In Azerbaijan, the 32nd anniversary of the Khojaly tragedy is commemorated. Survivors share their stories
This is one of the abandoned sanatoriums located in the Pirshagi settlement on the periphery of Baku. In 1992, during the first Karabakh War, many forcibly displaced people from Khojaly settled here in one-bedroom cottage-type houses.
The sanatorium is situated on the shores of the Caspian Sea. However, the sea is not visible from here as the coast is fenced off. You can only hear the sounds of the waves and feel the cold of the sea.
Ten years ago, public transport didn’t reach the sanatorium. Residents had to walk 4-5 km to the nearest bus stop. Now, there is only one minibus that goes from here to the “Koroglu” metro station.
Currently, about 80 families reside here. Previously, there were 112 families. In 2020, some of them were resettled into nine-story residential buildings constructed for IDps in the Ramana settlement.
There aren’t many people on the streets. Perhaps it’s due to the cold; the frost is biting.
According to residents, everything seems to freeze in February here. They say that they commemorate the anniversary of the Khojaly tragedy with immense pain every year. Neighbors gather in each other’s homes to hare their memories of Khojaly and reminisce about their loved ones lost on that ominous night.
“Among the residents of Khojaly, there is an unspoken rule: in February, no one celebrates holidays, festivities, or weddings at home. Every year, throughout this month, we are all in mourning,” says sanatorium resident Gunay Abdulova.
The Khojaly tragedy is considered the bloodiest event in the history of the Karabakh War. According to official information, as a result of the Khojaly massacre, which occurred on the night of February 25-26, 1992, 613 residents of Khojaly perished, including 63 children, 106 women, and 70 elderly individuals. Eight families were completely annihilated.
Twenty-five children lost both parents, while 130 children lost one parent.
487 individuals were wounded, including 76 children. 1275 people were taken hostage. The fate of 150 of them, including 68 women and 26 children, remains unknown to this day.
5379 people were forced to leave their homes.
Last week, as a result of construction-restoration works in the center of Khojaly, a mass grave was discovered. As a result of procedural actions, it was established that the human remains found belong to at least 4 individuals (one of whom was a child aged 4-5). It is reported that their hands and feet were tied.
Azerbaijan and several foreign countries have recognized the Khojaly tragedy as genocide.
Gyunay hails from the city of Shusha. Even though she was only 6 years old when she and her family left their home, she remembers that night very well.
On the night of March 13, 1992, a Grad rocket hit the house in Shusha where Gyunay lived with her father, mother, brother, and three sisters. The house was completely destroyed by fire. That night, Gyunay’s father evacuated the entire family from Shusha and took them to Baku.
“Over the years, the most hurtful thing was being called refugees in the country of which we are citizens. Perhaps only those who have experienced such things can relate,” Gyunay recalls the years of forced displacement.
In 2008, when she married Jeyhun Abdulov, an IDp from Khojaly, she moved into their one-bedroom cottage in this sanatorium. From this marriage, Gyunay and Jeyhun have two sons.
“They were the last hostages freed from Khojaly”
The Abdulov family hails from Khojaly. Jeyhun and Eldeniz Abdulov, the parents of Kamal and Sevil, lived there until February 25, 1992, the night of the invasion of Khojaly. That night, two members of the family—Sevil and their 13-year-old son Jeyhun—were wounded and taken prisoner by Armenian soldiers.
Jeyhun himself doesn’t talk about it; it’s difficult for him to relive everything. Therefore, Gyunay recounts their story based on her mother-in-law’s account. She says that her husband always refrained from discussing the tragedy, so everything she knows she heard from her mother-in-law, Sevil khanum.
“That night, after the shooting started, my father-in-law came home and told his wife—my mother-in-law—that it was time to leave. He and their eldest son, Eldeniz, were fighting as part of the self-defense unit. That night, they were trying to evacuate people from Khojaly.
Jeyhun and his mother, along with other residents of Khojaly, escorted people to the Gargar River to head towards Agdam. Meanwhile, the men went back to hold the defense.
People moved towards Agdam through the forest. It was very cold that night, and there was snow everywhere. They were being shot at from behind. One bullet pierced Jeyhun’s left shoulder, and another grazed his mother’s temple,” recounts Gunay.
Jeyhun and his mother tried to continue despite their wounds. But Jeyhun had no strength left to walk, so his mother laid him among the bushes in the forest. Although Jeyhun asked his mother to leave him and go with the others, Sevil Abdulova stayed with her son. They and several others sat and waited for help.
“After a long night, they were found by a group of Armenian soldiers. My mother-in-law said that they first demanded money and valuables. A woman who objected was shot along with her son. When they approached her, my mother-in-law handed over all the money she had in her pockets. She only begged them not to harm her son,” Gunay shifts her gaze to her husband, who listens from a distant corner.
That same night, Kamal Abdulov was also wounded. He had stayed in Khojaly with his eldest son to evacuate the residents. Eldeniz and his comrades managed to get Kamal out and bring him to Agdam. After he regained consciousness, they began searching for Jeyhun and his mother among those arriving from Khojaly. When they couldn’t find them, everyone assumed they had perished.”
Gunay recounts that the Armenians crammed Jeyhun and his mother into the back of a large military vehicle with several other captives and brought them to a place resembling a basement. A day later, the mother and son were moved to another basement. Besides them, there was an old man and an 18-year-old girl. They were selected for exchange with Armenian prisoners.
After two months in this basement, they were handed over to the Azerbaijani side at the prisoner exchange point in the Agdam district.
“Jeyhun, Mom said you were the last hostages released from Khojaly. Am I remembering correctly?” Gunay turns to her husband.
“Yes, that’s right,” Jeyhun says, speaking for the first time in the conversation.
The Khojaly district came under Azerbaijani control as a result of military actions initiated by the Azerbaijani side on September 19, 2023. The Abdulovs heard this news on television.
“When we heard about the liberation of Khojaly, there was such a commotion in the courtyard. Everyone came out of their houses, congratulating each other, talking happily, laughing. Jeyhun and I started crying tears of joy. We didn’t know what to do. Our hearts nearly stopped from excitement. The children ran around, jumping in the house, looking at us, and rejoicing,” she recalls.
“It’s a pity Sevil Khanum couldn’t see this day,” Gunay says, as if suddenly remembering her death.
Sevil Abdulova passed away in November 2022 due to prolonged health issues. The Abdulov family is now preparing to return to their native home without her.
When they left Khojaly, they were only able to take the key to the house they lived in.
“He’s being beaten on the head, he laughs, he’s being beaten, he laughs, as if he’s lost his mind”
Zaruna Salimova is one of the residents of Khojaly, living in the sanatorium. She lives here with her husband, three sons, daughters-in-law, and three grandchildren.
Four months before the invasion of Khojaly, she married her fellow villager, Farhad. She was 20 years old at the time. She and her husband wanted to spend their whole lives in their home in Khojaly and raise their children there. But the war shattered their dreams.
Since Khojaly had been encircled long before the occupation, it was completely cut off from the outside world. During this time, unarmed residents of Khojaly organized night watch shifts. On the night of February 25th, Farhad was on duty.
“It was a night when gunfire started. My mother-in-law, father-in-law, brother-in-law, his wife, and two children were at our house. Farhad came home in a hurry and told us to hurry up, we needed to leave quickly, Armenians entered Khojaly. There’s no time to waste. My mother-in-law, Adila, was a sick woman of 60 years. She couldn’t walk on her own. My husband and brother-in-law carried their mother out of the house on their shoulders,” Zaruna recalls.
The Salimov family, along with about 50 residents of Khojaly, set out along a forest road towards Agdam. Describing this road, Zaruna says that the night darkness in the forest was illuminated by the flashing of bullets, as they were constantly fired upon from behind.
“I have never seen heavier snow than the one that fell in Khojaly in February of that year. It was snowing so heavily that you couldn’t open your eyes. It was difficult for the elderly, sick people, and women with babies in their arms to walk. But there was nothing else to do. Bullets were raining over our heads. How many people were hit by bullets? My mother-in-law was also hit. The white snow was red with the blood of the people of Khojaly.
I remember, we were walking, and suddenly our neighbor Vagif fell face down in the snow. The poor man had a heart attack. His wife begged for help. But how could we help? We had to run. She was left with three children next to her husband. We never found out the fate of any of them. Out of our 50 companions, only 12 made it to Agdam.”
Zaruna walked from Khojaly to Agdam with a three-month-old baby in her womb. She was deeply shocked by what she saw that night, as well as by the news of the disappearance and death of her relatives. As a result of these shocks, her baby was stillborn in the sixth month of pregnancy.
She says that what happened to her uncle Huseyn horrified her the most.
“Uncle Huseyn fought as a volunteer. On February 26, he was captured in the woods near Khojaly. He saw soldiers had made a fire in the forest. He thought they were ours. Approaching closer, he realized they were Armenians, but he couldn’t escape. They tied him to the back of a military vehicle and dragged him through the snow for hours,” she says, bursting into tears.
Another captive who was with her uncle Guseyn, later exchanged for Armenian prisoners, told them they were held in the Askeran prison. According to him, Guseyn was killed by cruel torture – he was repeatedly beaten with a blunt object on the head.
“He said that after many hours of torture, Uncle Guseyn began to laugh. They were hitting him on the head, and he was laughing. His skull was shattered, probably he had lost his mind, he didn’t feel pain anymore. He died a few minutes later,” says Zaruna with fear in her voice.
That night she lost a total of 15 relatives, including her aunt Zarifa, cousin Emin, and cousin Rasmia, as well as her uncle Huseyn.
“There is only one thing I know: we must return home”
As a result of the Second Karabakh war in the fall of 2020 and the military actions initiated by the Azerbaijani army in September 2023, the territories of the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast and seven adjacent districts, which had remained under Armenian control for over 30 years, were returned to Azerbaijan.
After this, displaced persons from these areas were given the opportunity to visit their native cities and villages along routes established by the Azerbaijani government.
Only a few people living in the sanatorium were able to take advantage of this opportunity. Zaruna Salimova is one of them. She went to Khojaly on February 15.
At first, she wanted to see her father’s house, but only found a plain and the ruins of destroyed houses. However, the house of her husband’s parents, where she moved after marriage, stood untouched in its place, although it looked abandoned. They believe that an Armenian family lived there after they left.
According to Zaruna Salimova, they received information from the authorities that they will be resettled back to Khojaly in the coming months. Even repairs to their home have begun. However, she feels saddened that not all of her relatives will be able to return to their native places:
“I’m sad that most of my relatives won’t be able to return there. My mother, father, and brother have missed Khojaly for many years. Unfortunately, they didn’t live to see the day to see their homeland again. Honestly, I don’t even know how we will be able to live in Khojaly after all that we’ve been through. I only know one thing — we must return to our native homes.”
