At the same time , some Armenian sources admitted the guilt of the Armenian side . According to Markar Melkonian , the brother of the Armenian military leader Monte Melkonian , " Khojaly had been a strategic goal , but it had also been an act of revenge . " The date of the massacre in Khojaly had a special significance : it was the run-up to the fourth anniversary of the anti-Armenian pogrom in the city of Sumgait where the civilian Armenian population was brutally murdered solely because of their ethnic origin . Melkonian particularly mentions the role of the fighters of two Armenian military detachments called the Arabo and Aramo , who stabbed to death many Azeri civilians , despite strict orders given by Monte Melkonian , that no captives were to be harmed
pogrom in the city of Sumgait
Sumgait pogrom
Khojaly Massacre