Your reporting on the Karabakh Armenian exodus (‘It’s a ghost town’: UN arrives in Nagorno-Karabakh to find ethnic Armenians have fled, 2 October) does not reflect the trauma felt by Azeris when they were forced out of their homes across the disputed territory and from large swathes of Azerbaijan proper in 1992-94. I understand why the emphasis is on the tragic exodus of Karabakh Armenians from their ancestral homes, and I am no fan of Azerbaijan’s autocracy, but I was in the region in 1992-94, reporting for the Guardian and the BBC, and I think some perspective is in order.
I watched thousands of Azeris fleeing with all their worldly possessions on foot over mountains and across plains in the face of the Armenian advance in 1992-94. By some calculations, 800,000 Azeris lost their homes in Karabakh, the surrounding areas of Azerbaijan and Armenia during the 1988-94 period.
