107 years have passed since the March 31 genocide committed by Armenian Dashnaks together with the Bolsheviks against Azerbaijanis. The Armenians, who skillfully used the February and October coups in Russia in 1917, managed to realize their claims under the Bolshevik flag. The mass massacres that began in Baku from March 30 to April 2, 1918, by the Armenian Bolshevik gangs led by Stepan Shaumyan resulted in the murder of tens of thousands of innocent people, including many elderly people, women and children. The peaceful Azerbaijani population killed in those days was exterminated solely because of their nationality. The Armenians set fire to houses and burned people alive. They destroyed national architectural gems, schools, hospitals, mosques and other monuments, turning a large part of Baku into ruins.
The genocide of Azerbaijanis was carried out with particular cruelty in Baku, Shamakhi, Guba districts, Karabakh, Zangezur, Nakhchivan, Lankaran and other regions of Azerbaijan. In these territories, the civilian population was massively murdered, villages were burned, and national cultural monuments were destroyed and destroyed.
After the establishment of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic, special attention was paid to the March events of 1918. On July 15, 1918, the Council of Ministers adopted a decision to establish an Extraordinary Investigative Commission to investigate this tragedy. The commission investigated the March genocide, the atrocities in Shamakhi at the initial stage, and the grave crimes committed by Armenians in the territory of the Iravan province. A special body was created under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to convey these truths to the world community. March 31, 1919 and 1920, was twice celebrated by the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic as a Day of National Mourning. This was the first attempt in history to give a political assessment to the genocide committed against Azerbaijanis and the occupation of our lands that had lasted for more than a century. However, the collapse of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic did not allow this work to be completed.
On March 26, 1998, President Heydar Aliyev signed a decree “On the Genocide of Azerbaijanis”. Since that day, March 31 has been celebrated as the Day of the Genocide of Azerbaijanis.