from a mass of unresolved economic
and social issues and from the unsuitable working
style-and methods of the party organization." Gorba-
chev and others again leveled this accusation against
both parties at the USSR Supreme Soviet Presidium
meeting in July
Strong circumstantial evidence also indicated the
Armenian leadership's complicity from the outset:
? The huge demonstrations in Yerevan required ex-
tensive logistics to assemble, control, and disperse
such massive crowds, and the relative orderliness of
the protesters suggests at least some involvement on
the part of local Armenian officials in staging them.
? The police did not deny the demonstrators access to
the city and several reports suggest some even
participated in the demonstrations. Arutyunyan
even promised demonstrators in June that police
who harassed them would be punished.
before the Feb-
ruary demonstrations the organizers met with senior
party officials who tacitly supported the demonstra-
tions. The Yerevan first secretary, who was replaced
by a more hardline official in July, apparently
supported the demand for the return of Nagorno-
Karabakh.
? At least tacit approval would also have been re-
quired for using republic media to support the
irredentist claims, particularly giving Armenian
Patriarch Vazgen I the opportunity to endorse the
demands.
? Finally, the Armenian party sanctioned the 15 June
republic Supreme Soviet session at which Nagorno-
Karabakh's demand for incorporation was ap-
proved.
At the same time, Azerbaijan party leader Bagirov
ran into trouble for failing to check Azeri nationalism
and anti-Armenian violence. Bagirov strongly sup-
ported Moscow's initial position, rejecting the removal
of the autonomous oblast from the Azerbaijan Repub-
lic, but republic media, and apparently Bagirov, con-
tinued to reject any compromise over Armenian de-
mands even after Moscow backed off and announced
the organization of an investigation into the issues by
the Secretariat. Subsequently, in the wake of the
Sumgait riots he was criticized by Moscow for his
improper attention to minority affairs, which contrib-
uted to the events. Speaking at a news conference on
the eve of the party conference, a specialist on ethnic
groups in the Soviet Union, Vyacheslav Mikhailov,
publicly blamed Aliyev andBagirov for "errors"
leading to the Nagorno-Karabakh crisis.
Irredentist demands have apparently activated latent
Azeri nationalism throughout the party.
An unofficial Leningrad journal published an
official document describing a telegram sent by 250
members of the Azerbaijan Academy of Sciences to
Armenian academician Ambartsumyan opposing the
territorial readjustment. The cable alleged that "for
the third time in 100 years Armenians are ringleaders
of cruel clashes between brotherly nationalities." F_
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Azeri authorities privately acknowledged local
leadership involvement in organizing the demonstra-
tions, saying that the Azeri people can shout as loud
as the Armenians for what they want.
Moscow's alarm at the inability or unwillingness of
the republic party bosses to rein in nationalist demon-
strators increased the central leadership's desire to
remove both Demichyan and Bagirov, while simulta-
neously increasing their fear of the potential repercus-
sions of doing so. When renewed unrest finally caused
Moscow to act on 21 May, the attendance of a
Politburo member at the Yerevan plenum called to
remove Demirchyan suggests that resistance was ex-
pected from the republic party cadres. Similarly, the
attendance of Ligachev in Baku suggests a perceived
need to head off trouble there. Nevertheless, events
since the installation of Arutyunyan and Vezirov
clearly indicate they have also aligned themselves
with their populations, complicating Moscow's efforts
to resolve the crisis.
Involvement of Foreign Actors
The recent unrest appears to have made Soviet offi-
cials more fearful about the role of foreign actors in
the Nagorno-Karabakh problem. Of the approximate-
ly 5.5 million people in the world today who speak
Armenian, about 60 percent live outside the Soviet
Armenian republic, about 1.4 million elsewhere in the
USSR, and 2 million abroad. So far, Armenian
emigres-most of whom see Turkey much more than
Russia as the historic oppressor of their nation-have
not been actively involved in pushing for change in the
Soviet system or in Soviet policies. Moscow worries
that diaspora attitudes could turn sharply critical of
the USSR and that Armenians in the United States,
particularly, could grow into a powerful anti-Soviet
pressure group. Soviet officials are wary of the large
concentration of Armenians in California and New
York, states with large electoral votes that have been
closely contested in previous presidential elections.'
' The United States hosts at least 600,000 Armenians. About 90
percent of America's Soviet Armenian immigrants came to Califor-
nia. Los Angeles-with 100,000-has the largest community of
Armenians outside Yerevan. The New York City region has about
Although the Turkish Government has not explicitly
sided with Azerbaijan, Turkey'sfear of resurgent
Armenian nationalism makes Ankara sympathetic to
Baku. When the crisis broke in February, Turkish
Government spokesmen indicated publicly that inter-
national agreements entitle Ankara to a voice in the
crisis, an apparent reference to the 1921 treaty be-
tween the USSR and Turkey that led to the shift of
Nagorno-Karabakh and Nakhichevan' to Azerbaijan.
Turkey no doubt especially feared that transferring
Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia would whet Arme-
nian appetites and lead to increased pressure to
change the status of Nakhichevan' and to acquire
former Armenian regions in Turkey. Turkish officials
probably also noted that some Armenian expansion-
ist demands for a "Greater Armenia" were based on
historic claims rather than on the ethnic composition
of the affected territories. Thus, some Armenians
have demanded the return of Nakhichevan, even
though Azeris now greatly outnumber Armenians in
this region. Using such historical criteria could give
Armenians a claim even on some border parts of
Turkey where only 50,000 Armenians now live. F_
Nevertheless, the Turkish 'factor" appears to have
played a very limited role in the unfolding of events
and in Soviet calculations of how to deal with the
situation in the Caucasus.
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Soviet concern over US attitudes is balanced in part
by Moscow's concern over possible Iranian involve-
ment. Ancient links tie the Shi'as of Azerbaijan to
Iran. The Shi'as make up an estimated 70 to 75
percent of the population of Soviet Azerbaijan, as
compared with the Sunnis, who make up 25 to 30
percent. In southwestern Azerbaijan (Nakhichevan')
and along the Iranian border, the percentage of Shi'as
is higher. In addition to this religious affiliation,
which makes them potentially vulnerable to Iranian
blandishments, Soviet Azeris have close family and
ethnic ties to the Iranian Azeris across the border.
Between 4.5 to 6 million Azeris are located in north-
western Iran.
To a much lesser degree, Moscow may be concerned that foreign
Armenian terrorist groups like the Armenian Secret Army for the
Liberation of Armenia (ASALA) could turn against Soviet tar-
gets-although we have no evidence that this is the case. Hitherto,
the USSR has figured very little in ASALA's blending of armed
struggle with Marxist ideology; the dominant faction of ASALA
considers Soviet Armenia as liberated territory and the group
concentrates its attacks exclusively on Turkish officials. In fact,
ASALA eventually would like to see the "Armenian provinces"
now located in Turkey and possibly Iraq reattach themselves to the
Soviet Armenian core. Furthermore, ASALA is now in a quiet
phase, and its leader was assassinated on 28 April. Nevertheless,
ASALA in early April did send a moderately worded appeal to
Gorbachev supporting the reunification of Karabakh with Armenia,
while characteristically stressing that Armenia is an integral part of
the USSR and seeks only to rectify the border, not to pursue claims
The shock waves from Iran's 1979 revolution do not
appear to have resonated much in Azerbaijan, per-
haps because the Soviet republic enjoys a higher
standard of living than does Iran. Soviet Shi'a Azeris
have been cut off from their great religious centers in
Iraq and Iran since 1928, and there is little evidence
that Ayatollah Khomeini has developed a sizable
following in Soviet Azerbaijan. Azerbaijanis can pick
up Iranian television, but, according to some report-
ing, they seldom watch it because it is "all prayer or
war."
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Concern about a domino effect is a key factor in
Moscow's handling of the crisis in the Caucasus.
Throughout the USSR, Gorbachev's encouragement
of freer expression and greater political initiative from
below has clashed with his effort to reassert central
control over regional party organizations that gained
considerable autonomy during the Brezhnev years.
Elites in various republics, emboldened by glasnost
and resentful of interference from Moscow, have
begun to support popular aspirations on various issues
and have resisted cadre changes that they see as
benefiting the center at the expense of the republics:
? The violent riots in Alma-Ata in December 1986,
when Moscow replaced the Kazakh party boss with
an ethnic Russian, reflected the same convergence
of native popular and elite grievances that has taken
place in the Caucasus.
? In the Baltic area, where anti-Russian and anti-
Soviet feelings run high, citizen activists have open-
ly denounced the USSR's forced incorporation of
Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia during World War
II. They are pressing for political liberalization,
greater cultural and economic autonomy, and strict
limits on the migration of Russians to their repub-
lics. In Estonia, and to a lesser extent in the other
republics, the reform wing of the republic Commu-
nist Party is supporting these popular demands.
? Irredentist demands are at the heart of public
agitation by a number of national groups. Tatar
demands for the restoration of their homeland in the
Crimea, from which the Tatars were deported by
Stalin during the 1940s, has dogged the regime
since large Tatar demonstrations in Moscow a year
ago.
According to one report, consideration being given to
allowing displaced Volga Germans to return to their
old homeland was put on hold when the current unrest
in the Caucasus took on alarming proportions. There
are potential border and autonomy disputes between
Georgia and the Abkhaz ASSR, the Uzbek and
Turkmen Republics, and throughout the Caucasus,
where all the ethnic groups have competing claims.
Unconfirmed reports claim the expelled Muslim
Meshket group has been striking for the right to
return to its former homeland in Soviet Georgia.
There are also disputed areas along the Ukrainian and
Belorussian border, where the predominantly Ukraini-
an population of Brest Oblast has reportedly appealed
to Gorbachev to be reunited with the Ukraine, citing
Belorussian linguistic and cultural discrimination.
The Soviet leadership realizes that satisfying Arme-
nian demands could open Pandora's box. All factions
within the Politburo recognize that failure to enforce
central discipline on important issues would lead to a
revolution in relations between Moscow and the re-
publics, with the latter gaining a degree of autonomy
they have not enjoyed since the 1920s
At the same time, Gorbachev would like to avoid
sending a signal to non-Russian elites and populations
that Moscow will turn a deaf ear to all of their
grievances. He is seeking a broader foundation for his
rule than merely the support of the Russian heartland.
He apparently believes that Moscow no longer has the
resources to govern through the exercise of raw force,
and that it is consequently essential to address the
interests of different national groups as a means of
bringing about a rapprochement between Moscow and
the non-Russian majority in the country.
Despite his more flexible attitude toward nationality
issues, Gorbachev has strong political incentive to
prevent a renewal of the pattern of protest and
counterprotest in the Caucasus. The regime has 25X1
weathered the immediate crisis, but any major new
flareup of violence could heighten conservative fears
of political instability. Moreover, while the conflict so
far has been between Armenians and Azeris, tilting
too far either to the Azeri side or to the Armenian
side could cause protest to assume an antiregime
character.
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Whatever else he does, Gorbachev must maintain
firm limits on protest activity if he is to cope success-
fully with the situation. Whether or not he gets
agreement for more political concessions for the Ar-
menians in the coming months, he must stiffen securi-
ty measures and flex muscle in breaking up demon-
strations. Evidence already points to a crackdown on
party officials and protest organizers accused of com-
plicity in the six-month unrest. The Armenian party
removed at least one rayon and two city first secretar-
ies and expelled other officials. The regime has also
prosecuted strike and demonstration organizers.
Gorbachev's actions and speeches over the past year,
however, suggest that he may have what the Marxists
refer to as a "false consciousness"-that he is unduly
optimistic that diverse interests of national groups can
be accommodated and reconciled. If this is true, it is
possible that he will badly miscalculate in managing
the crisis.
Nevertheless, the leadership appears to be groping
toward a long-term compromise that just might work.
This would be some new administrative arrangement
whereby Nagorno-Karabakh is not transferred to
Armenia but is either given some degree of genuine
autonomy in Azerbaijan and, perhaps for the time
being, is run de facto by Moscow's representative .
This approach could be accompanied by some mea-
sures to give national groups living outside their
national "homelands"-like Armenians or Azeris in
Georgia-expanded cultural and economic rights.
The party leadership clearly prefers to place changes
in Nagorno-Karabakh's status in the broader context
of changes in nationality policy generally (see appen-
dix D)
Working out the details of such a plan will take some
time-requiring endorsement by a Central Commit-
tee plenum and probably approval of constitutional
amendments by the USSR Supreme Soviet. Gorba-
chev has been faced with the problem of trying to sell
a compromise when passions in the Caucasus were at
fever pitch and concerned parties, who might in
calmer times be amenable to compromise, have been
unwilling to back down.
The ongoing crisis in the Caucasus is symptomatic of
the problems of managing change in an authoritarian
political system. Gorbachev faces the classic dilemma
of a centrally controlled system: to have progress he
must allow more freedom, but allowing more freedom
threatens his power (see appendix E). He needs to
balance the need to maintain Moscow's political
authority over the periphery with the necessity of
liberalizing the political process. The General Secre-
tary will find it difficult to balance these goals in a
way that will minimize damage to his domestic
reform program
The plenum on nationality policy, which Gorbachev
has promised would be held early next year, will
provide the most solid indications on whether Moscow
will develop a workable strategy for defusing the
explosive nationality problem. In the meantime, if
Gorbachev fails to maintain a relatively normal state
of affairs in the Caucasus, he will become more
vulnerable to conservative criticism and challenges to
his leadership. Perhaps more important, a regime
failure to maintain control in the Caucasus might
embolden nationalists in other republics and raise
serious problems for regime stability.
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Appendix A
Leaders of the Armenian
Demonstrations
At its height, the Yerevan organizing committee (or
Karabakh Committee) was composed of more than
1,000 people, representing grassroots organizations in
all the Armenian cities, the university, and enter-
prises, with an executive body of about 100 people led
by members of the Writers Union, environmentalists,
scientists, and other notables. Although formally
banned on 25 March, it has continued to operate
quietly. The National Union for Self-Determination
was the more radical arm of the organization and,
Nagorno-Karabakh also had an organizing committee
(named KRUNK, which means "crane," a symbol of
homesickness). Although a decree of the Azerbaijan
Supreme Soviet on 25 March officially disbanded
KRUNK and its members were asked to sign a
statement that they would not engage in further
activity, reports in the Soviet press indicate this group,
too, has continued to exist, mounting strikes and
demonstrations almost without interruption since
May. Komsomolskaya pravda of 23 June said that
the KRUNK organization was headed by an 11-
member council and included 47 top local party
officials, media representatives, and intellectuals.
Even before 26 March, the violence apparently had
broken down the unity in the Yerevan organization
committee, where two factions-those who seek to
maximize the pressure on Moscow and those who
believe the political complexities demand a more
moderate stance-took shape.
=the several grassroots committees of artists and
intellectuals disbanded in early March to avoid "being
trapped by the extremists."
Leaders of the two groups include:
? Igor Muradyan. An Armenian engineer from Na-
gorno-Karabakh, Muradyan reportedly led the com-
mittee prior to the recent unrest and continues to
play an influential role. TASS viciously attacked
him on 21 March for trying to get "foreign back-
ing" and for calling for a "mass hunger strike." He
led the petitions drive from May 1987 to early
February 1988, but has reportedly maintained a
distance from dissidents and the underground na-
tionalist movement.
? Viktor Ambartsumyan. President of the Armenian 25X1
Academy of Sciences since 1947 and a well-known
astrophysicist, 80-year-old Ambartsumyan func-
tioned informally as the head of the Yerevan orga-
nizing committee
Speaking before the Supreme Soviet Presidium in
Moscow on 18 July, he passionately defended the
Armenian principal demand.
? Silva Kaputikyan. A noted Armenian poet who
writes occasionally for Literaturnaya gazeta, Kapu-
tikyan was the honorary president of the committee.
She was one of the two Armenian delegates whom
Gorbachev received. In a hard-hitting article in
early February before the unrest, she criticized
Moscow for placing the Armenian nuclear plant in a
seismic zone, attributed demonstrations in Armenia
to environmental pollution, and criticized the lack of
glasnost in the periphery. She has taken a flexible
stance on the Nagorno-Karabakh demands since she
returned from Moscow on 26 February and was a
delegate to the 19th Party Conference in June.
? Zoriy Balayan. An Armenian journalist and envi-
ronmentalist and a regular contributor to Literatur-
naya gazeta, he was one of the most active members
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of the organizing committee and the other delegate
who met with Gorbachev in February. His writing
emphasizes the destruction of Armenian ecology,
the devastating effect of industrial pollution on the
Armenian people, and the destruction of Armenian
village life. He shares Kaputikyan's advocacy of
moderate measures and reportedly tried to stop the
national protest as early as 24 February.
? Paruir Ayrikyan. He is a former dissident who
headed the secessionist National Unification Party
in 1968. A militant nationalist, he was arrested for
human rights and nationalist activities in 1974 and
released only in February 1987. As head of the
Union of National Self-Determination, Ayrikyan
was arrested again on 24 March 1988 and charged
with "spreading false news slandering the Soviet
social and state regime." He was in KGB custody
from the time of his arrest until 20 July, when a
Supreme Soviet Presidium decree stripped him of
his citizenship and expelled him from the country.
? Sarukhanyan. A theater director in Stepanakert, he
was the organizer of the demonstrations
and the first to bring the news to
Yerevan of violence against the Armenians in Na-
gorno-Karabakh on 23 February.
? Kuryan Nakhapetyan. An Armenian writer living in
Moscow, he heads the Moscow arm of the Kara-
bakh committee. He favors a moderate approach to
the territorial dispute, calling for an end to violence
and socioeconomic redress in Nagorno-Karabakh,
but not insisting on reunification.
? Gamlet Grigoryan. A leader of KRUNK, he was
labeled an "extremist" by Izvestiya. Grigoryan said
in Izvestiya on 29 March that "the problem raised
by the people of Karabakh is still with us today,
and ... the millions of rubles allocated by our
government do not fully remove it"-meaning that
he was not prepared to accept mere economic
concessions as a solution.
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Appendix C
Demirchyan and Bagirov:
Targets of Moscow's Criticism
Long before the outbreak of unrest, there were indica-
tions that Demirchyan and Bagirov were among those
republic leaders vulnerable to Moscow's wrath as
Gorbachev moved to root out corruption among re-
gional and local party elites and reverse the erosion of
the center's authority to the periphery. While this
effort has been particularly evident with respect to the
Central Asian republics, other republic leaders, in-
cluding Demirchyan and Bagirov, have felt Moscow's
wrath.
As early as 1986 it was clear that Gorbachev had
targeted Demirchyan for removal:
? In October 1986, Pravda published a strong denun-
ciation of the Armenian leadership and implicitly of
Demirchyan for "significant omissions in ideological
work" and for tolerating "bribery, speculation, em-
bezzlement, and abuse of official positions."
? Pravda and Izvestiya both harshly criticized Demir-
chyan's speech to an Armenian plenum in Decem-
ber 1987. They also reported that a rayon first
secretary-apparently supported by party represen-
tatives from Moscow-called for Demirchyan to be
removed and asked the CPSU Central Committee
to launch an investigation of the Armenian party.
development.
Azerbaijan party leader Bagirov has also been criti-
cized by Moscow previously. Central press criticism in
late 1987 accused him of tolerating corruption in the
republic and blamed him for failure to eradicate
bribe-taking and nepotism among the cadres. During
the June 1987 visit to Armenia by Central Committee
secretary Aleksandra Biryukova, Bagirov was criti-
cized for shortcomings in the republic's economic
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Appendix D
Moscow's Options
putting down protest activity.
Conservative Options
Sticking With the Status Quo. In theory, one option
is to hold fast, honoring the concessions to the Arme-
nians that have already been announced but yielding
no further ground. Several speakers at the 19 July
Supreme Soviet Presidium meeting advocated just
such a course. This approach has the obvious advan-
tage of pacifying Azerbaijan, where the potential for
communal violence is especially high, and of sending a
sign to restive national groups all over the USSR that
Moscow has not lost its will to respond forcefully in
army for an indefinite period.
From Moscow's perspective, however, there are com-
pelling arguments against an attempt to hold firm.
The Armenian movement to reclaim Nagorno-Kara-
bakh has gained enormous momentum. Rejecting
further concessions would require Moscow to use an
"iron fist," employing repression at a level that would
not only detract seriously from Gorbachev's attempt
to build a new basis of popular legitimacy for the
regime, but also necessitate deploying an occupation
first step on the road to eventual reunification.
Reformist Solutions
Making Further Economic Concessions. A variant
would be to grant further economic concessions to the
Armenians. Moscow could give Nagorno-Karabakh
greater financial independence and close the chemical
plant in Stepanakert, which the Armenians claim was
forced on them by the Azeri administration. In No-
vember 1987, Aganbegyan gave credence to the idea
that Nagorno-Karabakh would be separated economi-
cally from Azerbaijan and linked to Armenia, which
might satisfy some of the moderate Armenians as a
Some concessions on environmental issues in Armenia
may have already been made. Armenian officials have
said that an aluminum plant, a nuclear reactor, and a
rubber plant in the republic either have been closed or
may be closed because of ecological concerns.F_~
In the past, Moscow has sometimes responded to
territorial demands with a package of economic con-
cessions. For example, when the population in the
Abkhaz ASSR in Georgia demanded to be trans-
ferred to the Russian Republic in May 1978, Moscow
granted major cultural and economic concessions
while not changing Abkhazia's administrative subor-
dination.
The basic disadvantage of trying to buy off the
Armenians in this way is that most Armenians are not
likely to accept any solution that sidesteps the issue of 25X1
Nagorno-Karabakh's political status. The Nagorno-
Karabakh party chief has said that the region would
be unable to solve its social and economic problems
until it was reassigned to Armenian control. One of
the protest leaders told Izvestiya on 29 March that
Moscow's millions of rubles would not remove the
problems in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Enhancing Autonomy of Nagorno-Karabakh Within
Azerbaijan. Recently, there has been some discussion
at the Supreme Soviet session about making the
region an autonomous republic." Demichev acknowl-
edged this option was still being discussed following
the Supreme Soviet Presidium meeting, and Pravda
editor Viktor Afanasyev has publicly indicated it was
"very possible" that the autonomous region will be-
come an autonomous republic.
Another option may be running the region from
Moscow as a temporary expedient. The representa-
tive of the Central Committee and the Supreme
Soviet-now in Nagorno-Karabakh--could provide
the necessary mechanism. There is evidence that
Armenians may be willing to accept placing 25X1
10 There are 16 autonomous republics (ASSRs) in the Russian
Republic, two in Georgia, one (Nakhichevan') in Azerbaijan, and
one in the Uzbek SSR. Both the USSR and republic constitutions
vaguely state that an autonomous republic "independently decides
questions outside the boundaries of the laws of the USSR and a
union republic that relate to its jurisdiction.'
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Nagorno-Karabakh under Moscow, at least as a
temporary measure. On 21 June the Nagorno-Kara-
bakh soviet called for a transfer of the region to the
USSR, pending a more permanent solution. At a 30
June press conference in Moscow, the Armenian
delegation to the CPSU conference agreed that a
compromise was necessary and proposed that jurisdic-
tion over Karabakh should be transferred from Azer-
baijan directly to Moscow or the RSFSR government.
Pogosyan also specifically advocated such a solution
before the meeting, and it was endorsed by Armenian
party boss Arutyunyan and Academy of Sciences
President Ambartsumyan on 19 July. Such a system
might also allow Moscow to crack down on the unrest
in Nagorno-Karabakh, so it should not necessarily be
viewed as a simple concession to the Armenians.
Extraterritorial Native Cultural Institutions. The
concept of extraterritorial cultural institutions for
non-Russian nationalities is now being discussed at
high levels. In his conference speech on 28 June and
again on 19 July, Gorbachev expressed concern for
the many ethnic minorities living outside the bound-
aries of their national territory and indicated that
their plight-along with the examination of the pow-
ers now exercised by union and autonomous repub-
Radical Solutions
Giving In on the Territorial Issue. While the Su-
preme Soviet session appeared to finally and defini-
tively rule this out, there are a handful of historic
precedents for redrawing administrative boundaries in
the Soviet Union. In 1954 the Crimea was taken from
the Russian Republic and incorporated into the
Ukraine, and a large area of the Kazakh SSR was
transferred to the Uzbek Republic in 1963 for eco-
nomic purposes, but subsequently transferred back.
Nevertheless, the outright incorporation of the prov-
ince into Armenia is the least attractive option for
Moscow because of the danger of contagion and the
fact that caving in to Armenian territorial demands
would be completely unacceptable to Azerbaijan.
The conservatives would be particularly adament in
opposing such a change. For Ligachev, in addition to
concern about stirring up expectations among other
aggrieved national groups, yielding to the Armenians
would be perceived as a major personal setback after
his commitment in Baku in late May to the existing
boundaries.
lics-will be examined.
The status of the 160,000 Armenians in Nagorno-
Karabakh is not unique. Almost 30 million non-
Russians living outside their national republics have
no access to minority language education or cultural
institutions. Experts such as Gorbachev's economic
adviser Leonid Abalkin and the director of the Insti
tute of Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sci-
ences Yulian Bromlei have argued for some time that
demands of nonindigenous national groups should be
satisfied in the realm of language, cultural, and
everyday life."
" At present there are small minorities in the Soviet Union that
enjoy an authentic extraterritorial cultural autonomy. This is the
case of the Uygurs and Dungans-originally from China-and the
Assyrians and Muslim Kurds from the Ottoman Empire and Iran.
Each has a national press and a network of schools teaching the
national language. The Soviet press indicates that there has been
significant effort in recent months to improve similar limitations on
the use of native language, cultural facilities, and economic devel-
opment for the Ingilois-a small Georgian minority living on the
border of Azerbaijan-and for the large Ukrainian population
living in the Soviet Far East known as Zelenyy Klin-the area
includes Primorskiy Kray, Khabarovsk Kray, and Amur Oblast-
which has been under intense pressure of Russification since the
1920s.F_____1
Reconfiguration of Nagorno-Karabakh. If all else
fails, another possibility would be to split the Nagor-
no-Karabakh region between the two republics, trans-
ferring areas with predominantly Armenian popula-
tion to Armenia, and leaving predominantly Azeri
areas in Azerbaijan. This possibility has not yet been
raised by any of the parties involved in the territorial
dispute, but there is historical precedent for such a
reconfiguration of the oblast. Nagorno-Karabakh was
much larger between 1923 and 1930 and at one point
was contiguous to Armenia. This solution would be
difficult to implement, however, because in some
areas the population is so mixed that no redrawing of
the map would be satisfactory to everyone. Most
speakers at the Supreme Soviet session, in fact,
explicitly rejected this sort of an approach.
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Appendix E
Restless Nationalities:
Catalogue of Ethnic Tensions
in a Multinational State
Central Asia
Under Brezhnev, Soviet Muslims quietly but steadily
wrested control over many aspects of their lives from
Russians. There is a strong trend toward "nativiza-
tion"-the acquisition of authority by Central Asians.
Uzbeks, for example, reportedly still revere their
former leader Sharaf Rashidov-now vilified by Mos-
cow for corruption-as someone who stood up for his
republic. Islamic fundamentalism and nationalism
from neighboring Iran and Afghanistan-while not
widely popular-have had some resonance. A wide
network of unofficial clerics operates from the thou-
sands of underground mosques that dot the country-
side in Central Asia.
Kazakh SSR
The Kazakh SSR is the most dramatic example of the
negative local reaction to Gorbachev's attempt to
wrest power and break up the development of local
"mafias." When Moscow sacked the republic's Ka-
zakh party boss, Dinmukhamed Kunayev, and re-
placed him with Gennadiy Kolbin, an ethnic Russian,
hundreds of students rioted in Alma-Ata and other
Kazakh cities." The violent response-despite the fact
that the republic has slightly more ethnic Russians
than Kazakhs-underscores the native resentment of
Russification. Tension reportedly remains high.
The Baltic Republics
A number of unprecedented manifestations of nation-
alist sentiment have erupted in this region under
Gorbachev. Nationalist activists are pressing for more
political and economic autonomy, for freedom of
religion, for a cleaner environment, and some are even
demanding independence. An independent political
party emerged in Estonia in February 1988, whose
platform calls for the rejection of the "fiction" that
Estonia "voluntarily" joined the Soviet Union and for
separate representation in the United Nations. In
June 1987 in Riga, Latvia's capital, thousands pro=
tested the deportations of the nation's political leader-
ship and intelligentsia by the Soviets after incorpora-
tion into the USSR. In August 1987 demonstrators in
Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania denounced the Molo-
tov-Ribbentrop Pact that paved the way for the
forcible incorporation of the Baltic republics into the
Soviet Union. Since then, activists have held demon-
strations to mark their independence day and to .
commemorate the mass deportation in 1949 of those
who resisted collectivization.
This spring, at a plenary meeting of creative unions,
Estonian intellectuals formulated extensive proposals
for greater autonomy for the republic and received
9 X1
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endorsement from a newly created People's Front-a
broad coalition of intellectuals, party officials, and
unofficial groups-who sent a delegation with a re-
form platform to the 19th All-Union Party Confer-
ence in June. The platform included the proposal that
self-management and self-financing be extended to
union republics and other regions. The republic legis-
lature was asked to show initiative in changing laws.to
guarantee economic and cultural independence in
Estonia. Since then, Latvia and Lithuania have
formed similar People's Fronts, ostensibly within the 25X1
framework of the Communist Party but verging on
becoming real opposition parties. TASS reported that
on 9 July 100,000 Lithuanians gathered in Vilnius
under the leadership of the "Lithuanian Movement
for Restructuring" to press their proposals for greater
autonomy and to express support. for Nagorno-Kara-
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Crimean Tatars
Since Stalin exiled the Crimean Tatars for allegedly
collaborating with Nazi Germany, they have been
seeking to return to their homeland. Emboldened by
glasnost, hundreds of Crimean Tatars demonstrated
in the center of Moscow for several weeks in the
summer of 1987 until the militia forcibly sent them
back to Central Asia. A government commission
formed in July 1987 to investigate their demands has
allowed some Tatars to return to their Crimean
homeland, but the Tatar activists continue to demon-
strate. In March, Soviet media announced approval
for some Tatars to individually apply and return, but
just to those areas of the Crimean Oblast and Krasno-
dar Kray where significant numbers of Tatars already
reside. The Armenian irredentist demands have
sparked a new round of demonstrations by the Tatars
in Moscow, the Uzbek SSR, the North Caucasus, and
on the Crimean Peninsula.
Ukraine, Belorussia, and Moldavia
Perhaps the most worrisome is the prospect that
nationalism will flare up in the Ukraine, the largest
and the most traditionally independent of the Soviet
minority republics. Although nationalist aspirations
have not been manifested to the degree observed in
the Baltic republics, there are signs of increased
activism since Gorbachev came to power. Resentful of
the suppression of their language, their history, and
the Ukrainian Orthodox and Catholic Churches,
Ukrainian intellectuals are pushing for improvement
in the cultural sphere. Writers are pushing to make
Ukrainian the "official" language in the republic-
just as the native languages in Georgia, Armenia, and
Azerbaijan are guaranteed by their respective consti-
tutions-and to make its study compulsory in Ukrai-
nian schools, but-party officials have rejected both
proposals. Ukrainian nationalists have also appealed
for legalization of the Ukrainian Catholic Church,
which was liquidated by the Soviet authorities in
1946, but which has continued its underground exis-
tence. Many unofficial groups have sprung up in the
Ukraine. New groups called the Association of Inde-
pendent Creative Intelligentsia in L'vov and the
Ukrainian Culture and Ecology Club are debating
Stalin's brutal collectivization drive and the engi-
neered famine in 1932-33 that left millions dead. On
the second anniversary of the Chernobyl' accident, an
informal group organized a large antinuclear rally in
Kiev, which was broken up by police who arrested
about 20 participants. During June and July 1988,
even larger demonstrations took place in western
Ukraine. Participants demanded greater political, cul-
tural, and religious freedom and criticized Ukrainian
leaders. Such large demonstrations-up to 50,000
people-have not been seen since just after World
War II and show a growing antinuclear and national-
ist sentiment in the Ukraine.
In Belorussia, intellectuals are also pressing for lin-
guistic and cultural autonomy and organizing unoffi-
cial groups to review past repression under Stalin.
Increased activity in support of nationality concerns
have also come to the forefront in Moldavia, a sign of
the seriousness of ethnic tension there. At the Molda-
vian Central Committee plenum in late 1987, party
boss Semen Grossu attacked unofficial groups and
religious sects, accusing them of promoting disorder,
while the head of the republic's Interior Ministry
focused on "foreign subversion." Various ethnic
groups within the republic have begun to voice de-
mands, reflecting their rising sense of national self-
awareness.
Georgia
Nationalist feelings in Georgia remain strong. Some
200 to 300 persons have reportedly joined a new
extremely "anti-Soviet" nationalist organization.
There has been longstanding resentment among Geor-
gians over Russification, and intellectuals are pressing
for a fuller account of Georgian history and for more
textbooks published in the Georgian language. Many
Georgians are displeased with Gorbachev's de-Stalini-
zation campaign that some considered anti-Georgian.
Concern for the environment is also on the rise. Last
fall, Georgians collected 75,000 signatures for peti-
tions against the construction of a Transcaucasus
railroad, which they say will hurt the region's ecology.
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Georgians fear that the railroad will also "open up"
the Georgian republic to Russian influence. The
Georgian Supreme Soviet recently adopted stiff regu-
lations on public demonstrations, meetings, and
marches, apparently to head off planned demonstra-
tions. here
was considerable nervousness over the potential for.
ethnic clashes between national minorities in Georgia,
and officials reacted promptly to demonstrations in
the Yugo-Osetin AO over a typhoid outbreak by
firing the local party boss. Georgian leaders also face
territorial problems similar to Nagorno-Karabakh.
There were rumors that the Akhalkalaki region in
Georgia-populated by Armenians-and the Abkhaz
ASSR have attempted to separate from Georgia.
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m An r^r
Top Secret?
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