Solution of the perplexing nationality question was of vital concern to the peoples of Transcaucasia. The resolution of the Conference
- condemned the Provisional Government's perpetuation of tsarist "divide and rule" schemes in the border lands;
- repeated the claim that only the Bolsheviks could solve the nationality question;
- denounced the Armenian and Georgian bourgeois-nationalist parties for endeavouring to weaken the bonds between the Russian proletariat and the masses of Transcaucasia;
- pledged active opposition suggested bourgeois programs;
- chastised the Petrograd rulers for not proclaiming the right of all peoples to self-determination up to complete separation from Russia;
- favoured local cultural autonomy, education in native languages, a regional assembly (seim), but opposed administrative divisions based on nationality;
- qualified the party's position on self-determination by asserting that separation from Russia or establishment of a federative state was not in the interest of the masses;
- insisted that the inhabitants of Western (Turkish) Armenia, Lazistan, and Persian Azerbaijan were alone to determine the form of government for those areas, in whose reconstruction all nations should participate;
- proclaimed that only with the assistance of the Russian proletariat could these goals be attained. 91
In such a declaration, one could seek and find whatever he desired.
In addition to adopting resolutions, the Conference heard reports of party activity in the several provinces. Anastas Mikoyan announced that his Haghpat-Alaverdi district in Lori was the only area in which the landless Armenian villagers had accepted the leadership of Social Democracy. Unfortunately, however, the claws of Dashnaktsoutiun were implemented deeply into the flesh and mentality of most Armenian peasants. 92 Then before adjourning, the delegate elected a Regional Committee to direct the activities that would culminate in armed rebellion. The international composition of that body – S. G. Shahoumian, P. A. Japaridze, F. I. Makharadze, G. N. Korganov, M. D. Orakhelashvili, M. G. Tskhakaia, H. Nazaretian, A. A. Mravian, I. T. Feoletov, and S. I. Kavtaradze – adequately reflected the Bolshevik stand on the nationality question. 93 Immediately after the Conference, Shahoumian travelled to Alexandropol, where he urged the large military garrison and many railway workers to turn their weapons against the perfidious Petrograd government. Then he returned to Baku to direct the party's efforts in the most advanced proletarian and industrial centre of all Caucasus. 94
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