Armenian–Tatar massacres of 1905–1907

The Armenian-Tatar massacres also known as the Armenian-Tatar war of 1905—1907 refers to the bloody inter-ethnic confrontation between the Caucasian Tatars (today called Azeris) and Armenians throughout the Caucasus. The events were caused by a lasting hostility between Asiatic and Moslem Tatars on one side and European and Christian Armenians on the other. The Russian Empire, which at the time ruled the region, feared the Armenians long tradition of struggle against foreign domination and chose to rely on the less politically developed Tatars and their traditional respect towards the rulers. During 1903 and 1904 the authorities began arming Tatars and preparing antiarmenian pogroms. The massacres started during the Russian Revolution of 1905, and claimed hundreds of lives. The most violent clashes occurred in 1905 in February in Baku, in May in Nakhichevan, in August Shushi and in November in Elizavetpol, heavily damaging the cities and the Baku oilfields. Some violence, although of lesser scale, broke out also in Tiflis, but the local Social-Democratic Party, the only force enjoying popular confidence, was able to intervene between the two communities and to prevent larger carnage in the city.

References

• Thomas De Waal (2004), Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War, NYU Press, ISBN 0814719457
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