Heydar Alirza oghlu Aliyev (10 May 1923 – 12 December 2003) was an Azerbaijani politician who was a Soviet party boss in the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic from 1969 to 1982, and the third president of Azerbaijan from 1993 to 2003.
He was a high-ranking official in the KGB of the Azerbaijan SSR, serving for 28 years in Soviet state security organs (1941–1969). He governed Soviet Azerbaijan from 1969 to 1982 as First Secretary of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan. He held the post of First Deputy Premier of the Soviet Union from 1982 to 1987. He rose through the ranks due to his close associations with Leonid Brezhnev and Yuri Andropov.
Aliyev was installed as president of Azerbaijan after the 1993 military coup ousted President Abulfaz Elchibey. Elchibey was a prominent Soviet dissident and Azerbaijani nationalist leader who had been elected as president in independent Azerbaijan's first free election in 1992. Aliyev's installation as president put an end to Azerbaijan's short post-independence democratic interlude. Shortly after taking charge, Aliyev organized a presidential election where he won nearly 99% of the vote.
His regime in Azerbaijan has been described as dictatorial, authoritarian, and repressive. He was also said to have run a heavy-handed police state where elections were rigged and dissent was repressed. A cult of personality developed around Aliyev, which has continued after his death in 2003. Shortly before his death, his son Ilham Aliyev was elected president in a fraudulent election and continues to lead Azerbaijan to this day.
According to both his official biography and the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, Aliyev was born on 10 May 1923 in the city of Nakhchivan. His family had moved to Nakhchivan before his birth from the village of Comardlı (modern-day Tanahat in the Syunik Province of Armenia), located only a few miles from Nakhchivan. Some sources claim that Aliyev was actually born 2 years earlier in Comardlı, but that it was later decided that a senior Azerbaijani politician should not have an Armenian place of birth. His father was from Comardlı and his mother was from Vorotan (also in modern-day Syunik Province of Armenia). Aliyev had four brothers: Hasan, Huseyn, Jalal, and Agil, as well as three sisters: Sura, Shafiga and Rafiga.
After graduating from the Nakhchivan Pedagogical School, Aliyev attended the Azerbaijan Industrial Institute (now the Azerbaijan State Oil and Industry University) from 1939 to 1941, where he studied architecture. In 1949 and 1950, he studied at the USSR Ministry of State Security Higher School in Leningrad. Aliyev's official biography also states that he studied at Baku State University, graduating with a degree in history in 1957. According to American journalist Pete Earley, Aliyev first attended the Ministry of State Security Academy in Leningrad and graduated in 1944. He also took Senior Staff Professional Development courses at the Dzerzhinsky Higher School of the KGB in Moscow in 1966.
In 1948, Aliyev married Zarifa Aliyeva. On 12 October 1955, their daughter Sevil Aliyeva was born. On 24 December 1961, their son Ilham was born. Zarifa Aliyeva died of cancer in 1985.
During World War II, he served as commander of a Smersh battalion, which conducted intelligence operations on the Soviet Union's own forces and executed soldiers who deserted or fought insufficiently hard.
He joined the Azerbaijan SSR People's Commissariat for State Security (NKGB) in 1944 and proceeded to become the department head of the State Security Committee of Azerbaijan SSR in 1950, after he graduated from the Senior Staff Training School of the USSR State Security Committee.
In 1954, as part of a government reform, the NKGB, which was previously named the Ministry of State Security (MGB), was again renamed, this time as the KGB. Sources point to Aliyev working in the Azerbaijani KGB's Eastern Division, which included Iran and the Middle East. During this time, Aliyev was a close associate of Semyon Tvsigun. Aliyev became head of the Azerbaijani KGB in 1960 and eventually received the rank of major general. During his time in Soviet Secret Service, Aliyev was mostly unknown in Azerbaijan.
From KGB to leader of Azerbaijan SSR
Aliyev was elected First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Azerbaijan Communist Party at its Plenary Session held on 12 July 1969. He was reportedly selected for the job by Brezhnev after his friend Semyon Tsvigun, Brezhnev's brother-in-law, advocated for Aliyev's selection.
Aliyev subsequently dominated affairs in Soviet-era Azerbaijan. Described as the "Monarch of Azerbaijan", Aliyev established an extensive patronage network across Azerbaijan and profited on the black market. According to Harold James Perkin, Aliyev was "surrounded by female ‘volunteers’ whose services were mainly sexual."
In his obituary, The Washington Post wrote, "He made a name for himself by smashing local mafia groups, but his personal circle moved in to profit off oil, caviar and other sectors." Aliyev was selective in his anti-corruption campaign, as he targeted those that refused to cooperate with him but rewarding and elevating those that did.
Aliyev frequently treated Brezhnev with lavish gifts. The gifts included a ‘Sun-king’ diamond ring worth 226,000 roubles and a jewel-encrusted framed portrait of Brezhnev. Aliyev built a palace for Brezhnev's personal use for his official visit in 1982.
He promoted individuals from his native Nakhichevan to leadership positions in the Azerbaijan SSR. He also promoted Azerbaijani culture and language.
In the early 1980s, Aliyev barred the children of certain legal personnel from attending the republic's law school, in a purported effort to curb a self-perpetuating elite based on corruption.
Aliyev was subsequently promoted to the Moscow Politburo in 1976.