Wednesday, December 25 2019 11:06

ArmInfo. Armenia is determined to protect and ensure the right to existence and peaceful development of the Armenian people in their historical homeland,  including in Artsakh. This is stated in the statement of the press  secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the RA Anna  Naghdalyan in connection with the 100th anniversary of the pogroms of  Armenians in Agulis (Nakhichevan).

"Today we recall the 100th anniversary of the massacres of Armenians  in Agulis. One hundred years ago, in 1919, from December 24 to 25,  the peaceful Armenian population was massacred, and the ancient  Armenian settlement of Nakhichevan - Agulis - turned into ruins,"  Naghdalyan's statement received by ArmInfo reads.

She recalled that the government of the First Armenian Republic  appealed to the international community and, in particular, to the  Entente countries with an appeal to prevent violence on its territory  and ensure the safety of the Armenians in the region.

The press secretary of the Armenian Foreign Ministry emphasized that  the crimes against the Nakhichevan Armenians occurred not only in the  20th century, but continue today. "The Azerbaijani authorities,  having carried out ethnic cleansing of the Armenian population of  Nakhichevan, also carried out the massive and systematic destruction  of the Armenian cultural heritage," said Anna Naghdalyan in a  statement.  As a result of these events, thousands of Christian  monuments, including churches, monasteries and khachkars in Dzhugha,  Agulis and other places, were completely destroyed. "The destruction  of thousands of khachkars in Azerbaijan by Azerbaijani soldiers,  considered to be the masterpieces of medieval Christian art, was  documented by video and will remain in world history as an  unprecedented manifestation of atrocities against cultural  monuments," the statement of the press secretary of the Armenian  Foreign Ministry said.  Agulis - in the past, a large medieval  Armenian city was located in the valley of the Agulis River (Aylis),  surrounded by rocky mountains from the east and west, stretching from  north to south, in its middle course.  In ancient times, the  territory of Agulis was part of Gokhtn region in different periods of  the Great Armenia belonging to the Syunik region. In 1829, the city  consisted of 10 districts, of which 8 were Armenian, in Agulis there  were 122 Armenian houses and 50 Caucasian Tatars (the documentary  sources of the Russian Empire of the 19th and early 20th centuries  refer to Azerbaijanis in this way), in 1873 there were 170 Armenian  houses and 54 Caucasian Tatars. According to the 1897 census, 649  people lived in Lower Agulis, all Armenians. In Upper Agulis, 1325 -  Armenians and 639 - Caucasian Tatars, in 1904- 256 houses (2205  inhabitants) of Armenians and 68 houses (731 inhabitants) of the  Caucasian Tatars. In 1919, Agulis was destroyed, and the Armenian  part of the inhabitants was slaughtered by Turkish-Tatar troops.  The  Armenian part remained uninhabited for some time, after which several  families of Caucasian Tatars settled here.