Portal:Azerbaijan

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The Azerbaijan Portal

A view of Baku, Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan, officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, is a transcontinental country located at the boundary of Eastern Europe and West Asia. It is a part of the South Caucasus region and is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia's republic of Dagestan to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia and Turkey to the west, and Iran to the south. Baku is the capital and largest city.

The territory of what is now Azerbaijan was first ruled by Caucasian Albania and later various Persian empires. Until the 19th century, it remained part of Qajar Iran, but the Russo-Persian wars of 1804–1813 and 1826–1828 forced the Qajar Empire to cede its Caucasian territories to the Russian Empire; the treaties of Gulistan in 1813 and Turkmenchay in 1828 defined the border between Russia and Iran. The region north of the Aras was part of Iran until it was conquered by Russia in the 19th century, where it was administered as part of the Caucasus Viceroyalty.

Azerbaijan is a unitary semi-presidential republic. It is one of six independent Turkic states and an active member of the Organization of Turkic States and the TÜRKSOY community. Azerbaijan has diplomatic relations with 182 countries and holds membership in 38 international organizations, including the United Nations, the Council of Europe, the Non-Aligned Movement, the OSCE, and the NATO PfP program. It is one of the founding members of GUAM, the CIS, and the OPCW. Azerbaijan is also an observer state of the WTO. (Full article...)

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Operation Ring (Russian: Операция «Кольцо», romanized: Operatsia Kol'tso; Armenian: «Օղակ» գործողություն, Oghak gortsoghut'yun), known in Azerbaijan as Operation Chaykand (Azerbaijani: Çaykənd əməliyyatı) was the codename for the May 1991 military operation conducted by the Soviet Army, Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) of the USSR and OMON units of the Azerbaijan SSR in the Khanlar and Shahumyan districts of the Azerbaijani SSR, the Shusha, Martakert and Hadrut districts of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, and along the eastern border of the Armenian SSR in the districts of Goris, Noyemberyan, Ijevan and Shamshadin. Officially dubbed a "passport checking operation," the ostensible goal of the operation was to disarm "illegal armed formations" in and around Nagorno-Karabakh, referring to irregular Armenian military detachments that had been operating in the area. The operation involved the use of ground troops accompanied by a complement of military vehicles, artillery and helicopter gunships to be used to root out the self-described Armenian fedayeen.

However, contrary to their stated objectives, Soviet troops and the predominantly Azerbaijani soldiers in the AzSSR OMON and army forcibly uprooted Armenians living in the 24 villages strewn across Shahumyan to leave their homes and settle elsewhere in Nagorno-Karabakh or in the neighbouring Armenian SSR. Following this, the Armenian inhabitants of 17 villages across the Shusha and Hadrut regions were forcibly removed. Border villages in the Armenian SSR were also raided. British journalist Thomas de Waal has described Operation Ring as the Soviet Union's first and only civil war and as the "beginning of the open, armed phase of the Karabakh conflict." Some authors have also described the actions of the joint Soviet and Azerbaijani force as ethnic cleansing. The military operation was accompanied by systematic and gross human rights abuses. (Full article...)

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Did you know (auto-generated)

... that the 14th- and 15th-century Azerbaijani poet Imadaddin Nasimi was possibly flayed alive after he was accused of being a kafir by Sunni scholars?
... that with the help of Turkish and Azerbaijani agents, Muslims in Armenia revolted in 1919–1920 and massacred over 10,000 Armenians?
... that Ashiq Peri was the first prominent female folk poet in Azerbaijan?
... that Marina Nekrasova was the first woman artistic gymnast to represent Azerbaijan at the Olympics?
... that Azerbaijan has been a member of the Council of Europe, an organization promoting human rights, for more than twenty years, despite holding political prisoners and rigging elections?
... that in 2017 the British travel magazine Wanderlust rated Azerbaijan's electronic visa as the easiest visa to obtain in the world?

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More Did you know

...that the origins of the Church of Caucasian Albania date to St. Eliseus' efforts in the first century AD to spread Christianity to the area?

...that the first co-ed school in Azerbaijan was founded by Hamida Javanshir in 1908?

...that Sakina Akhundzadeh is considered the first female playwright and dramatist in Azerbaijani literature?

More did you know facts

General images

The following are images from various Azerbaijan-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Side view of the Church of Kish (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 2Roman inscription in Qobustan (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 3Early caliphates:
  Muhammad, 622–632

  Rashidun Caliphate, 632–661

  Umayyad Caliphate, 661–750
(from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 4The Caucasus after the Treaty of Gulistan, in which Persia ceded most of its northern khanates to Russia after the first Russo-Persian war (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 5The Achaemenid empire at its greatest extent (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 6Pottery from Kul-Tepe I (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 7Iran around 1900 (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 8Mammad Amin Rasulzade, a founder and spokesperson of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic in 1918, was widely regarded as Azerbaijan's national leader. (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 9The Maiden Tower, in Baku's Old City (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 10Shah Abbas I of Safavid at a banquet. Detail from a ceiling fresco, Chehel Sotoun palace, Isfahan. (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 11Battle-scene miniature in the Palace of Shaki Khans (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 12Ilham Aliyev in Munich in 2010 (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 13Heydar Aliyev during a 1997 Pentagon visit (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 14Shah Abbas I at a banquet (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 15"Hounds and Jackals" game (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 1619th-century Gasimushaghi carpet from Şəlvə, Lachin (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 17Oil derricks in Balaxanı around 1890 (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 18Ismail I's empire (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 19Ateshgah of Baku, a Hindu and Zoroastrian temple (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 201996 Azerbaijani postage stamp commemorating Novruz (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 21Topographic map of Azerbaijan (from Geography of Azerbaijan)
Image 22Arabic inscriptions on the surviving Gate of Ganja (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 2315th-century Shirvanshah mausoleum in Baku (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 24Sasanid silver plate from Shamakhi District (Azerbaijan State Museum of History) (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 25Carpet based on Nizami Ganjavi's 12th-century Layla and Majnun (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 26Cut pomegranate (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 27Goytepe site (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 28Transcaucasia in the early 19th century (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 29Soviet postage stamp commemorating Azerbaijani musical instruments (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 30Baku's first film studio during the early 1920s (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 31Momine Khatun Mausoleum in Nakhchivan (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 32Azerbaijani deputies to the 1907 Second Russian State Duma. Seated left is Fatali Khan Khoyski; seated right is Khalil Khasmammadov. (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 33Petroglyphs in Gobustan National Park date back to 10000 BC. (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 34Gobustan rock art (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 35Late-19th-century rug market in Ganja (from Culture of Azerbaijan)
Image 361748 maps of Shirvan, the Caucasus and Persia (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 37Azerbaijan map of Köppen climate classification zones (from Geography of Azerbaijan)
Image 38Qajar-style painting of mullahs with the shah (from History of Azerbaijan)
Image 39Salt bag circa 1880, Karabakh (from Culture of Azerbaijan)

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This is a list of recognized content, updated weekly by JL-Bot (talk · contribs) (typically on Saturdays). There is no need to edit the list yourself. If an article is missing from the list, make sure it is tagged (e.g. {{WikiProject Azerbaijan}}) or categorized correctly and wait for the next update. See WP:RECOG for configuration options.