Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast in the context of "Nagorno Karabakh Republic"

Artsakh (/ˈɑːrtsɑːx, -sæx/ ART-sa(h)kh), officially the Republic of Artsakh or the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh (/nəˌɡɔːrnoʊ kərəˈbɑːk/ nə-GOR-noh kər-ə-BAHK), was a breakaway state in the South Caucasus whose territory was internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan. Between 1991 and 2023, Artsakh controlled parts of the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast of the Azerbaijani Soviet Socialist Republic, including its capital Stepanakert. It had been an enclave within Azerbaijan from the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war until the 2023 Azerbaijani offensive, when the Azerbaijani military took control over the remaining territory controlled by Artsakh. Its only overland access route to Armenia after the 2020 war was via the five-kilometre-wide (3.1 mi) Lachin corridor, which was placed under the supervision of Russian peacekeeping forces.

The predominantly Armenian-populated region of Nagorno-Karabakh was claimed by both the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic and the First Republic of Armenia when both countries became independent in 1918 after the fall of the Russian Empire. A brief war over the region broke out in 1920. The dispute was largely shelved after the Soviet Union established control over the area, and created the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) within the Azerbaijan SSR in 1923; however, throughout the Soviet period, Armenians in the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast were heavily discriminated against. The Soviet Azerbaijani authorities worked to suppress Armenian culture and identity in Nagorno-Karabakh, pressured Armenians to leave the region and encouraged Azerbaijanis to settle within it, although Armenians remained the majority population.

The First Nagorno-Karabakh War was an ethnic and territorial conflict that took place from February 1988 to May 1994 in the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in southwestern Azerbaijan between the majority ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh backed by Armenia, and the Republic of Azerbaijan with support from Turkey. As the war progressed, Armenia and Azerbaijan, both former Soviet republics, entangled themselves in protracted, undeclared mountain warfare in the mountainous heights of Karabakh as Azerbaijan attempted to curb the Karabakh Movement.

The enclave's parliament had voted in favor of uniting with Armenia and a referendum, boycotted by the Azerbaijani population of Nagorno-Karabakh, was held, in which a 99.89% voted in favor of independence with an 82.2% turnout. The demand to unify with Armenia began in a relatively peaceful manner in 1988; in the following months, as the Soviet Union disintegrated, it gradually grew into an increasingly violent conflict between Armenians and Azerbaijanis, resulting in ethnic cleansing, including the Sumgait (1988) and Baku (1990) pogroms directed against Armenians, and the Gugark pogrom (1988) and Khojaly Massacre (1992) directed against Azerbaijanis.Inter-ethnic clashes between the two broke out shortly after the parliament of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) in Azerbaijan voted to unite the region with Armenia on 20 February 1988. The declaration of secession from Azerbaijan was the culmination of a territorial conflict. As Azerbaijan declared its independence from the Soviet Union and removed the powers held by the enclave's government, the Armenian majority voted to secede from Azerbaijan and in the process proclaimed the unrecognized Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Operation Ring (Russian: Операция «Кольцо», romanized: Operatsia Kol'tso; Armenian: «Օղակ» գործողություն, Oghak gortsoghut'yun), known in Azerbaijan as Operation Chaykand (Azerbaijani: Çaykənd əməliyyatı) was the codename for the May 1991 military operation conducted by the Soviet Army, Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) of the USSR and OMON units of the Azerbaijan SSR in the Khanlar and Shahumyan districts of the Azerbaijani SSR, the Shusha, Martakert and Hadrut districts of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, and along the eastern border of the Armenian SSR in the districts of Goris, Noyemberyan, Ijevan and Shamshadin. Officially dubbed a "passport checking operation," the ostensible goal of the operation was to disarm "illegal armed formations" in and around Nagorno-Karabakh, referring to irregular Armenian military detachments that had been operating in the area. The operation involved the use of ground troops accompanied by a complement of military vehicles, artillery and helicopter gunships to be used to root out the self-described Armenian fedayeen.

However, contrary to their stated objectives, Soviet troops and the predominantly Azerbaijani soldiers in the AzSSR OMON and army forcibly uprooted Armenians living in the 24 villages strewn across Shahumyan to leave their homes and settle elsewhere in Nagorno-Karabakh or in the neighbouring Armenian SSR. Following this, the Armenian inhabitants of 17 villages across the Shusha and Hadrut regions were forcibly removed. Border villages in the Armenian SSR were also raided. British journalist Thomas de Waal has described Operation Ring as the Soviet Union's first and only civil war and as the "beginning of the open, armed phase of the Karabakh conflict." Some authors have also described the actions of the joint Soviet and Azerbaijani force as ethnic cleansing. The military operation was accompanied by systematic and gross human rights abuses.

Stepanakert, officially Khankendi, is a city in the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. The city was under the control and the capital city of the breakaway Republic of Artsakh prior to the 2023 Azerbaijani offensive in the region. The city is located in a valley on the eastern slopes of the Karabakh mountain range, on the left bank of the Qarqarçay (Karkar) river.

The area that would become Stepanakert was originally an Armenian settlement named Vararakn. During the Soviet period, the city was made the capital of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, becoming a hub for economic and industrial activity. In addition, the city became a hotbed for political activity, serving as the center for Armenian demonstrations calling for the unification of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia. Stepanakert suffered extensive damage following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the outbreak of the First Nagorno-Karabakh War and passed into the hands of local Armenians with the establishment of the Republic of Artsakh. During the Soviet and Artsakh periods, the city was a regional center of education and culture, being home to Artsakh University, musical schools, and a palace of culture. The economy was based on the service industry and had varied enterprises, food processing, wine making, and silk weaving being the most important. As of 2021, the population of Stepanakert was 75,000.

Anti-Armenian sentiment in Azerbaijan, or Armenophobia is widespread in Azerbaijan, and refers to hostility toward Armenians. Observers and human rights bodies describe Armenians as the most vulnerable ethnic group in the country, noting widespread negative stereotyping in public discourse. Polling over the past decades has shown deep animosity toward Armenia, and the term "Armenian" (erməni) is widely used as an insult in everyday language and media.

Historical roots trace back to anti-Armenian sentiment in Turkey, pan-Turkism, the actions of Russian and Soviet authorities, and the higher economic and social status of Armenians compared to Azeris at the turn of the 20th century. Contemporary Armenophobia in Azerbaijan traces its roots to the Karabakh Movement, in which Armenians petitioned Soviet authorities to transfer the mostly Armenian-populated Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) in Azerbaijan to Armenia. In response, anti-Armenian pogroms occurred in Sumgait, Kirovabad and Baku. From 1988 through 1992, an estimated 300,000–350,000 Armenians were either deported from or fled Azerbaijan under threat of violence — primarily from areas outside Nagorno-Karabakh, where the Armenian population was largely spared. The conflict eventually escalated into the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, in which Azerbaijan lost control over the territory to the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) Republic, further magnifying anti-Armenian sentiment.