YEREVAN, JANUARY 19, ARMENPRESS. Members of Parliament and citizens gathered at a cross-stone near the Tsitsernakaberd memorial on January 19 to commemorate the victims of the crimes committed against Armenians in Sumgait, Baku, Kirovabad and other Azeri cities.

MP Vilen Gabrielyan told reporters that lessons must be learned from these bloody chapters of history and that Azerbaijan still continues the same policy, with the blockade of Lachin Corridor and Nagorno Karabakh being a bright example.

“What the Azeri authorities perpetrated in Baku, Sumgait, Shamkhor and other cities is a policy of ethnic cleansing, because nearly half a million Armenians used to live in Azerbaijan, but now factually there is no one left, thousands have died and became refugees. And this policy is now factually proven by what Azerbaijan is doing today against Nagorno Karabakh,” the MP said.

MP Taguhi Tovmasyan, the Chair of the Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights Protection, said that years go by but the enemy and its aspirations towards Armenia and the region have remained the same.

“Nothing has changed in Azerbaijan’s genocidal policy,” Tovmasyan said. “Years ago, by displacing our compatriots, murdering them, the Azerbaijanis deprived them from their right to live. I’d like to clearly record that today’s commemoration is very important for the whole world to see that we are not forgetting. In all times genocide must have one clear response, that is, accountability. As long as there’s been no accountability, the same crimes will be repeated over and over again. The latest events in Artsakh prove that Azerbaijan is ready to commit a new genocide and won’t stop before anything,” Tovmasyan warned.

The pogroms against Armenians began in Sumgait in 1988, and continued in Kirovabad and other cities. In early January of 1990 the pogroms began in Baku and continued until January 19.