 The dismantling was opposed by some local left-wingers and by the Azerbaijan Communist Party in particular.It also upset Armenia as the Armenian public believed that the demolition and reburial was motivated by the reluctance of the Azerbaijanis (because of the Nagorno-Karabakh War) to have ethnic Armenians buried in the center of their capital.Another scandal happened when Azerbaijani press reports claimed that during the exhumation only 21 bodies were discovered out of expected 26 and that "Shahumian and four other Armenian commissars managed to escape their murderers".