The Bolshevik party's Caucasus Bureau, reversing its resolution of the previous day, resolves to leave mountainous Karabakh within Soviet Azerbaijan with broad autonomy — the decision that produces the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast in 1923.
Why it mattersA one-line party decision became the century's most contested border: an Armenian-majority autonomy inside Soviet Azerbaijan, institutionally Armenian enough to sustain a national project and Azerbaijani enough to make its transfer unthinkable for Baku. Both 1988 and 2023 trace to this text.
See this event in the timeline Interactive: select this record and follow what connects to it.