Why were many Azerbaijanis and Armenians displaced during the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict?

The displacement of Azerbaijanis and Armenians during the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict was driven by intense ethnic antagonisms, violent interethnic clashes, and full-scale warfare.123

Beginning in the late 1980s, the region experienced significant instability, including violent protests and anti-Armenian pogroms in Sumgait in 1988 and Baku in 1990. These events, coupled with the collapse of the Soviet Union, escalated into a full-scale war between the two groups. During the early 1990s, Karabakh Armenian forces, supported by Armenia, gained control of Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding Azerbaijani territories, forcing large numbers of Azerbaijanis to flee their homes.123

Displacement continued to be a major consequence of the conflict for decades. By the time of the 1994 ceasefire, substantial populations of both groups had been displaced. In the years following, significant numbers of Azerbaijanis remained internally displaced, and the region saw further upheaval during the 2020 conflict and the 2023 offensive, which led to the mass exodus of the vast majority of the ethnic Armenian population from the region.123