What’s in a name?

Russian state media used the Armenian name for Karabakh’s capital. Azerbaijani outlets responded by renaming Russian cities.

Diplomatic tensions between Russia and Azerbaijan have been steadily escalating. In June, Russian authorities arrested members of the Azerbaijani diaspora in Yekaterinburg; two people died in custody. Azerbaijani officials responded by arresting Russian citizens and scaling back cooperation with Moscow. Now, the tit-for-tat has extended to place names. After Russia’s state news agency, TASS, referred to the administrative center of the long-disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region by the name it held during the Soviet era and under the self-declared Republic of Artsakh, the Azerbaijani outlet Minval began using historical names for Russian cities in retaliation. Here’s how the name-calling unfolded.

At the end of July, the Russian state news agency TASS published an article referring to the administrative center of Nagorno-Karabakh as Stepanakert — the name it held during the Soviet era and under the breakaway Republic of Artsakh. In fall 2023, Azerbaijan took full control of the region, and today, Azerbaijani authorities call the city Khankendi. They did not take kindly to TASS using the old name.

The offending article, published on July 31, reported on the removal of a monument to Ivan Aivazovsky, an ethnic Armenian painter born Hovhannes Aivazian. The statue had been installed in December 2021, when the region was still under separatist control, with Russian peacekeepers stationed there at the time participating in the installation. In its coverage, TASS referred to the city as Stepanakert.

That same evening, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry demanded an apology from TASS, arguing that the use of the name Stepanakert by a Russian state agency amounted to an “an act of disrespect and insult to the territorial integrity of [Azerbaijan].”

The ministry warned that if Russia continued to use “names adopted by the former separatist puppet regime,” Baku would reserve the right to start referring to various places in Russia by their “historical” names.

Soon after, pro-government Azerbaijani news outlet Minval published a series of articles about Russia, in which it referred to Kaliningrad as Königsberg, Orenburg as Orynbor, and the Volga River as the Itil.

Konstantin Zatulin, deputy chairman of the Russian State Duma Committee on CIS Affairs, responded by accusing Azerbaijan of “deciding it could disregard Russia” after reclaiming control over Nagorno-Karabakh. He claimed that Baku was deliberately escalating tensions with Moscow and pointed out that “Azerbaijan used to call the city Stepanakert as well.”

“Azerbaijan was never a true ally of Russia in the region,” Zatulin said. “Its behavior is a mix of ambition and foolishness.” He added that Baku “shouldn’t expect an apology from Russia.”

TASS eventually edited its article. First, the phrase “in Stepanakert” in the headline was changed to “in Nagorno-Karabakh,” and later to “in Karabakh,” the name the Azerbaijani authorities use for the region.

Relations between Russia and Azerbaijan have sharply deteriorated over the past year. In December 2024, a Russian air defense unit mistakenly shot down an Azerbaijan Airlines passenger jet en route from Baku to Grozny. After a missile struck the plane, the pilots were forced to attempt an emergency landing in Aktau, Kazakhstan, where they crashed. Thirty-eight people were killed. In a call with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed condolences for what he called a “tragic incident,” though he stopped short of directly acknowledging that Russian forces had downed the aircraft.

Minval covered the investigation into the crash in detail. On July 1, the outlet published what it said was a written statement from the Russian officer who allegedly gave the mistaken order to fire on the Azerbaijan Airlines flight. Alongside a photo of the statement, the site also published an audio excerpt, said to be a recording of Russian military communications that corroborated the account. Minval noted that it could not verify the authenticity of the document but did not explain how it had obtained it.

Later in July, Minval published the name of the general it claimed had issued the direct order to fire, followed days later by the surnames of Russian servicemen who were reportedly on duty at the time of the attack. The outlet again did not disclose its sources.

In late June, several members of the Azerbaijani diaspora were arrested in Yekaterinburg, two of whom died in custody. In response, Azerbaijani authorities opened criminal cases against employees of Russian state media bureaus and detained several Russian citizens, labeling them members of an “organized crime group.” Official video footage of the arrests showed that the detainees had been beaten.

The Russian authorities, meanwhile, continued their own crackdown. On July 30, the Interior Ministry placed Shahin Shykhlinski, head of the Azerbaijani diaspora in the Urals, on a wanted list. He was reportedly taken into custody on August 2.

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Cover photo: Aziz Karimov / Getty Images