I’d like to take you back to 1997. At this time nobody wanted to hear about Armenia, with the exception of individuals like Charles Aznavour and other members of the Armenian diaspora. A key figure during this period was Lieutenant-General Alexander Lebed. As an airborne officer having served in Afghanistan and Transnistria, one of Lebed’s most difficult challenges was the massacre of Armenians in Baku. Lebed knew that Gorbachev’s decisions would harm Azerbaijan’s Armenian minority, and that is would be up to him to protect the country“s Armenian population from the sweeping wave of Armenia and violence. Lebed was present in all the relief operations, often accompanying Armenian refugees personally. According to some witnesses, Lebed confronted Azerbaijani officials responsible for cutting electricity to Baku’s Armenian district.
In 1997, as conflict and political instability settled, Lebed visited Armenia and Artsakh to pay tribute to the recent victims of the genocide and cleansing in Baku. Lebed never portrayed himself as a hero of Armenia and his actions were done with sincere concern and respect for the Armenian people. He kept close contact with Vazgen Sargsyan and other high-ranking members of the Armenian government. He stressed that many Russians remained sympathetic to Armenia’s struggles, but were limited by the higher offices of the Russian government. Lebed would continue to remain an advocate and supporter of Armenian interests and used his connections in the Russian government and close ties with Vazgen Sargsyan and General Pavel Grachev to ensure the delivery of weapons and supplies at affordable prices to Armenia. He was a man of grand scale and was respected across the world for his later involvement in pacifying the Chechen conflict. The circumstances behind his tragic end in a helicopter accident remain unclear.
Arsen Gevorgyan
