'Scars still fresh': Turkiye marks 30th anniversary of Khojaly massacre

By Busra Nur Cakmak

ANKARA (AA) - Turkiye on Saturday commemorated the 30th anniversary of the 1992 Khojaly massacre of Azerbaijanis by Armenian forces.

More than 600 people were killed in one of Armenia’s bloodiest assaults on Azerbaijani civilians in the Upper Karabakh region, which was liberated by Baku in November 2020 after decades of occupation.

“We know that the scars of this atrocity that took place 30 years ago before the eyes of the world are still fresh. We feel the grief of brotherly Azerbaijan as our own grief and share it deeply in our hearts,” the Turkish Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

The two-hour Armenian offensive took place on Feb. 26, 1992, just after the Soviet Union was dissolved.

Armenian forces took over the town of Khojaly after battering it with heavy artillery, tanks, and infantry forces.

They killed 613 Azerbaijani citizens, including 106 women, 63 children, and 70 elderly people, and seriously injured 487 others, according to Azerbaijani figures.

Some 150 of the 1,275 Azerbaijanis captured by the Armenians remain missing. In the massacre, eight families were completely wiped out, while 130 children lost one parent and 25 children lost both parents.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry pointed out that “the fate of the missing remains unknown until this day.”

“We wish Allah’s mercy upon our Azerbaijani brothers and sisters who lost their lives in the Khojaly massacre. We once again extend our most sincere condolences to the brotherly people of Azerbaijan and remember with respect the dear memory of those who have lost their lives,” it added.