Sumgait

According to historians, Medean tribes lived in the area in ancient times. During the construction boom, when the foundation of the executive power building was being excavated, remains of an ancient caravanserai along with personal items and kitchenware was found at the site.

The first reports of settlements at the present site of Sumgait were in 1580, when English traveller H. Barrow mentioned Sumgait in his writings and in 1858, when Alexander Dumas wrote about the area in his memoirs Trip to Caucasus, although nothing substantial was created on the site until the Soviet Union gained control over the area in the 1920s.[7]

Following the politics of glasnost, initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev, civil unrest and ethnic strife grew in various regions of the Soviet Union, including Nagorno-Karabakh,[8] an autonomous region of the Azerbaijani SSR.

The Sumgait pogrom against the local Armenian population on February 27-29, 1988 was one of the first violent events of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.[9] It killed more than 30 people, wounded some 200, and produced thousands of refugees; most of the victims were Armenians who constituted a large minority of the population.[10]

After the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, the city became home to a number of Azerbaijani refugees internally displaced persons, mainly from Qubadli and Zengilan regions.[11] In 1994, Heydar Aliyev initiated a large-scale Free Economic Area project on the territory of the city.[12]

As a result of the Soviet planning of the industrial boom era, the city became heavily polluted. Soon after Azerbaijan's independence, the industrial sectors went into decline. The Absheron Peninsula (which consists of Sumgait, Baku and the Absheron District) was considered by scientists to be the most ecologically devastated part of Azerbaijan. The city was known for its children's cemetery, known as the "Baby Cemetery" which contains many graves of infants born with deformities and mental retardation that were further complicated by the lack of adequate medical care for the poor.[14] Sumgait was named as most polluted place on Earth by the U.S.-based environmental group the Blacksmith Institute in 2006 and placed on their list of The World's Most Polluted Places by Time magazine in 2007.[15] The report noted the former Soviet industrial base was polluting the local environment with industrial chemicals like chlorine and heavy metals. The report also mentioned cancer rates in Sumgait were as much as 51% higher than the national average and that genetic mutations and birth defects were commonplace.[16] The city administration prepared an environmental protection plan for 2003–2010 which has been steadily decreasing the levels of pollution to minimal. The program oversees 118 activities aimed at minimizing pollution at all possible levels of economic production. The program was prepared with the participation of all industrial enterprises in the city and its enforcement is being regulated by the executive power of the city. For instance, the amount of wastewater from industrial production went down from 600,000 m³ (21,000,000 cu ft) during the 1990s to 76,300 m³ (2,690,000 cu ft) in 2005. Solid waste went down from 300,000 to 3,868 tons a year. The World Bank has issued a loan to the Azerbaijani government for construction of a burial range for mercury waste.[17]

Azerbaijanis comprise 85% of the population, Talysh 5%, Lezgins 5%, Russians 2%, Turkish 1%, and others 2%. Prior to February 1988, Sumgait was home to 20,000 Armenians, who were displaced as a result of the Sumgait pogrom.

Sumgait did not have a mosque until after the collapse of the Soviet Union.[23] In the 2010s, the city emerged as a center for Salafism in Azerbaijan, a form of Sunni Islam that advocates a return to Islam's earliest practices.[23][24] The Syrian Civil War and emergence of ISIL forced authorities to take action on crackdown of perceived religious radicals in Sumgait.[23][25][26]

New buildings in Sumgayit

Haydar Aliyev avenue in Sumgayit city

Residential Buildings

The first studies in architecture and urban planning of the city of Sumgait were carried out by Azerbaijani and Soviet scientist, academician of the International Academy of Architecture of the Eastern Countries, honored architect of Azerbaijan SSR Kamal Mammadbeyov. The result of years of research were numerous scientific publications and a book about architectural and planning development of the city of Sumgait.[29] Mammadbeyov donated a large number of graphics and illustrations made by him to the archives of The City Museum. The Flag Museum in Sumgait was opened on December 15, 2017, with the participation of Ilham Aliyev.[30][31]

Sumgait was credited as the main regional driving force behind rock bands of the 1990s including Yuxu, Miraj, Mozalan, and Sirr.[32][33]

The regional channel Dünya TV and newspaper 365 Gün are headquartered in the city.[34]

In 2020, the Azerbaijan Jewish Media Center was established in Sumgayit.[35]

Sumqaıt Boulevard

Sumgait canyon

During the Soviet rule of Azerbaijan, Sumgait was believed to have the longest boulevard in the republic. The Culture and Leisure Park was laid on 23 hectares (57 acres) of Sumgait coastline in 1967. On August 17, 1978, the park was given the name of a distinguished Azerbaijani poet Imadaddin Nasimi. The same year, the city administration raised the Peace Dove sculpture and monument in the middle of the park assigning the city a symbol of peace.[36]

The flora of the park includes 39 types of trees. Events of the 1990s, such as the Black January tragedy and First Nagorno-Karabakh War, led to the establishment of Stars (Ulduzlar) and 20 January Monument monuments in the park. In the eastern section of the park, Shehidler Khiyabani, similar to Martyrs' Lane in Baku, was established as a burial ground for thousands of soldiers from Sumgait who died during the war. According to Decree No. 132 of the Cabinet of Ministers of Azerbaijan dated August 2, 2001, the park was given the status of national historical importance. Its current size is 80 ha.

In addition to Nasimi Culture and Leisure Park, the city administration built Ludwigshafen Park in 1997 in celebration of the 20th anniversary of twin-city relations between Ludwigshafen and Sumgait. In 1999, Heydar Aliyev Park and Luna Park were built in the rapidly growing city.[37]

Mehdi Huseynzade Sumqyit City Stadium

The city has one professional football team competing in the top-flight of Azerbaijani football – Sumgayit, currently playing in the Azerbaijan Premier League.

The city had a tram system that functioned from 1959 to 2003.[38] Sumgait's trolleybus system at its height, it consisted of eight lines and existed until 2006.[39] On June 3, 2015, in Baku, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev opened the reconstructed Baku-Sumgait Railway with trains taking 40 minutes from Baku to Sumgait.[40][41]

Sumgait is twinned with the following cities:[44]