The Telegraph: Power plants and statues: Azerbaijan cements its culture on bitterly contested town

The Telegraph has published an article on Karabakh.

Power plants and statues: Azerbaijan cements its culture on bitterly contested town

Last autumn's six-week war led to a rapid victory for Azerbaijan, and now the town is being recast in the victor's image

By

Colin Freeman

SHUSHA

6 July 2021 • 6:00 am

Three decades after he fell victim to a bout of wartime cancel culture, the bust of Uzeyir Hacibeyli, composer of Azerbaijan's national anthem, is back in what fans consider its rightful place.

In Soviet times, the bronze sculpture of the country's greatest classical musician stood proudly in the centre of Shusha, the town regarded as the cultural capital of the “disputed” region of Nagorno Karabakh.

But after Nagorno Karabakh fell into the control of Armenian separatists in the early 1990s, Hacibeyli's bust was used as target practice by gunmen and sold to a scrap metal dealer in Georgia, from where it was salvaged by Azerbaijan's culture ministry.

Now, with Shusha recaptured by Azerbaijani forces during last year's renewed hostilities, Hacibeyli's bullet-scarred bust once again looks out over the town square, where the Azerbaijani flag now flies from the nearby town hall. Also restored are busts of Khurshidbanu Natavan, an Azerbaijani poet, and Bulbul, a famous singer, likewise dusted off after decades of safekeeping in Azerbaijan's Museum of Arts.

Construction workers brought to the town of Shusha by the Azerbaijani government to rebuild after the war of 2020

“These monuments stood here before the war of 1988, but the Armenians fired on them to show their disdain for Azerbaijani culture,” said Zaur Ferhadov, an official in the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry. “We've now restored the statues, but we've left the bullet marks as a reminder of the aggression that was shown towards them.”

Last autumn's six-week war led to a rapid victory for Azerbaijan, which used Turkish-supplied military drones to overwhelm Armenian defences around Nagorno Karabakh's mountain flanks. Azerbaijan's president, Ilham Aliyev, now plans to return hundreds of thousands of displaced citizens to recaptured parts of the region, regarded internationally as legitimate Azerbaijani territory.

Mr Aliyev’s most prized re-possession is Shusha - known as Shushi to Armenians - a hilltop town of mosques and churches that both sides regard as Nagorno Karabakh's cultural capital.

During the 1988-94 war, it was the scene of a major victory for Armenian separatist troops, who scaled the steep slopes leading up to Shusha to stop Azerbaijan’s military from using it to rain missiles down on nearby Stepanakert, the breakaway region’s capital.

But when The Telegraph visited Shusha during last year’s conflict, the tables were being turned, as Azerbaijani forces pounded it with missiles, including one that wrecked the dome of the town's 19th century Holy Saviour cathedral. Azerbaijani troops then scaled Shusha's slopes to replant the Azerbaijani flag, a move that helped force Armenia into signing a Russian-brokered ceasefire deal.

A bust of Uzeyir Hacibeyli, composer of Azerbaijan’s national anthem.

"It was a very hard battle because we were fighting uphill, but we were happy to do it because Shusha is part of our cultural heritage,” said Colonel Gafarov Mushvig.

Col Mushvig was speaking to The Telegraph during a media visit to Shusha organized by the office of Mr Aliyev, for whom the war has been a huge propaganda victory. The president has already visited Shusha several times, opening three new hotels and promising that after decades of Armenian savagery, Shusha will now become a tourism haven.

“Shusha will become one of the cultural capitals not only of Azerbaijan, the region but also of the world,” he declared.

Several brand new power stations have been built, bearing pictures of a triumphant Mr Aliyev in military uniform.

In Shusha itself, work is underway to replace the town’s ageing Soviet-era housing stock, much of which has lies wrecked by the war, and to restore Azerbaijani museums and cultural sites. A new sign showing the Azerbaijani spelling of Shusha adorns the town’s castle, and on some buildings, fresh graffiti in Latin quotes the Roman phrase “Veni, vidi, vici” (I came, I saw, I conquered). Renovation work is also underway on the bomb-damaged cathedral, which Armenia claims was deliberately targeted.

Azerbaijani forces retook the city during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War

The central mosque in Shusha

Among the army of construction workers is Seymur Nasibov, 42, who was one of the thousands of Azerbaijanis forced to leave when it was captured by Armenian forces in 1992.

“I was just 14 at the time - the place was being bombed and when Armenian troops entered, we fled,” he said, as he showed the Telegraph around the bomb-wrecked apartment block where he grew up. “Every day after work I return to visit this old flat, even though it is now minus windows and doors - it feels like a miracle to be back here.”

The reconstruction drive is designed to quite literally cement Mr Aliyev’s grip on Nagorno Karabakh, although under the terms of last autumn's ceasefire, Stepanakert - which Azerbaijanis call Khankendi - remains under Armenian control. A 2,000-strong team of Russian peacekeepers now police a narrow corridor connecting Stepanakert to Armenia proper, giving the enclave an economic lifeline.

However, Mr Aliyev has said that he wants all the former breakaway regions to eventually return to Azerbaijani control. Diplomats believe he may resort to force again if future talks on the region fail.

Meanwhile, it remains to be seen if any of the Armenians who fled Shusha last year will return. Azerbaijani officials have said that once their own citizens have been resettled there, the Armenians will be allowed back too. But with the feeling still running high on either side, nobody expects that to happen any time soon.

Among the Armenians who have already ruled out returning is Ashot Ghulyan, 56, whom The Telegraph last met during the fighting last October. He fled Shusha shortly afterwards and is now living in rented housing in the Armenian capital, Yerevan.

“When I left I Shusha I thought our Armenian troops would mount a big counter-attack and we would regain it,” he said. “But will I come back and live under the control of the enemy? No way.”