Word: azerbaijanis
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...turmoil centered once again on the largely Armenian enclave of Nagorno- Karabakh, a part of Azerbaijan since 1923. Trouble began when Azerbaijani attacked a busload of Armenian students near the regional capital of Stepanakert in Nagorno-Karabakh. Fighting spread swiftly as roving bands set fire to houses and cars. Ethnic Armenians and Azerbaijani battled with knives and guns in the worst outbreak of violence since 32 people died last February in riots in Sumgait, an Azerbaijani city. As Soviet troops arrived to restore order, authorities imposed a military curfew. The Soviet news agency TASS said one Armenian had been killed...
...much for wishful thinking. The executive council of the Azerbaijani parliament promptly passed a resolution declaring the vote illegal, and Nagorno-Karabakh's public prosecutor appeared on nationwide television to second that opinion. In a main square of Yerevan, the Armenian capital, protesters continued to demonstrate solidarity with Nagorno-Karabakh secessionists...
...with two well-known Armenian writers, Zori Balayan and Silva Kaputikyan. Gorbachev promised them that he would personally study the Armenian demands. As soon as that message was relayed to Yerevan, the protest leaders agreed to suspend the demonstrations for one month. In Nagorno-Karabakh, however, at least two Azerbaijani youths were killed in clashes with Armenians...
...apparently the news of those casualties that sparked last week's rioting in Sumgait (pop. 223,000), situated about 20 miles north of the Azerbaijani capital of Baku. According to a local television worker reached by telephone, the trouble started when a group of some 50 Azerbaijanis arrived in Sumgait from Nagorno-Karabakh bearing word of ethnic fighting there. The apparent result was a murderous backlash aimed at local Armenians. An Armenian resident of Sumgait, sobbing into the telephone, told Reuters that Azerbaijanis had gone on a rampage of rape and murder against Armenians. He said that seven members...
...Azerbaijani-Armenian clashes apparently stemmed more from centuries of bitter ethnic rivalries than from separatist urges. Says a senior Western diplomat in Moscow: "I think it would be a mistake to consider them a challenge to Soviet rule as such, or to a socialist system." Nonetheless, the turmoil has once again shattered the ritual claim that Communist "internationalism" and "Soviet patriotism" have overcome the primitive instincts of nationalism...