By Siranush Adamyan
Azerbaijani pro-government media are increasingly directing historical accusations over Yerevan’s emergence as Armenia’s capital in 1918 toward Ottoman Turkey rather than the founders of Azerbaijan’s first republic, according to exiled Azerbaijani historian and political analyst Altay Goyushov.
The shift comes amid an unusual public dispute between Azerbaijan and Turkey, traditionally close allies, over restrictions on Islamic headscarves in Azerbaijani schools.
“Amid the current dispute with Turkey, Azerbaijani pro-government media has resorted to a new narrative to attack Turkey,” Goyushov wrote in a post on X.
“Now Azerbaijani pro-government propaganda attacks ‘brotherly’ Turkey, accusing it of betraying Azerbaijan and giving Yerevan to Armenia a century ago.”
Goyushov, who lives in exile in France, is an outspoken critic of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev. In February 2026, an Azerbaijani court sentenced him in absentia to six years in prison on charges of making public calls against the state. The proceedings concerned his online political commentary, according to PEN America.
Goyushov argued that the accusation itself was familiar in Azerbaijani political discourse. What had changed was the identity of those accused of surrendering Yerevan, the capital of present-day Armenia.
“It should be noted that this is not a new narrative. The target has changed,” he wrote.
“Previously, for the same reason, Aliyev’s propaganda machine had another eternal enemy: the first democratic republic. He relentlessly attacked its leaders, calling them traitors who gave Yerevan to Armenia.”
“Now the target is different. His propaganda machine attacks the Ottomans, accusing them of forcing the leaders of the first republic to do that.”
Ottoman Turkey accused of betrayal
A recent example appeared on October 17, when Azerbaijani news website Oxu24 published an article headlined ‘This was brotherly Turkey’s first trick — Our historic city was erased from our map.’
The article reproduced a social media post by Müqabil Bayramov, chairman of the Azerbaijan Cartographers Public Association, accusing the Ottoman Empire of sacrificing Azerbaijan’s territorial interests to resolve the Armenian question after World War I.
According to Bayramov, Ottoman authorities wanted Armenians to establish their state outside Ottoman territory and therefore favored Yerevan rather than Kars or Gyumri as its political center.
He argued that Ottoman officials exploited the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic’s military and political weakness and pressured its leaders to accept Yerevan as the capital of the newly independent Armenian state.
Bayramov also accused Ottoman leaders of seeking political control over Azerbaijan and its oil resources, suggesting that Ottoman ambitions were thwarted by the empire’s defeat in World War I.
The publication connected those historical accusations to Ankara’s current policy toward Armenia. Bayramov criticized Turkey’s efforts to improve relations with Yerevan and portrayed them as part of a longstanding pattern of betrayal.
The article is a concrete example of the change highlighted by Goyushov: Ottoman Turkey, generally celebrated in Azerbaijan for helping the country secure independence in 1918, is instead portrayed as having acted against Azerbaijani national interests.
The accusations represent a particular Azerbaijani nationalist interpretation of the events of 1918, when Armenia and Azerbaijan declared independence amid the collapse of the Russian Empire and the Ottoman military advance into the South Caucasus. They do not establish that Yerevan was simply transferred from one sovereign state to another.
Turkey-Azerbaijan tensions
The publication follows a series of increasingly sharp exchanges between Turkish and Azerbaijani political figures.
The dispute intensified after girls wearing Islamic headscarves were prevented from attending some Azerbaijani schools under new uniform regulations introduced in September. The restrictions triggered protests in Azerbaijan and criticism from Turkish politicians.
Oktay Saral, a senior adviser to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and lawmakers from Erdoğan’s governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) criticized the measures.
Azerbaijan’s ruling New Azerbaijan Party responded on October 13 by accusing the Turkish politicians of interfering in the country’s internal affairs.
The same day, Azerbaijan’s parliamentary working group on relations with Turkey issued a statement expressing concern over what it described as a campaign against Azerbaijan in parts of the Turkish media.
The lawmakers specifically criticized Saral and several AKP lawmakers, while emphasizing Azerbaijan’s sovereignty and the principle of noninterference in domestic affairs.
By October 16, Turkish political figures were seeking to ease the tensions. AKP representatives reaffirmed the importance of the alliance and said criticism of Azerbaijan by individual politicians should not be interpreted as the Turkish government’s official position.
The dispute has nevertheless brought an unusual level of public criticism into a relationship routinely described by both governments as one nation, two states.
Turkey remains Azerbaijan’s most important regional military and political ally. Ankara strongly supported Baku during the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh, and the two countries maintain close defense, energy and economic ties.
Anti-Armenian rhetoric remains unchanged
Goyushov argued that the changing portrayal of Turkey had not altered the broader anti-Armenian narrative promoted by Azerbaijani authorities and government-aligned media.
“Even when attacking Turkey, they invoke the Armenian question because Armenia is as an eternal enemy,” he wrote.
“In fact, anti-Armenian propaganda continues unabated, and the so-called issue of Western Azerbaijan is raised daily in pro-government media.”
Western Azerbaijan is a term used by Azerbaijan’s government and affiliated organizations for territory within present-day Armenia. Baku presents the campaign as a demand for the return of ethnic Azerbaijanis displaced from Armenia, while Yerevan considers the terminology and associated rhetoric a potential challenge to its territorial integrity. Azerbaijan denies having territorial claims against Armenia.
Goyushov said the historical argument about Yerevan had become deeply rooted in Azerbaijani public perceptions.
“The problem is that the idea that Yerevan is actually an old Azerbaijani city unjustly given to Armenia is now embedded in the mindset of the Azerbaijani population,” he wrote.
His assessment suggests that although the political target of the historical accusation has changed from Azerbaijan’s founding republican leaders to Ottoman Turkey, the underlying narrative about Armenia and Yerevan remains intact.
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