First Secretary of the Baku Party Committee who blocked buses from entering Baku, shifting the violence to Sumgait
“I realized that it was a pogrom. I ordered all roads to the city blocked from these settlements. The order was executed. The buses went to Sumgait.”
A Soviet and Azerbaijani party and state official who rose through the construction sector to become First Secretary of the Baku City Party Committee in 1983. In February 1988, as buses carrying Azerbaijani refugees expelled from Armenia converged on Baku, he ordered the city's access roads blocked; the measure kept violence out of Baku but diverted the bus convoys to Sumgait, where the pogrom erupted days later. After the dissolution of the USSR, he served as the first president of independent Azerbaijan's football association (1992–2003), steering the country into UEFA and FIFA membership.
Career Timeline
- 1975–1977First Deputy Minister of Rural Construction, Azerbaijan SSR
- 1977–1981First Deputy Chairman, State Planning Committee, Azerbaijan SSR
- 1981Deputy Chairman, Council of Ministers, Azerbaijan SSR
- 1981–1983Secretary for Construction, Central Committee, Communist Party of Azerbaijan
- 1983–1988First Secretary, Baku City Party Committee
- 1989–1990Chairman, State Committee for Industrial Safety and Mining Supervision
- 1990–1991Secretary for Industry, Central Committee, Communist Party of Azerbaijan
- 1992–2003President, Association of Football Federations of Azerbaijan (AFFA)