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CLOSED BORDERS AND VIOLENT HISTORIES HAUNT SOUTH CAUCASUS
By Alex Whiting
Reuters AlertNet
Nov 15 2012
LONDON (AlertNet) - "I used to film my friends' weddings, birthday
parties and special occasions. But then the world turned upside
down ...
I started to film their funerals instead," said Rudik Khojabaghyan,
a former soldier living in the town of Goris, southern Armenia.
His next door neighbour and childhood friend, Mihran Mirumyan, recalls
mending people's home-made guns when war came to Goris in the early
1990s. "It's a tragedy that we lost such good people. That's what
peace cost us, all those lives," Mirumyan said.
Goris is about 20 miles (32 km) from Nagorno-Karabakh, a disputed
mountainous enclave within Azerbaijan's borders that has been
controlled by ethnic Armenians - with Armenia's support - since a war
with Azerbaijan. The war tore Azerbaijan and Armernia apart during
the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.'
Khojabaghyan and Mirumyan's recollections of the conflict are shared
in Memories without Borders, a moving film that portrays the impact of
closed borders and violent histories over the past century on people
living in Azerbaijan, Armenia, Nagorno-Karabakh and Turkey.
The Nagorno-Karabakh war displaced more than 1 million people across
Armenia and Azerbaijan. About 30,000 people died. Nearly 600,000
Azeris remain displaced - it is not known how many people are still
uprooted in Armenia.
A truce was signed in 1994. But peace talks have stalled, tensions
between Armenia and Azerbaijan are rising again, and skirmishes along
the front lines persist. Armenia's borders with Azerbaijan and Turkey
have been closed for nearly 20 years because of Armenia's support
of the Nagorno-Karabakh separatists, and its economy is suffering as
a result.
"No one wins, we're wasting time," Mirumyan said. "You have to live
next door, so you need to make peace, otherwise you should sell your
home and leave. There should be another way out, some way over the
barrier that we fixed here. We negotiate, we meet and discuss, but
with no result."
The war deepened tensions between Armenia and Turkey, tensions that
have run deep since World War One. Armenia, backed by many historians
and parliaments, says about 1.5 million Christian Armenians were
killed in what is now eastern Turkey in a deliberate policy of genocide
ordered by the Ottoman government.
Successive Turkish governments and most Turks feel the charge of
genocide is an insult. Ankara argues there was heavy loss of life on
both sides during fighting in the area.
Sitting on his shaded terrace, Mirumyan points to a beautiful chess
set he carved out of black walnut and light pear wood. Each piece
is a famous character from Armenian or Turkish history - including
Talaat Pasha, one of the senior Ottoman officials during the 1915
massacre of Armenians.
The middle of the board represents the closed border between Armenia
and Turkey, he says.
The set took two years to make and is priced at $10,000. "If it's a
Turk buying, I'd probably give a discount. I'd like a Turk to buy it,"
he said.
LIVING THE DREAM
A small number of descendants of Armenians who fled Ottoman Turkey
during the World War One killings have moved to Nagorno-Karabakh
since the 1990s.
"I can't say whether what I've done is foolish or heroic. It's
quite egoistic," says Armen, a young man who in 2004 moved to
Nagorno-Karabakh from his home in Marseilles, France. His father,
who lives in France, has refused to speak to him about his decision.
Armen's wife Christina is a quarter Armenian by blood, and she too has
chosen to make this the basis of her identity. "What do you do to feel
Armenian when you live in the diaspora?" asked Christina. "You can go
to events. You can sing Our Father in church. You can sing My Kilikia,
eat basturma (cured beef sausage) and drink cognac. That's it."
Armen and Christina live in Shusha, a town surrounded by mountains
and meadows, where they plan to raise their family.
"In the Armenian diaspora they dream of Shushi (Shusha). I'm living
the dream," Armen said.
Back in Goris, sitting in his workshop, Mirumyan muses on state
borders. They should be respected, he says. "But, you know, the
clock hand drops for everyone one day. No one lives for ever, not
even those who create borders."
Next door, Khojabaghyan opens a box of film tapes. "These are the
tapes I got left with. People took the films of the weddings and the
parties. But no one took the tapes of the funerals ... I'll have them
for the rest of my life," he says.
* Memories without Borders was made by Conciliation Resources, an
international peacebuilding non-governmental organisation. It will
be screened in western Europe in 2013. The first public screenings
took place in October 2012 in Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenia, Georgia,
Azerbaijan and Turkey
http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/closed-borders-and-violent-histories-haunt-south-caucasus
By Alex Whiting
Reuters AlertNet
Nov 15 2012
LONDON (AlertNet) - "I used to film my friends' weddings, birthday
parties and special occasions. But then the world turned upside
down ...
I started to film their funerals instead," said Rudik Khojabaghyan,
a former soldier living in the town of Goris, southern Armenia.
His next door neighbour and childhood friend, Mihran Mirumyan, recalls
mending people's home-made guns when war came to Goris in the early
1990s. "It's a tragedy that we lost such good people. That's what
peace cost us, all those lives," Mirumyan said.
Goris is about 20 miles (32 km) from Nagorno-Karabakh, a disputed
mountainous enclave within Azerbaijan's borders that has been
controlled by ethnic Armenians - with Armenia's support - since a war
with Azerbaijan. The war tore Azerbaijan and Armernia apart during
the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.'
Khojabaghyan and Mirumyan's recollections of the conflict are shared
in Memories without Borders, a moving film that portrays the impact of
closed borders and violent histories over the past century on people
living in Azerbaijan, Armenia, Nagorno-Karabakh and Turkey.
The Nagorno-Karabakh war displaced more than 1 million people across
Armenia and Azerbaijan. About 30,000 people died. Nearly 600,000
Azeris remain displaced - it is not known how many people are still
uprooted in Armenia.
A truce was signed in 1994. But peace talks have stalled, tensions
between Armenia and Azerbaijan are rising again, and skirmishes along
the front lines persist. Armenia's borders with Azerbaijan and Turkey
have been closed for nearly 20 years because of Armenia's support
of the Nagorno-Karabakh separatists, and its economy is suffering as
a result.
"No one wins, we're wasting time," Mirumyan said. "You have to live
next door, so you need to make peace, otherwise you should sell your
home and leave. There should be another way out, some way over the
barrier that we fixed here. We negotiate, we meet and discuss, but
with no result."
The war deepened tensions between Armenia and Turkey, tensions that
have run deep since World War One. Armenia, backed by many historians
and parliaments, says about 1.5 million Christian Armenians were
killed in what is now eastern Turkey in a deliberate policy of genocide
ordered by the Ottoman government.
Successive Turkish governments and most Turks feel the charge of
genocide is an insult. Ankara argues there was heavy loss of life on
both sides during fighting in the area.
Sitting on his shaded terrace, Mirumyan points to a beautiful chess
set he carved out of black walnut and light pear wood. Each piece
is a famous character from Armenian or Turkish history - including
Talaat Pasha, one of the senior Ottoman officials during the 1915
massacre of Armenians.
The middle of the board represents the closed border between Armenia
and Turkey, he says.
The set took two years to make and is priced at $10,000. "If it's a
Turk buying, I'd probably give a discount. I'd like a Turk to buy it,"
he said.
LIVING THE DREAM
A small number of descendants of Armenians who fled Ottoman Turkey
during the World War One killings have moved to Nagorno-Karabakh
since the 1990s.
"I can't say whether what I've done is foolish or heroic. It's
quite egoistic," says Armen, a young man who in 2004 moved to
Nagorno-Karabakh from his home in Marseilles, France. His father,
who lives in France, has refused to speak to him about his decision.
Armen's wife Christina is a quarter Armenian by blood, and she too has
chosen to make this the basis of her identity. "What do you do to feel
Armenian when you live in the diaspora?" asked Christina. "You can go
to events. You can sing Our Father in church. You can sing My Kilikia,
eat basturma (cured beef sausage) and drink cognac. That's it."
Armen and Christina live in Shusha, a town surrounded by mountains
and meadows, where they plan to raise their family.
"In the Armenian diaspora they dream of Shushi (Shusha). I'm living
the dream," Armen said.
Back in Goris, sitting in his workshop, Mirumyan muses on state
borders. They should be respected, he says. "But, you know, the
clock hand drops for everyone one day. No one lives for ever, not
even those who create borders."
Next door, Khojabaghyan opens a box of film tapes. "These are the
tapes I got left with. People took the films of the weddings and the
parties. But no one took the tapes of the funerals ... I'll have them
for the rest of my life," he says.
* Memories without Borders was made by Conciliation Resources, an
international peacebuilding non-governmental organisation. It will
be screened in western Europe in 2013. The first public screenings
took place in October 2012 in Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenia, Georgia,
Azerbaijan and Turkey
http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/closed-borders-and-violent-histories-haunt-south-caucasus