Monte Melkonian: Difference between revisions - Wikipedia

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'''Monte Melkonian''' (in [[Armenian language|Armenian]]: Մոնթէ Մելքոնեան, [[November 25]], [[1957]] – [[June 12]], [[1993]]) was a famed [[Armenians|Armenian]] [[military]] commander in the [[Nagorno-Karabakh war]]. He is largely credited for the major military victories against [[Azerbaijan]] from the late autumn of [[1992]] to his death in June [[1993]]. Melkonian had no prior service record in any country's [[army]] before being placed in command of an estimated 4,000 men in the war. He had largely built his military experience beginning from the late [[1970s]] and [[1980s]] where he fought against the various splintering factions in the [[Lebanese Civil War]], against [[Israel Defense Forces|Israeli]] troops in the [[1982 Lebanon War|Israeli invasion of Lebanon]] and was a member of the Armenian guerrilla organization [[ASALA]], for which he was denounced in Europe as an international terrorist [http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=17-1850436355-0].

An [[Armenian-American]], Melkonian left the United States and arrived in [[Iran]] in 1978 during the beginning of the [[1979 Iranian Revolution]], taking part in demonstrations against the [[Shah]], [[Mohammed Reza Pahlavi]]. Following the collapse of the Shah's monarchy in [[1979]], he traveled to Lebanon during the height of the civil war and served in an Armenia militia group in the [[Beirut]] suburb of [[Bourj Hammoud]]. In ASALA, he took part in the assassinations of several [[Turkish people|Turkish]] diplomats in Europe during the early to mid-1980s and was later arrested and sent to prison in [[France]]. In [[1989]], he was released and in the following year, acquired a visa to travel to Armenia.