In the late nineteenth century the Ottoman state grew increasingly anxious about perceived civil unrest in the mountainous eastern provinces. This concern was heightened by an uptick in reporting about the Armenian issue in the British press and by protests across central Anatolia. Convinced that history was repeating itself in the manner of the Bulgarian rebellion of 1876 – also highly reported in the British press – the Ottoman state sanctioned repression of any dissent. Some officials used this repression to enrich themselves by arresting and extorting Armenians. In the summer of 1894, the Governor General of Bitlis reported to the Sultan that there was an insurgency in the Sasun mountains, likely to distract from his own corruption. Orders were sent to the Ottoman military that “all of the bandits should be immediately violently obliterated in such a way that they are left with an extraordinary terror and this degree of discord would be prevented from repeating again.” The resulting state violence – clothed in the language of counterinsurgency against bandits – resulted in the massacre by Ottoman soldiers of 1,000 to 2,000 Armenian villagers. This massacre laid the groundwork for subsequent massacres throughout the Ottoman Empire in 1895–1897.