Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic
Naxçıvan Muxtar Respublikası
Flag
Emblem
Location of Nakhchivan in the South Caucasus. Capital
(and largest city)
Nakhchivan
Official languages
Azerbaijani
Government
Autonomous republic
-
Parliamentary Chairman
Vasif Talibov
Legislature
Supreme Assembly
Autonomy
-
Establishment of the Nakhchivan ASS
R
February 9, 1924
-
Nakhchivan
Autonomous Republic
November 17, 1990
Area
-
Total
5,500 km2
2,071 sq mi
-
Water (%)
negligible
Population
-
2011 estimate
414,900[1]
-
Density
77/km2
199.4/sq mi
HDI (2010)
0.793[2] (very high)
Currency
Azerbaijani manat (AZN)
Time zone
EET (UTC+4)
-
Summer (DST)
EEST (UTC+5)
The Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic (Azerbaijani: Naxçıvan Muxtar Respublikası) is a landlocked exclave of the Republic of Azerbaijan. The region covers 5,500[1] km² and borders Armenia (221 km) to the east and north, Iran (179 km) to the south and west, and Turkey (15 km) to the northwest. Nakhchivan became part of the Safavid dynasty of Persia in the 16th century. In 1828, after the last Russo-Persian War and the Treaty of Turkmenchay, the Nakhchivan khanate passed into Imperial Russian possession. After the 1917 February Revolution, Nakhchivan and its surrounding region were under the authority of the Special Transcaucasian Committee of the Russian Provisional Government and subsequently of the short-lived Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic. When the TDFR was dissolved in May 1918, Nakhchivan, Nagorno-Karabakh, Zangezur (today the Armenian province of Syunik), and Qazakh were heavily contested between the newly formed and short-lived states of the Democratic Republic of Armenia (DRA) and the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic (ADR). In June 1918, the region came under Ottoman occupation. Under the terms of the Armistice of Mudros, the Ottomans agreed to pull their troops out of the Transcaucasus to make way for British occupation at the close of the First World War. In July 1920, the Soviet Union occupied the region and on July 28, declared the Nakhchivan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic with "close ties" to the Azerbaijan SSR, beginning seventy years of Soviet rule. In January 1990 Nakhchivan declared independence from the USSR to protest suppression of national movement in Azerbaijan, and became the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic within the newly independent Republic of Azerbaijan a year later. The Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic is an autonomous area of Azerbaijan, governed by its own elected legislature. The region continues to suffer from the effects of conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and its Karki exclave has been under Armenian occupation ever since. The administrative capital is the city of Nakhchivan. Vasif Talibov has been the leader of the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic since 1995.[3]
