President: In first years of independence, Azerbaijan faced numerous threats and challenges

“On October 18, 1991, Azerbaijan got the opportunity to gain independence for the second time in the 20th century and declared to the world that it was the successor of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic with the Constitutional Act “On State Independence of the Republic of Azerbaijan,” President Ilham Aliyev said in his address to the people of Azerbaijan on the 30th anniversary of the restoration of independence, Report informs.

The president emphasized that in the first years of independence, Azerbaijan faced numerous threats and severe challenges.

“Internal strife, arbitrariness and incompetence in public administration, and a severe political and economic crisis brought the country to the brink of civil war and questioned its future. Under these conditions, the Armenian armed forces occupied the Azerbaijani lands, and hundreds of thousands of our compatriots were expelled from their ancestral lands. What has happened has shown once again that maintaining true independence is far more complicated than gaining it,” the head of state noted.