On September 27, 2020 Azerbaijan has declared war on the civil population of Artsakh in the middle of a global pandemic. Since then, the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh has been bombarded heavily, cities, hospitals, kindergartens, schools and civilian residences. Thousands are being killed including soldiers and civilians, more than 60 000 have been displaced from their homes, mostly women, children and elderly...
I kept a diary of these days, while I was engaged like many of us in Yerevan on providing humanitarian aid to the refugees and those affected by the conflict.
I am reposting here my previous posts, so I remember...
October 1 - Day 5 of war: the worst part these days is to wake up to the suffocating uncertainty and fear each morning.
After managing a few hours of sleep, send a message to loved ones in NK, hold your breath and wait with anxiety for them to respond that they are ok.
Then quickly and hysterically go over the news feed or whatever info available(not much) to try figure out how worse the situation became in the few hours that you passed out, hoping that damages are scarce, not more than what your heart can handle.
Then try to breathe...
October 3 - Day 7 of war. I don’t know what to feel anymore, fear? Panic? Sadness? Anger? This morning I am thinking about the aftermath of all this. If we stay alive and sane, How are we going once more to deal with all the consequences that war leaves behind, losses, destruction, dismantled infrastructures, destroyed homes, orphaned children, widowed women, the hate, broken bodies, broken souls...
The already extremely sad entrance walls of schools will be filled once more of new fresh photos of fathers, uncles and brothers of kids, who were killed these days. And children will walk in their classrooms under the heavy gazes of these portraits remembering each and every day those who are no more with us.
those among us who survive this, will spend another lifetime cleaning up after all the mess that war will leave behind, pick up the pieces, try to restore and heal the souls... reconstructing the roads and houses would be the easiest part, it’s the rest that I am afraid of.
Many of you are writing asking how to help. If I don’t answer back, it is because honestly I don’t know how...but it helps a lot that you are asking and offering support.
Talk about what’s happening here among your circles. Donate to
Hayastan All Armenian Fund Հայաստան համահայկական հիմնադրամ
to ensure the humanitarian aid. Check on your friends, relatives here, talk to them if you can. Yesterday, I was practicing with my kids what to do during an emergency air raid. It is so sad to see how children grow up so fast in these situations.
October 4 - Day 8 of #war. A couple of months ago we started not to hug each other on the streets or kiss because of COVID-19, these few days we also stopped asking each other how we are in Armenia...
The most difficult is to feel helpless in all this. We are asking constantly what can we do to help? to support, to end this..as soon as there is a call for blood donations, 1000s gather in front of the central lab and authorities are forced to thank many of us and send us home because there is a surplus of donation more than they can store.
When there is a call for food or cloths or medications, very quickly and smoothly we all mobilize without asking questions, without pointing at our differences, and concentrate on the task and deliver.
A deep sad silence reigns over the capital Yerevan, many are in grief, for their soldiers, waiting for news from their relatives stuck under fire in #NagornoKarabakh or border regions of Armenia. At the same time, with resilient faces, burying their pain deep in their souls, they continue working, helping, supporting each other or whoever needs it without asking, in harmony and austerity.
Most of us have our emergency bags ready in front of the door, and some of us sleeping(or trying) with our outdoor cloths on, just in case, since the other side is ruled by crazy bloodthirsty dictators Aliyev and Erdogan who have a history of not caring even for their own population.
My mother is often calling from Canada. They are extremely worried. They are trying to mobilize the international community, protests are carried in different cities abroad.
Many among my foreign friends are silent and that silence is so loud and heavy.
We are all going to lose one way or another, all of us, even those who are staying silent.
Life turned upside down these days, some of my Azerbaijani peacebuilder friends are rejoicing for territory since for them it is more important than human lives, others are repeating the slogans of their dictator criminal Aliyev who once was putting them in jail for expressing their opinions...
Many of the projects I was involved in before September 27 have become irrelevant from now on and things have drastically changed in me.
But still the tiny anti war genuine statements are resonating more in my mind and I am still holding on to that to not lose my sanity.
Stepanakert is in the dark since yesterday night because of shelling of electricity stations.
Gayane and Liza were in the shelter underground yesterday in Shushi.
While Life goes on as usual for many of you around the world, I gather all my resilience and energy to support whatever or whoever is left in the aftermath of all this.
October 7 - Day 11 of #war.
Yesterday, I wasn’t able to write anything, trying to listen to the pain that people are carrying in them these days.
I woke up to my daughter’s message, saying that a boy from their school was killed on the frontline.
We have another generation of young people growing up with friends and classmates missing one by one. All in the name of...
I remember 1989 in Beirut, that day when I went to my school after spending weeks in our bomb shelter...There was a seat empty in the middle of the class and a heavy silence everywhere. Teachers were trying to explain that he was hit while waiting in line for bread and the street was targeted suddenly. They were trying to comfort us, when they themselves needed the most comforting...and we had to live with that empty seat all our lives.
And now our children, those who are not drafted in the army, those who did not lose their lives on the borders, in bombarded towns, will have to live with those empty seats all their lives.
The heavy bombing continues. Stepanakert is a complete disaster, Shushi’s cultural center was destroyed. But all those can be rebuilt, restored...it’s the broken bodies and lives that I am worried about.
More peaceful voices are heard from all sides...some trying to share their experiences, trying to not lose their humanity.
Many of us from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Greece, Germany, France have signed a peace statement...but those piece of papers are not helping to stop the war now! But they are giving us hope that all is not lost yet, that together we will overcome the violence, the trauma, the hate...as much as we can, one day at a time, over and over.
Oddly enough it’s the 20th anniversary this year of the UN Security Council resolution 1325 on women, peace and security. Another useless piece of paper that many states take advantage of to increase their armies by including women soldiers as well, in the name of gender equality(!), leaving aside the prevention and protection part.
Papers, resolutions, action plans...thousands of them serving only to appease the guilt of many international agencies and numbing their emotions while they sit and watch another war every year bursting in a new corner of the world, killing many, destroying, raping and looting...and then writing more reports, inviting more victims to share their pain on international podiums and going home to their comfy dinners in their safe and warm homes, preparing the next resolution to protect women, elderly and children...
Life has stopped on September 27 for many of us on all sides of this conflict.
I am not able to concentrate on anything. And getting frustrated with each insensitive work mail I am getting these days, zoom call invites from organizations abroad, consulting calls, and specially those mails that start with « hi, I hope you are having a good day, I am writing to you concerning... ».
It seems that I am forgetting that life only stopped for us here but that for the rest of the world it’s business as usual.
And then there is this growing nationalism, which is going to take us somewhere not good and I wonder how we are all going to survive that, once the war stops.
There was this saying that we used to repeat among ourselves peace-builders that, for many, war doesn’t end with the last bullet...
When many say « we will win » I want to shout, what? Winning what really? Tell me, i beg you... to soothe my heart.
October 9 - Day 9 of #war.
I didn't sleep much tonight. I was glued to my phone, chatting through messages with Gayane who spent the night with her children in a safe shelter, her counting the bombs, me trying to divert her attention with images of better days, both hoping for a quick end to this deadly war.
Shushi was under attack yesterday, we don't know how many civilians suffered. Stepanakert is still being bombed non-stop.
I spent the day staring at the photos of young soldiers killed on the borders posted on my news feed, most of them are 19-22 year-olds. How are we going to live with this? it's suffocating.
People in Yerevan are trying to help as much as they can, while more volunteers are leaving for the frontlines.
Some of us are still gathering help, sharing information, playing with kids who arrived here from Artsakh, to be safe, while their parents stayed behind to fight and defend themselves.
The ministry of emergency situation is sharing regularly information, PSAs on how to keep safe during an air strike, where to go what to take...We are constantly living in this fear and not able to concentrate on anything else.
I realized today that out of 48 years of my existence on this earth I lived 35 years in a war zone or unstable conflict area, between Lebanon and Armenia/Artsakh.
We are a population of almost 3 million on the ground in this tiny country and territory and fighting a war of survival and existence against 2 dictators Aliyev and Erdogan with a joint population of over 80 million. Turkey's leader has often threatened to finish the Armenian Genocide that started in 1915(and before). Israel is providing the sophisticated weapons to kill the civilians, the irony in all this...they are accomplice in a genocide. I was wondering these days where are the dissident voices from that region and the jewish voice for peace to hold their government accountable?
Protests are continuing in the diaspora...Armenians are strange people, while many try to leave war zones for safer destinations, here we are seeing the reverse situation; many are coming back in the middle of heavy bombings to support the country in every way possible, returning home when home needs you the most.
People are regularly donating to
Hayastan All Armenian Fund Հայաստան համահայկական հիմնադրամ
to help. It seems we are our own and only support. EU transitioned from 'very concerned' to 'extremely concerned'. Many international organisations and embassies are still very silent (or concerned, which is the new silence).
The more this war continues, more killings, more lives destroyed, more hate, more nationalism, more going backwards as societies. How are we going to deal with all this afterwards?!
But it seems we don't have time to think about all this right now. right now we just need to survive, stay alive.
I think I aged a decade or more these few days, in resilience as well.
October 10 - Day 14 of #war and a possible ceasefire.
I can't believe it's almost two weeks that we are in war. I don't remember which day we were. I am forgetting many things...
For the last couple of days, I spent all my time with a family and loved ones we welcomed in our home. They were displaced temporarily from Nagorno-Karabakh. Each morning would start with a cup of strong coffee and holding our breath while reading the list of the killed soldiers, most born in 2000, 2001, 2002...
Their son and brothers are also on the frontline and every time the phone rings, the agony starts until we make sure they are safe. We finally heard from them today and the joy was immense for all us.
The most important thing during times of war is to not lose your sanity and help others to keep theirs. Especially when you have young kids, it is one of the most difficult tasks and takes incredible efforts for parents to make sure that their children feel safe and protected. It takes great efforts to not get annoyed with their joy and simple numerous questions.
I remember my mom during the war in Beirut. She would wake up after a night of heavy shelling spent in a bomb shelter, brush her hair, put on make-up and greet us with a smile. We knew then, things were not as horrible as it sounded, since mom was there looking as usual and as normal with make-up on, like during peaceful times. Even if it was an illusion and that things were still horrible and scary, our sanity was saved for a while.
I was trying these past days, to brush my hair and teeth as usual, change my cloths. I was trying to do what alive human beings do in general, being present for others, despite the strong urge to stay curled in a corner of the house and let the mental and physical exhaustion and despair take over.
The whole nation is reading, looking at the photos of fallen soldiers... this is our routine these days. And more and more, we find people we know among them, people we spend time with, people we worked with or studied, people who we bought our groceries from, people who were part of our lives. Most are very young 18, 19, 20...
The photos are posted on facebook, and come up on my news feed regularly; photos of young bright boys with huge smiles on their faces and a painful RIP note in their captions.
The safe shelters’ addresses is posted on each entrance, just in case. Our emergency bags are ready, just in case…
Humanitarian aid continues in every corner of Armenia. People are mobilized, those left behind in the city are kinder to each other. I hope this caring attitude and genuine interest in each other’s' well-being will continue after the war is over. I hope we will not go back to the hate speech and calls for violence and finding threats and animosity in our differences as a society.
The total mobilization of the Armenian diaspora around the world is mind-blowing and fills my heart with love and hope. Friendly neighbors are silent, they have been for a long time despite the involvement of two dictators, and one of them not only attacking Armenia but targeting many other populations and ethnicities around them. Once more, this war showed us that we can only rely on ourselves. It showed that the so-called peaceful countries or civilized world are too engaged in their own interests or too politically correct/numb to care for small unimportant nations.
Things have changed drastically in my mind. I am witnessing incredible transformations, some expected I guess, people are coping in a different way with this horrifying situation, some in a shocking way… Human rights defenders becoming supporters of dictators, peace builders glorifying an army attacking peaceful population and churches, internationally known investigative journalist spreading fake news and rhetoric planned and designed by an oligarchic lunatic. Yes indeed, senseless things happen during war and it takes a huge internal force to not lose your own values and integrity among the chaos...
If you are not on the battlefield or the military leadership leading the process, you are hanging somewhere in between trying to make sense of all this when nothing makes sense in reality.
The reality is that military is the focus right now and populations are serving them, nothing less is accepted, nothing more is expected, anything other could be regarded as inappropriate, even treacherous. It is a survival war for Armenians and beyond the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
The peace voices coming from ordinary people are fading it seems or remain unfortunately at the level of a slogan repeated and hashtagged without concrete actions. Peace means something different for each side. No one is defining that right now. I am thinking once we start defining for ourselves what peace is, it won’t be as peaceful for the other side anymore.
finally a ceasefire is declared after 11 hours of closed negotiations in Moscow among MFAs from both sides, a humanitarian one to start exchanging bodies, prisoners…counting bodies, identifying the losses. Even though this gives us a time to breathe, I am afraid what is awaiting us will be even more unbearable.
The post-war will soon be here, with all its devastating mindset, broken lives and wounded spirits.
We need to be ready, regain courage to survive it once again. We need to learn how to live again in the absence of loved ones, how to walk again among the ruins, how to heal ourselves and others and find hope to continue constantly rebuilding which is constantly destroyed.
Life continues despite all our efforts to stop it.
Update: it seems that the ceasefire didn't last more than 5 minutes...shelling continues.
October 13 - Day 17 of #war
Living constantly under threat, waiting for news from loved ones, family and friends from the frontline or from the ones hiding in shelters in Stepanakert, Shushi and the border regions has become the new reality for many of us.
The long list of names of young soldiers killed reached more than 500 yesterday…They say more will be identified soon.
We are all in mourning, grieving for lost ones or worrying for more bad news coming from the front.
People are still arriving from the war zone, temporarily displaced to safer places in Armenia. Hospitals who used to mobilize for Covid19 patients are now making space for the wounded soldiers and civilians.
War and Covid19, both suffocating us. When will this nightmare end?
Organisations, individuals, businesses are all mobilized and helping each other to assist the displaced and those in need of support. Many among us are also connected on twitter and other social media platforms sharing information about our reality around Nagorno-Karabakh, the conflict, the involvement of Turkey, the mercenaries from Syria brought to Azerbaijan to fight the Armenians.
The ombudsman’s office is monitoring the human rights violations and war crimes, almost half of the population(approximately 75 000people) is being temporary displaced, mostly women, young children and elderly according to his reports some in Nagorno-Karabakh and a good number of them to Armenia. The targeting of civilians in Artsakh continues.
Hadrut has been heavily attacked. Photos of a mother and her son with disability who couldn’t move fast enough from their home were shown, shot, killed in cold blood.
Courageous international and local journalists are still reporting from Stepanakert.
Diaspora Armenians are mobilizing with great numbers to help with humanitarian aid and pressuring their local governments, since we understood the hard way that we are our only supporters. Seeing the photos of these protests gives me hope.
Most of international organisations and agencies are still silent or adopting the “both sides” rhetoric without digging deep into the details and specificity of the present situation. It gives the impression that they have been copy pasting the same texts with each escalation on the borders for the past decade or so. their last year's reports are already outdated. There is a new reality since September 27 and it seems they are late to catch up.
I have been thinking about this a lot lately, wondering why this silence? I mean as Armenian civil society, we have been standing for decades with Azerbaijani human rights defenders and journalists when they were imprisoned and tortured, we have been standing with Ukrainian activists, we have been standing with Belarus during the recent protests, with each and every journalist or activist in the region who was harassed, imprisoned, bullied by oppressive governments or warmongers, we were there.
But when the time has come to support us as a new democracy in the region who are being bullied, attacked, massacred by the dictatorship in Azerbaijan known for its long history of oppressing its own people and shutting all kinds of freedoms, and Turkey helping by bringing terrorists from Syria known to torture populations, rape women and girls in other area of the world…suddenly the world goes silent or too politically correct to react…
Then I remembered a recent event and started laughing at myself insanely for being so naïve and shocked of this international reaction or the lack of it... I was invited to an international peace conference a while ago, where I insisted that participants from Artsakh to be present as well, since they are the ones directly affected by a conflict in the region and their voices and presence essential in a peace conference. First it was all agreed, then a letter came, trying to be as politically correct as possible, they were feeling uncomfortable, asking too many questions, raising concerns of the participation of the Artsakhtsis…It was clear that the organizers and donors were bullied by the local representation of Azerbaijani government in that country where the peace conference were to happen…Azerbaijani diplomats made it clear that they didn’t want to see Armenian representatives from civil society of Nagorno-Karabakh in that conference…imagine that! Azeri govt reps bullying conference organizers on peace to not accept our participants from Shushi and Stepanakert. But we stood strong on our feet, we were committed, we challenged them, and we finally made it there and made our voices heard, despite the obstacles put in front of us. There were other consequences we faced eventually, but I leave that story for my upcoming book.
So, this silence somehow is not so strange for me anymore, on the contrary it’s becoming clearer by the day…I am starting to think they are expected, forced or bullied to do so, by donors, by governments who have their political or economic assets and interests at stake. Sad!
Of course, there is the propaganda as well, and the information war going on social media and many internationals are insinuating that it’s from both sides, again. I wonder if they counted the financial abilities of the “both sides”, who has more access to news media, who can pay more to propagate fake news and manipulation…hmmm let me think Turkey+Azerbaijan or Armenia? Tough to understand or see the power difference and the amount of resources invested and its effects, right?
And then there are the battles on the ground… again calls for “both sides” to stop. I mean imagine you have on one side Azerbaijan+Turkey with more ammunitions coming regularly from Israel, and not only (check the regular cargo flights reported by several international sources) and Armenia+Artsakh with their military spending, any obvious differences there? So, when the humanitarian ceasefire was declared, and Azerbaijani forces continued shelling more mercenaries from Syria deployed,…what do you call that? Ah you are not sure who started it? Of course, you are not, there are almost no international independent reporters on the other side to cover the true stories. Azerbaijan has made sure to control that space and close it down very early in the start of the escalation, who does that? Who is afraid that information circulates? Who shuts down internet and restricts social media access to its own population? You have the answer to that? Isn’t it obvious? Ask the right question and you will understand.
A bully is a bully and an aggressor everywhere at home and outside…how can a peaceful civilian presently living in Martakert, Stepanakert or Hadrut and being inhumanely attacked by this bully dictator, surrender and trust to that same bully who is also oppressing his own population? How can you even suggest that? How can peace be possible in this situation when there is no condemnation, no guarantees whatsoever that civilian populations will be safe. When a state like Turkey joins forces and wants to be part of mediation? What mediation by whom? What peace? Whose peace?
So many questions, so little time, and too many deaths…
But we are still here resisting, surviving as much as possible and when all this comes to an end, nothing and no one will be the same anymore, including me.
October 16 - Day 20 of #war
I wish I could share positive news with all of you today, but I can’t.
Death is everywhere nowadays. As if war was not enough, the second wave of Covid19 is here with numbers exceeding thousand infected each day. I lost a friend today, Covid! I am still under the shock and can't express what I feel. I have a feeling she will call back one of these days and all this is just a huge nightmare dragging for too long...and I will wake up soon.
I can’t even imagine the state of health workers right now. Hospitals in Yerevan and outside are full of wounded soldiers and civilians and on top of that, hospitals need to also find space for those in emergency care due to the pandemic.
People continue to arrive from the conflict zone; women, children, elderly… According to the Ombudsperson office more than 60% of Nagorno-Karabakh population are displaced, approximately 90 000 civilians. Many hotels and residences in Armenia are full. Families and those temporary displaced are finding safe shelters in and around Yerevan. Local organisations, like members of the
Coalition to Stop Violence against Women
are mobilized in Yerevan, Spitak, Gyumri, Vanadzor to support the local government’s efforts to assist those affected directly by the conflict. We are constantly collecting cloths, medicines, hygiene items, infant care, diapers and other needed stuff. Help is coming from local donations and Armenians from the diaspora, since international humanitarian aid is slow to arrive or obstructed because of politics. Turkey closed its space for the humanitarian aid plane coming from Los Angeles.Apparently, there are people in this world who are considered invisible, since the territory they live on is not officially recognized. So, if they are killed, tortured, starved to death, the world can’t do much (except being concerned!), they don’t exist on official papers and humans are humans only if they exist on official papers.
Psychologists are working from hospitals, residential centers and other places where people are gathered. They are mobilized to deal with the pain of mothers and spouses of fallen soldiers, among other victims…
Many, like me, are hosting families in their homes, sharing their worries. As I mentioned before, our life in this tiny corner of the world is interrupted for an uncertain time. We can’t work, concentrate, breathe, feel anything right now except the deep pain and fear of people and realities fading slowly around us.
Bellingcat confirmed yesterday the authenticity of the photos/video of the execution of two Armenian prisoners of war by Azerbaijani forces; an old man and a young soldier were cold-bloodedly killed in front of the camera and these images were circulating since yesterday on social media. I have no words…
I remember when Safarov case happened, I was so shocked that not a single human rights defender or peacebuilder from Azerbaijan protested openly and condemned the fact that their government was glorifying a murderer, someone who killed another human being in his sleep…I raised the issue in small circles and was always met with people trying to justify his act, linking it to the NK conflict… I mean how can you justify coldblooded murder, especially in time of relative peace? Everyone seems to have forgotten about Aliyev's oppressive approaches, the exorbitant wealth he managed to accumulate in corruption, the imprisoned journalists, the internet shutdown, the police brutality during the few protests. He succeeded in a matter of a few weeks to mobilize the support of human rights defenders, activists and NGOs around him, in the name of territories…I had to block several of them, I couldn’t stand the images of human cruelty they were sharing and Aliyev’s hate speeches they were liking and spreading. And what about Erdogan helping, how can anyone on the side of justice and human rights can accept that someone like Erdogan be involved in their country, the conflict, this region(any region!) and stay silent about it (this is where most lost me, that is where I draw the red line)?…War teaches us a lot, unfortunately. It clarifies many uncertainties. And life is too short to compromise and collaborate with those who fail to condemn aggressors and dictators.
Hate against Armenians is not new. My grandparents were victims of it, their parents too…Even now, those living in Istanbul, Turkey know very well that…They remember Hrant Dink, and many other incidents in the community.
My mother called me today from Montreal, she was extremely worried…
She also said that following the recent protests in front of parliament there, several Turkish and Azerbaijani people in their city are starting to gather for a counter-protest, mostly calling Armenians liars, and that Genocide is a myth…I wonder if they have an answer to why millions of Armenian families like mine are spread around the world since 1915. This war, if not stopped soon, I fear will spread beyond these borders...and will reach your peaceful homes and communities.
Silence continues from the International community…people were protesting today in front of the UN building in Yerevan, demanding a reaction, asking them to go and monitor the borders, the residences where refugees are gathered, visit the wounded, write those damn reports and condemn what is happening and not rest until a complete ceasefire is respected.
I am trying to stay strong and repress my anger. People around me are devastated but most are trying to control their emotions. They are all working together, helping each other quietly.
Our mental health is failing..but we are reminding each other to stay strong, whatever that means these days.
The photos of fallen young soldiers continue to appear on my feed...so many are dying from both sides. How are we going to live with this.
The worst part is that we are slowly getting used to this war, to this reality.
October 20 - Day 24 of #war
Soon it will be almost a month that we are living in this war.
Yesterday, I changed some of the stuff in my emergency bag. I included warm cloths and socks, since the season is changing and soon winter will be here.
Covid numbers are adding so fast. Many in my surroundings are sick. The virus season is not helping with the war situation.
Health workers and hospitals are full. I can hear once more the constant sirens of the ambulances. But this time I am not sure if it is a patient suffocating because of Covid or a wounded soldier brought back from the frontlines.
These past weeks, our family got bigger, with people coming from Shushi and temporarily staying with us. This means more “chay” time with sweets and malina muraba with Gayane. Those rituals used to be so cheerful in the past with long conversations, planning future projects and laughter. Today we are both glued to our phones, following the news, exchanging the updates (me translating the English ones to her, and her translating the Russian ones) so we don’t miss any details in any language while the “chay” is often getting cold on the side table and laughter is so rare, and future projects forever on hold... Then there is the painful wait for news from the son, the relatives still fighting on the borders.
It seems that during this war, I am becoming my grandmother, wanting to cook non-stop and feed everyone. Is it that intergenerational war and trauma memory waking up in me, preventing all possible or unimaginable starvation?
I remember life in the bomb shelters in Lebanon in the 80s. The adults used to send us there all the time with loads of sandwiches enough for a week ration and hot sweet powder milk that used to come in large bags with “Hariri aid” written on it. Then the adults would sit on the stairs in the entrance listening to the urgent news on the radio which would always start with a very panicky short music. That short panicky music would automatically trigger discomfort and pain in my stomach, and I used to end up the first 20-30 minutes in the toilet with my mother telling me in a panicky voice to hurry up which would trigger even more pain in my stomach and longer sessions in the bathroom. As a child, my biggest fear was to die somehow hit by a bomb while on the toilet seat…
Many more people are arriving from the conflict region, the battles are becoming harder…Shelling continues on Stepanakert and Shushi. Hospitals, schools, kindergartens, shops and residential building are hit constantly. I mean for how long? People are still in bomb shelters, trying to keep their spirits high. Doctors are operating in underground hospitals and grandmothers are continuing to cook and bake for the families who stayed behind and the soldiers on the front.
In Yerevan, most of us are helping as much as we can. Supporting whoever needs support. Collecting warm socks, hygiene items, pads, cloths, baby food…No one is able to concentrate on anything else but the war.
Today we visited several embassies and EU demanding to stop this aggression and massacres of civilians. No one seemed to be there, I don’t know if they heard us? I don’t know if they care? Does it matter anymore? We are trying to not lose hope, to continue resisting all this…
Photos of tortured soldiers by Azerbaijani army and beheading of a young soldier are circulating accompanied by so much hate and violent calls. I can’t erase those horrible photos and videos from my mind…They say “the war will end, and we still have to live together here” …but how?
I hope tomorrow will bring better news, even though I don’t know any more what kind of news can be considered better or good since so many young faces killed on the borders are still posted everywhere and adding more every day.
Pain and grief are everywhere but also resilience and many resisting and keeping their spirits high despite the circumstances.
Life goes on, we will survive and rebuild and restore and heal and continue…Like we always do.
October 23 - Day 27 of #war
I woke up to the news that Covid-19 numbers reached 2500 in one day in Armenia.
My mom called me from Montreal saying that their numbers reached 1000 and they are in panic mode in Quebec, declaring it “zone rouge” (red zone).
I looked at myself in the mirror and wondered who that old and sad woman was. I wanted to cry.
What color do you give a zone with high numbers of Covid-19 combined with a terrible war?
There are almost no beds available in the hospitals of Yerevan and around right now. Most are occupied by wounded civilians and soldiers coming from Artsakh. It means if you are really sick with Covid, and you need to go to the hospital, you need to wait for your turn for a long time… A friend’s father got really sick the other day and they tried to call the ambulance, which was only able to reach them the second day, since most ambulances are busy transporting the wounded coming from the war zone.
While I am writing these lines, Stepanakert and Martuni in Artsakh are heavily bombed by Azerbaijani forces. For the past month, almost constantly, civilian populated towns, cities villages were under shelling. As a known Journalist said today, “Armenians are fighting against 4 powers in Nagorno-Karabakh: Azerbaijan, Turkey, Jihadists and sophisticated Israeli drones”
People are still not very much aware how disastrous this war is. In less than one month, 5000 deaths from all sides…and thousands more wounded. Azerbaijan is still not respecting the ceasefire after the 2nd attempt. So, Soldiers’ corpses are left on the frontlines to rot or be eaten by wild animals. The red cross is not granted safe passage to be able to retrieve the bodies…
Families are still waiting for news of their beloved sons or brothers or husbands. Others are burying theirs. The whole nation is grieving. Every single one living in Armenia is affected.
Many are volunteering to support the army on the battleground since the fighting is getting heavier every day.
I see older and younger men leaving for the front, even women. I see artists, actors, scientists, professors, teachers, bakers, architects, intellectuals, doctors…all leaving to support and defend the civil population in Nagorno-Karabakh from on-going attacks and massacres.
This is not the war of the 90s…This is a war conducted by two powerful countries with incomparable military resources, constantly being recharged with new ammunitions and modern artillery coming from Israel and other countries paid with oil money, all under the silent approval of the rest of the world (specially those who are extremely ardent in human rights and democratic values). This is a war where thousands of terrorists/jihadists from Syria are deployed by Turkey on the borders to fight alongside the Azerbaijani army. All this against a population not larger than 150 000. Imagine that for a moment…
Human Rights Watch released today their report on Azerbaijan using widely banned cluster munitions in Nagorno-Karabakh, they said ““The repeated use of cluster munitions by Azerbaijan should cease immediately as their continued use serves to heighten the danger for civilians for years to come,”(yes, but who cares really?)
I was following the videos posted by some of the mercenaries and Azerbaijani soldiers fighting in the area…they had posted several videos of Armenian prisoners, young men, tortured, humiliated, forced to repeat insults against their own leaders, forced to praise Azerbaijan…I tried to find if Azerbaijani prisoners are treated the same way in Armenia, and I couldn’t find one single video.
The human rights defender’s office is documenting all these cases to submit it to relevant international bodies to be investigated as war crimes.
Armenians in the diaspora continue to mobilize demanding their governments to take action, stop selling weapons to Azerbaijan, sanction Turkey, stop the war on civilians in Artsakh, pressure for a ceasefire…
It seems there is no end to this ugly war. It seems the whole world has forgotten us.
I am not sleeping much these days, like many. More displaced people are arriving from NK, since more villages are being shelled now…there are more posts on social media asking support for people looking for places to stay and basic necessities. The government is trying to accommodate everyone, organisations are helping, hotlines are working non-stop to help the newly arrived. The sense of unity and caring for each other is omnipresent. People are ready to give what they have and even what they don’t have here and in the diaspora.
Fear, depression, anger, uncertainty, grief, despair, losses, trauma…lots of things we need to deal with once the war stops.
My kids are asking lots of questions…I have hard time explaining to them what is happening right now, nor do I have the patience.
War is everywhere now...in the classrooms, in the playgrounds, in the kitchen, on the streets, in their books and stories. The bullets and bombings will stop one day, but the war will continue for a long time in their lives, in their minds, imagination and games.
I wonder how peace would look like after all this, how will I recognize it since all my perceptions have fallen apart, broken into pieces and I lost all my reference points.
October 28 - Day 32 of #war
It has been a month now that we are dragged in this war.
Someone was asking me the other day, how are you staying sane in all this? I told him that I was concentrating on the simple things around me, simple tasks I needed to do like so many other people, items I needed to gather, money I needed to fundraise, medicines I needed to buy, news I needed to follow, internationals I needed to wake up, support I needed to offer to those who have lost loved ones or their homes and letters I needed to write to comfort families and friends in the diaspora and tell them that we are ok, to not lose hope and to continue supporting us, as much as they can. All these simple things are getting me throughout the day.
I am getting lots of hateful messages and manipulative videos and images from the other side. There is a huge fake Azerbaijani army on social media trying to spread fear or break the will of many on this side. The war is not only on the battlefield. I got invites from some who were planning to celebrate their national holidays in Stepanakert. I got images of Baku with fireworks, celebrating their armies allegedly recapturing of certain areas…despite all the deaths and losses, it gives the impression that many Azerbaijanis are in quite celebratory mood in this humanitarian catastrophe. I even saw a so-called peace platform coordinator agreeing with Aliyev for chasing Armenians like dogs… loss of humanity...Some voices are still there to try to condemn all this, but these voices are so tiny and already fading away… I see now how their state was sponsoring hate against Armenians all this time. I mean I used to see hate from Armenian side as well, but not at a state sponsored level and in such larger scale, horrifying. And when I don’t see any real attempt from civil society(if it still exists in Azerbaijan after all the shrinking that their government did under the silent approval of many international agencies) to hold their own dictator accountable and trying to make their country democratic and supportive of human rights, I wonder how can Armenians live under such a dictatorship, supported by warmonger genocidal Turkey with full support of the majority of the Azerbaijani population rejoicing with each destruction? Armenians will be slaughtered, massacred like the beheading we are seeing, the live executions of an old villager by the Azerbaijani army, the coldblooded shooting of a mother and her son with disability, nothing stops Aliyev and his supporter Erdogan…
The news of more Jihadists and Syrian mercenaries hired by Turkey to fight in NK are confirmed by investigative journalists and other governments. The use of illegal artillery is reported and condemned by Human Rights Watch, Genocide Watch had also released a warning…yet still, no one seems to stop this war. So, what is left to do? Continue resisting, defending ourselves, helping each other, mobilizing communities here and in the diaspora, supporting each other with whatever is needed to stay ALIVE, to survive against all odds.
Young soldiers are dying, thousand and more already, Many civilians as well…how many more generations are going to lose their lives, is this the only destiny we have? A young woman called the other day, she lost her husband, and didn’t know what to tell her young children…another one, like so many will give birth soon in one of the hospitals of Yerevan, very far away from home, to already orphaned infants. Doctors are describing how horrible are the wounds, due to the used weapons, so many amputees, in pain, with deep wounds that they need to carry all their lives.
Past memories of discussions and consultations in cold European offices with white men in suits, seem so irrelevant right now…Internationals hiding behind “bothside-ism” rhetoric to stay safe and keep their resources intact, politicians well-fed by oil money and caviar diplomacy telling us what to do, what is right and what is wrong are even more despicable than those financing this war with sophisticated weapons sold endlessly…
Soon winter will be here…things will probably get harder. But then I remember the mountains, surrounded by so many of them…At some point, I felt suffocating and wishing for the water, the sea…but then I realized, they are our only support, those nurturing protective mountains, so serene, calm yet powerful and comforting…it is almost impossible to conquer people of mountainous regions they say, it is almost impossible to break their will, their hopes and their resilience.
Life continues…on a very different path for us.
Food is stored, vegetables and fruits are being preserved; pickling, jam-ing, compote-ing, drying…warm socks are being knitted, wool blankets are being sewn for the displaced people. Medicines and necessities are being collected and sent by communities here and in the diaspora. Humanitarian aid is organized, transported despite the lack of transportation, kids are continuing to learn, sing and draw…soldiers are calling to comfort their moms, but also funerals everyday, everywhere...
Yes, life is hard right now, I don’t know how tomorrow will be…but no matter what the outcomes are, we will survive this, one day at a time. We will rebuild, we will heal, we will work again, we will learn to smile again and celebrate, no one will be left behind, everyone will be cared for…The mountains are here, we will be ok.
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