After execution the mass genocide of Azerbaijanis in the Baku province (March-April 1918) by Baku Council of People’s Commissars, headed by the Bolshevik Stepan Shahumyan and the Dashnak armed forces, the Baku Council, together with the Karabakh Armenians, was going to attack Ganja and generally establish Soviet power on the territory of the whole of Azerbaijan. To achieve this goal, Shahumyan was also interested in attracting to his side the armed formations of the Armenian General Andranik Ozanyan, who invaded the borders of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic in the summer of 1918.