On January 28, 2022, a film about Garegin Nzhdeh, a Nazi criminal and Hitler's accomplice, one of the founders of the infamous "Armenian SS Legion", known for its atrocities against civilians and its participation in the Holocaust, was scheduled to be shown at the youth centre of the "Union of Armenians of Russia" for the 30th anniversary of the Armenian Army. The "Russian Veterans" organization filed an appeal to the Prosecutor General's Office demanding to ban the demonstration of the film and glorification of Nazism.

Consequently, even before the screening started the police arrived at the location of the Union of Armenians of Russia where the film about Nzhdeh was to be shown, read out a prosecutor's representation on the inadmissibility of the rehabilitation of Nazism (Article 354.1 of the Criminal Code) and removed the gathered people.

The Russian law enforcement agencies have finally tackled the brazen glorification of Nazism and fascism by Armenian organisations. This is a sign that the Russian authorities' patience with the antics of their "allies" is running out. In addition, the Union of Armenians of Russia timed the screening of the film about Nazism not so much to the 30th anniversary of the Armenian army as to the Day of Remembrance of Victims of the Holocaust and the Day of Lifting the Siege of Leningrad. Making it unequivocally clear who the Armenian nationalists consider to be "heroes".

This is all the more blasphemous when Armenian nationalists demand, for example, that Israel and the Jewish people recognise their mythical "genocide of 1915".  And in doing so they simply spit into the soul of the Jewish people by glorifying the executioner who took a direct part in the Holocaust on the day of remembrance of its victims.

The glorification of Nazi accomplices and attempts by Armenian propaganda to glorify the Nazi criminal caused indignation in Russia even among those who sympathize with Armenia. They once again reminded us that Garegin Nzhdeh's participation in the atrocities of the Nazis is an irrefutable fact. Here is, for example, an excerpt from the material about the film about Nzhdeh shown in Moscow from "Tsargrad" TV channel's site:

"Nzhdeh perceived the Nazis who came to power in Germany as allies and helpers in the restoration of "Greater Armenia". It's known that Nzhdeh collaborated with two departments of SD responsible for political intelligence in the USSR and the Balkans (!) since summer 1940. And in December 1942, he was a member of the Armenian national council organized by the Nazi military administration. Paradoxically, the Armenian nationalist appealed to Alfred Rosenberg, the minister for Eastern territories, who oversaw this organization, with a proposal to turn Soviet Armenia into a German colony. Nzhdeh subsequently claimed that the cooperation was symbolic. However the information declassified by the American military intelligence has shown that he recruited 30-40 people for the prospecting and sabotage work against the USSR: 17 of them were caught by SMERSH.

Together with another Dashnak and Tsekhakronist ideologist Hayk Astariyan, our anti-hero promoted the slogan "Who dies for Germany, dies for Armenia".

Following it, the Armenian legion of the Wehrmacht was formed of volunteers, which actively participated in the offensive in the Caucasus."

This, we recall, is not a quote from the Azerbaijani media (as Armenian neo-Nazis love to say when it comes to the truth about their idol Nzhdeh), but from Tsargrad, the Turkophobic and Azerbaijanophobic publication, which in every way supports the Armenian aggression against Azerbaijan in Karabakh. But even this publication is forced to report the truth and admits that Nzhdeh was a Nazi and a criminal.

Nevertheless, the Armenian Embassy in Russia rushed to the defence of the Nazi criminal and resented the fact that in Moscow, the capital of the country that defeated Nazism, they do not allow the Nazi executioner to be glorified:

"The Embassy of the Republic of Armenia in the Russian Federation is in touch both with the Union of Armenians of Russia and other Armenian organisations operating on the territory of the Russian Federation and with the Russian authorities. The Embassy also closely follows the publications in the press and expresses its deep concern about the attempts to desecrate the memory of the Armenian independence fighter G. Nzhdeh. Nzhdeh's memory has been vilified by certain circles interested in slandering Armenian-Russian fraternal relations," the statement from the Armenian embassy reads.

For the Republic of Armenia, Nazi Nzhdeh is still officially a "hero" and "fighter for independence" and the Armenian embassy is outraged that Russia does not allow Armenian propaganda films to be shown against which their own "hero" fought and the citizens he destroyed.

The Armenian embassy in Russia "appeals to refrain from spreading blatantly false and untrue information". And what information is "untrue"? That Nzhdeh served Hitler? That he took part in the destruction of civilians? But these are documented historical facts.

Garegin Nzhdeh wasn`t sentenced to death in 1948 like the majority of Nazi criminals. In 1947 the death penalty was abolished in the USSR. In 1948 Garegin Ter-Arutyunyan (Nzhdeh) was sentenced to 25 years imprisonment by the Special Board under the MGB, the highest penalty at the time.

So Garegin Nzhdeh was "lucky" here, the death penalty was returned only in 1949, but "retrospectively" they didn't reconsider the sentence of fascist. But this fact is interpreted by the Armenian followers of Nazism in their own way, saying that "Nzhdeh didn't commit anything criminal", because he wasn't sentenced to death. They forget to specify that at the time of sentencing, there was simply no such punishment in the Soviet criminal code.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev also drew attention to attempts by the Armenian lobby to "internationally venerate" the Nazi criminal and to the ongoing glorification of Nazism in Armenia:

"I raised the issue of Nzhdeh's executioner during my speech at one of the CIS summits. I stated that the installation of the monument to Nzhdeh in Yerevan is the propaganda of fascism, and this must be stopped. This man was a fascist and an executioner. He killed innocent Azerbaijanis, and then killed Soviet soldiers and officers during WWII. But in Armenia he is being glorified. Unfortunately, the current government of Armenia also promotes and protects fascists.

Conducting this unacceptable action by an Armenian diaspora organisation in Moscow is out of the question. Russia itself is in the forefront of the fight against the glorification of fascism. There have been numerous discussions with the Russian side on this issue. At the level of presidents, other officials and public organisations, we agree that the revival of fascism is inadmissible.

There must be an end to attempts to distort the history of the Second World War. This policy will bring the whole world to the abyss. Fascism must not be glorified. However, Armenia is in fact taking concrete steps to glorify a fascist like Nzhdeh. In Armenia, streets, squares and a meter station are named after Nzhdeh, and a six meter high monument has been erected to him, which has not been torn down yet", Ilham Aliyev said.

The aggressive glorification of Nazi Nzhdeh, as we can see, has long ago spread from Armenia beyond its borders. This, too, reveals a well thought-out strategy of Armenian nationalists to instil in other nations, including Russia, the same idea of the "chosenness" of Armenians, that they "can do what others cannot do".

Kavkazplus