Karabakh movement

Karabakh movement
Karabakh movement
Part of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, First Nagorno-Karabakh War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union
	The first major demonstration in Stepanakert, February 13, 1988
Date	13 February 1988 — 30 April 1991
Location	Armenia (mainly Yerevan) ; Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast
Goals	Unification of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia
Methods	Demonstrations, sit-ins, strikes, hunger strike, student protest, civil disobedience
Resulted in	Establishment of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic ; Escalation of the First Nagorno-Karabakh War
Parties
Karabakh Committee (1988–1989) ; Pan-Armenian National Movement (1989–1991); Armenia	Soviet Union Azerbaijan SSR;
Lead figures
	Levon Ter-Petrosyan ; Vazgen Manukyan ; Movses Gorgisyan ; Babken Ararktsyan ; Igor Muradyan Mikhail Gorbachev ; Kamran Baghirov ; Abdurrahman Vazirov ; Ayaz Mutallibov
Number
Yerevan: ; 200,000 (24-25 February 1988) ; 1 million (26 February 1988) ; 300,000 (May 1988) ; 400,000 (January 1990) ; Stepanakert: 100,000 (25 February 1988) ; 120,000 (26 February 1988)

The Karabakh movement (Armenian: Ղարաբաղյան շարժում), also known as the Artsakh movement (Armenian: Արցախյան շարժում), was a national mass movement in Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh from 1988 to 1991 that advocated for the transfer of the mainly Armenian-populated Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast of neighboring Azerbaijan to the jurisdiction of Armenia.

Initially, the movement was entirely devoid of any anti-Soviet sentiment and did not call for independence of Armenia. The Karabakh Committee, a group of intellectuals, led the movement from 1988 to 1989. It transformed into the Pan-Armenian National Movement (HHSh) by 1989 and won majority in the 1990 parliamentary election. In 1991, both Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh declared independence from the Soviet Union. The intense fighting known as the first Nagorno-Karabakh War turned into a full-scale war by 1992.