Armenophobia in Azerbaijan

Extracts from the diary of Armen Balasanyan: One feels differently in Ejmiadzin. We made an offering of doves at the sacrificial wall. I did it for my mother too. She is afraid of doing this; she has a bad heart. She cannot watch it as doves get smashed against the wall. This is our old custom of offering sacrifice. Before, I couldn’t watch the scene myself, but later I was explained that this must be done (if you are a man

).

‘Personal involvement or eyewitness account’ of the episode described, with a reservation that no proof survived, and the report must be taken on trust:

“A few hours before us, poor refugees, who were the bulk of the city’s fleeing population, had walked through this forest path. Mutilated corpses were everywhere. Here and there, you could see severed heads. I saw cut-off female breasts. A pregnant woman was ripped open, with her unborn child placed next to her and with a severed male head inserted in the gaping cavity in her belly. My mother tried to cover up my eyes, so that I, a 10-year-old girl, could not see any of it”.

‘Quoting the eyewitnesses’ who are not alive or who are impossible to contact, with written testimony “destroyed” by either their authors or holders:

“I was told the story of this girl from Shushi by a soldier of the national army who received treatment in the republican hospital in Baku in 1993. He told me that once, after a successful offensive, a girl of unspeakable beauty went to meet them <…>.

“Guliyev told that a pair of innocent and harmless twin brothers had been taken hostage by Armenians. Then Armenians sent them off to Armenia, so that they could be brought up to become suicide attackers who would be sent to kill Azerbaijanis. And they said as much: “We need your children whom we will later send to war with you”. Later, we managed to ransom the twin brothers”.

“Only on the next day, as I went down into the basement to put there some of the belongings of our new neighbors, I noticed behind the door several Armenian books and notebooks that had fallen out. <…> These damped notebooks proved to be the diaries of Armen Balasanyan, a person of my age, born in 1961. <…> Four notebooks, each 12 pages long, had to be translated into Azerbaijani or at least Russian. <…> In a month’s time, we could translate only a half of one notebook. <…> After a while, I couldn’t find the diaries on my desk. It transpired that my grief-stricken mother tore up and discarded the notebooks. I stood there looking into her eyes and didn’t know what to say. Was there really anything to be said?”

The first timid steps towards disseminating the “horror stories” were made through forums and blogs. Later, they leaked into the mass media taking the form of interviews, references to named and unnamed sources, books and paintings on the ‘subject’. These stories were ultimately exported onto international platforms, the media and foreign television, while a member of the Azerbaijani parliament Ganira Pashayeva even ventured to read out extracts from a “book” by Zori Balayan presumably entitled “Revival of Our Spirit”

from a rostrum at one of the PACE sessions.

A distinctive feature of all these “confessions” is that they are published exclusively in the form of extracts, hearsay and retelling the words of dead relatives or protagonists, with sources “destroyed” either by authors themselves of by thoughtless relatives of the person who held the rarity.

Quite typical techniques are employed here:

• common Armenian names of protagonists (Armen, Tigran, Khachatur);

• detailed depiction of the “atrocities” (torture of newborns, abuse, contributions to a clandestine subversive committee “Krunk”);

• absence or very blurred depiction of small details, such as: weather, mood, events preceding the described episode not related to the “atrocity” itself that necessarily accompany any narration;

• invariable presence of children, young girls or old people in the episode;

• indication of unconfirmed details about the author or edition; representing fictitious addresses, non-existent publishing houses or localities (Daud Mansur Heyriyan, born in 1942 in Beirut, ethnic Armenian, resides in Beirut, in the Armenian district, house 43, apartment 25, block 1, on the second floor

; publishing house ‘Vanadzor’

);

• attempts to use in the text Armenian place names or brands, albeit, with mistakes: Jemruk, Javakkh, Haestan.

A few excerpts from this non-existent “book” are constantly quoted in the Azerbaijani mass media as a proof of “atrocities perpetrated by Armenians”. However, neither the original book, nor its full contents or even the full contents of the quoted pages has ever been presented anywhere. The same applies to the fictitious book by Daud Heyriyan (Heyryan) entitled ‘In the Name of the Cross’.

In 2012, the Xenophobia Prevention Initiative NGO officially announced its intention to purchase the books ‘Resurrection of Our Soul’ and ‘In the Name of the Cross’.

In the 6-months’ period following the announcement, the proposal remained unanswered.

As a rule, the plot of the “horror stories” follows the same pattern: ritualistic and vindictive blood thirst and inhuman cruelty which spring from the upbringing and negative sentiments intrinsic to Armenians.

“All Armenians make contributions to a certain fund” to finance action against Azerbaijan”. The name of the fund varies depending on the storyteller, the general fabric of the narration or the goal at hand. It may be “Krunk”, “Ejmiadzin” or “Dashnaks”.

“Armenians entombed Azerbaijani children in welded tubes”. The place of the tube, its form, eyewitness accounts of retrieving the bodies or welding the tube as well as the number of children vary depending on the author, edition, etc.

Locality:

Gugark (Lori Province, Armenia);

Spitak (Lori Province, Armenia);

Leninakan (Shirak Province, Armenia);

Kapan (Syunik Province, Armenia), Karabakh.

The tube:

chimney;

a tube 20 meters long, with a diameter of 1.5 meters;

a tube 6 meters long, with Azerbaijani children aged between 3 and 10 entombed inside.

The number of entombed children:

70 children aged 5-12;

23 bodies found entombed alive in a chimney;

80 Azerbaijani children were entombed in a tube and set ablaze;

71 corpses of Azerbaijani children;

15 Azerbaijani children.

Discovered by:

a French rescue team;

Medina Sharifova, the mother of one of the children;

an Azerbaijani doctor;

French dogs.

It must be noted here that the reference is made to a single tube. No Azerbaijani source or official makes reference to more than one tube assuming that they existed in several places at the same time.

The mythology of “children welded shut in a tube” is a subtly schemed and potent device. It shakes the foundations of the human self-consciousness, morality, instincts and worldview. The image of suffering children gives people such a dreadful shock that they stop thinking reasonably on the assumption that “such things cannot be invented”. Facts, logic or proofs are no longer needed as the goal is achieved.

“Of course, the world has an unwritten law of double standards, and we regularly face this tendency. Why the international organizations, which routinely issue statements on violations of human rights in Azerbaijan, have not in all these years made any statement on the Azerbaijani children entombed alive in welded tubes and ruthlessly slain by Armenians? Personally, I have not come across any such statements”, said Vusala Huseynli, Country Manager of World Youth Bank Network.

“Armenians tortured Azerbaijanis”. The sophisticated brutality and variety of tortures is shocking.