On January 18, 2024, at the offices of Azerbaijan General Consulate in Los Angeles, a ceremony was held to commemorate the January 19–20, 1990, what is known as Black January or Black Saturday events.

January 19–20, 1990, what is known as Black January, Black Saturday or the January Massacre, was a violent crackdown on Azerbaijani nationalism and anti-Soviet sentiment in Baku, Azerbaijan, as the Soviet Union’s dissolution began.

On January 19, 1990 late night, 26,000 Soviet troops entered Baku, in order to crush the Popular Front during which 147 civilians were killed, 800 people were injured and five people went missing.

Then Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet Communist Party General Secretary and Defense Minister Dmitry Yazov asserted that military law was necessary to thwart Azerbaijan’s independence movement efforts to overthrow the Soviet Azerbaijani government.

In the photo from left: Guest, Behkam Nikaein, Eti El-Kiss CEO Cachet Worldwide Productions, Ramil Gurbanov, Consul General Azerbaijan, Nurit Greenger, President US-AZ Cultural Foundation, Ruslan Biryukov, Cellist.-Photo credit Nurit Greenger