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Along Artsakh's Paths of War To The Church of The Prayer For Peace

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  • Along Artsakh's Paths of War To The Church of The Prayer For Peace

    ALONG ARTSAKH'S PATHS OF WAR TO THE CHURCH OF THE PRAYER FOR PEACE

    http://www.noravank.am/eng/issues/detail.php?ELEMENT_ID=4894
    24.06.2010

    BOOK REVIEW

    Boris Baratov - `The Chronicles of Karabakh. 1989-2009' (Linguist
    Publishers, Moscow. 2010. 512 pages, printed in Italy)
    `The Chronicles of Karabakh' by writer, screenwriter and film director
    Boris Baratov is an illustrated book of huge cognitive, cultural and
    political significance. The deep love of the author for his homeland
    permeates the book, which is full of historical and contemporary
    facts, presented in chronological order and illustrated with
    documentary evidence. `The Chronicles of Karabakh' covers a
    twenty-year period, but it is illuminated by the millennia of the
    heroic history of the Armenian people, which forms the very roots of
    Artsakh.

    In its ideological integrity this book draws the reader towards its
    key concept: the Motherland, the home of our ancestors. The book
    consists of five chapters: `The Road of Life', `The Angel', `Death in
    Karabakh', `Paradise Laid Waste' and `Twenty Years After' and contains
    more than 1,000 original photographs of historical monuments, natural
    surroundings and human fates.


    As he steps onto the Road of life, in a burst of emotion, the author
    looks over from Artsakh to the white-capped peak of Ararat. The reader
    is inspired with certainty that the sight of Ararat-Masis from all the
    corners of the Armenian range is one of the sacred criteria of
    Armenian spirituality. The Monastery of Khor-Virap, with its view over
    Ararat, the Church of Zvartnots with its graceful columns with a proud
    eagle soaring over its capital, Noah descending from Mount Ararat into
    Nakhijevan [as painted by Ivan (Hovhannes) Aivazovsky], the khachkars
    (stone crosses) in Jugha and suddenly the inscription under the
    photograph of the khachkar `destroyed by the Azerbaijani authorities'.
    Sacred elements of a lofty culture have been destroyed by hordes of
    modern savages, so-called Azerbaijanis, the descendants of the
    Oguz-Turkic nomadic tribes from the Mongolian steppes, who
    appropriated the geographic name of Iranian Azerbaijan for the
    pan-Turkic aims.

    The author interprets the road of life from Ayrarat (the ancient
    province of the Kingdom of Great Armenia) to Artsakh as living
    Armenian history, full of creativity. As he steps on the soil of
    Zangezur (Syunik), the author comes into contact with the sources of
    the poetry of Paruir Sevak. Sevak's poetry was conceived at a tragic
    time, when the blameless life of the great Armenian poet Egishe
    Charents was slowly extinguished in a Stalinist torture chamber. As
    Baratov writes: `It is almost as if Providence did not want the poetic
    genius of this ancient people to be snuffed out.' The author also
    speaks about political motivation, decades later, which underlies the
    tragic deaths of Paruir Sevak and wonderful Armenian artist Minas.

    The road to Artsakh is strewn with pearls of Armenian architecture,
    antiquities and nature: Karaunj (5th - 3rd millennia B.C.), Noravank
    (8th - 14th centuries A.D.), the Shaki waterfall. The author defines
    the historical significance of Syunik-Zangezur by the greatness of the
    mountains and the height at which the eagles soar on the streams of
    warm air: `...Syunik, which in the past had seen great battles, and the
    concluding and breaking of peace agreements; the fate of Armenia has
    been decided on many occasions in this area'. Photographs of the
    statues to the great Armenian military leaders David-bek and Garegin
    Nzhdeh (at the foot of Mount Khustup) bear witness to this. Thanks to
    the political and military activities of Garegin Nzhdeh, the native
    Armenian region of Syunik was retained as a part of Armenia. In his
    accounts of the military and freedom-fighting activities of the
    Armenian military leader Andranik, Baratov also writes about Western
    Armenia, thereby setting out his position on the historical and
    geographical unity of Armenia.

    With its marvellous illustrations and its essay style, the book
    follows along the same lines as the immortal work of Paruir Sevak `The
    Unceasing Bells' and appears before us like `an unceasing tocsin' of
    the struggle for the freedom of Artsakh, encapsulating the history and
    contemporary life, depicting the chefs d'oeuvre of architecture and
    native nature, the fates of our fellow-countrymen and the images of
    the recent war. Baratov writes the following: `Eye-witness accounts of
    the war in Karabakh show it in terms of a people resisting the
    strangle-hold on their freedom. The people of Karabakh were not
    prepared to spend their lives on their knees in the post-Soviet
    concentration camp, which had been prepared for them.'

    The author has visited Artsakh many times over the last two decades.
    On one occasion, he ended up in a car with some foreign observers, one
    of whom, with a degree of subjective criticism, compared the situation
    in Karabakh to that of Spain in the 1930s. Baratov comments: `And as
    in Spain in the 1930s the Henkel bombings were not directed at him
    personally, my companion had still not managed to understand the
    essential difference: whereas in Spain, Hitler and Mussolini managed
    to throttle the Republic, in Karabakh, Azerbaijan and Turkey failed in
    the same aim.' Of the many foreigners to visit Artsakh, Baratov
    singles out Baroness Caroline Cox, who not only understands the
    Armenian people, but `who fought and continues to fight with this
    people as if she herself were one of their valiant daughters.'


    In the chapter `The Angel', the author catalogues the monuments dating
    back over a five-thousand year period, relating to ancient and
    mediaeval Armenian culture: the sanctuaries, the fortresses, the
    arched bridges, the early Christian monasteries, the reliefs on the
    stone crosses, frescoes, rare manuscript books and miniatures `bearing
    witness to the indigenous population of Artsakh - the Armenians'.

    The high moral tone of the writing is conditioned by Baratov's words
    of gratitude to those specialists who have devoted their whole lives
    to studying the history of the region. Accompanied by the historian
    and archaeologist Vardkes Safarian, who is Director of the Stepanakert
    Museum of Local History, the author visited the sites of
    archaeological excavations, which abounds in evidence of the cultural
    activities of the Armenians who are indigenous of the Armenian
    Plateau. During a visit to the village of Shosh, Safarian, with his
    extensive knowledge of the history of his homeland said: `This land is
    just heaven for an archaeologist.' In a burial mound dating back to
    the 2nd millennium B.C. in Northern Artsakh, grape pips were found in
    a wine jar, which conforms with the discovery of evidence of
    wine-making in Zangezur, discovered in the Areni-1 cave (in Vayots
    dzor, on the left bank of the river Arpa, 12 kilometres from
    Ekhegnazdor), from the Neolithic era (5th - 4th millennia B.C.). In
    burial mounds, unearthed in the villages of Chartar, Metshen,
    Khandzadzor and other places in Artsakh golded, bronze and iron
    implements, and pottery indicating the existence of large settlements
    of ancient Armenians many millennia ago were found. These people
    clearly had developed the art of processing metals and ceramics. The
    martial spirit of the forebears of Hayk is shown in the sculptural
    depiction of a dagger on the grave stones set up above the graves of
    warriors. A bead with hieroglyphs from the era of the Kingdom of Van,
    as well as an ancient caravan route through Artsakh to Zangezur,
    Nakhijevan and onwards into the valley of the river Aratsani (the
    Eastern Euphrates) and the Tigris, all are indicative of the links of
    time in the history of Armenia.

    The author proves the groundlessness of the arguments of the bogus
    academics from Baku, who attempt to falsify the history of the
    Armenian region. At the same time, learning from the `lessons' of the
    Turkish marauders, the Azerbaijani ruffians till now continue to
    destroy monuments of Armenian architecture and culture, with the full
    sanctions of the authorities in Baku. These are chef d'oeuvres of
    world architecture. The last remaining group of tens of thousands of
    unique khachkars in the Armenian cemetery of Jugha was destroyed by
    them at the beginning of the 21st century.

    Visiting the Gtich Monastery, Baratov with a heavy heart notes: `This
    was not a building that had grown old and come to the end of its
    useful life; this was a beautiful church which had been cut down in
    its prime...and having maimed and killed it, they had wreaked vengeance
    on the graves. This was yet another Sumgait - a Sumgait against beauty
    and culture...' The same fate was shared by 222 Armenian churches over
    the period when Nagorno-Karabakh was forcibly annexed to the
    Azerbaijan SSR. As the author rightly notes, such a single-minded
    destruction of the Christian churches of Artsakh is evidence that they
    were a stone chronicle of the Armenian people. The Azerbaijani
    marauders have destroyed and looted monuments of Armenian history. The
    author cites examples from the historian Shaghen Mkrtchian about
    events in the Azokh cave. During archaeological digs in the cave (from
    1960 - 1980) priceless mediaeval Armenian manuscripts and church
    regalia were discovered. These were the property of the monasteries
    (which the Armenian monks had hidden from the enemy looting raids) and
    they should have been handed over to the Nagorno-Karabakh State Local
    History Museum. However, all these treasures were illegally
    transported to Baku and have disappeared without a trace.

    But the history of Artsakh itself - with its unassailable fortress of
    the citadel of Jraberd, its majestic monasteries (Gandzasar, Dadivank,
    Gtich, the Three Youths etc.) and thousands of other monuments, some
    of which have survived and others have been destroyed by contemporary
    savages - soars proudly like an eagle, bearing witness to the creative
    activity of the indigenous inhabitants of Artsakh - the Armenians.
    Alongside the struggle for liberty, the creative activity of the
    Armenians of Artsakh runs like a thread throughout Baratov's book. The
    culmination of this activity was the building of the Church of St.
    John the Baptist in the Gandzasar Monastery (1216 - 1238), which
    stands `high above the canyon of the River Khachen, amongst the
    gorges, mountains and alpine meadows, like a long and ancient chant'.

    Baratov admires for the creative achievement of the genius Mkhitar
    Gosh, who despite the ruinous raids on Armenia by the Seljuk Turks
    (which took place in the second half of the 11th century and on into
    the 12th century) and the Mongols (13th century), dreamed of the
    fundamentals of human rights and created his famous `Code of Law'.
    Many manuscripts by leading Armenian thinkers which were stored in the
    monasteries of Artsakh (Gtich, Gandzasar, Amaras, Khatravank and
    others) met a sad fate after the raids of foreign hordes. However,
    some of them were saved and are now preserved in the Mesrop Mashtots
    Matenadaran in Yerevan, as well as in foreign centres for the
    preservation of Armenian manuscripts (in Jerusalem, Venice and in the
    libraries of Vienna, Aleppo, Washington and elsewhere).

    This book is full of folk saying, such as: `They say that the
    mountains and gorges of Karabakh were created by ancient gods, but
    that the bridges over these gorges had to be created by Armenians.'

    Armenia is located far from the tropical jungles, but here in Artsakh
    there is a tree, which outdoes even the giants (on the island of Kos
    in the Aegean Sea). This is one of the wonders of nature: a plane
    tree, 50 metres high, which at midday can shelter the whole population
    of the nearby village of Sekhtorashen in its shade. The author
    accompanies his wonderful photographs of this giant tree with an
    account of the eternal existence of the Armenian people on their
    native land. `In Karabakh, the people revere the Tree as a relic,
    calling the place where the Tree grows Surb Tekh, or Holy Place... The
    Tree has seen and heard it all - all the life of this energetic and
    industrious people has unfolded in its shade. And now the Tree is
    waiting patiently, waiting for its Homer, who will recount a new
    `Iliad', the Iliad of the Armenians of Artsakh'.

    The author is honest in recording the innermost impressions, which
    touch the finest strings of the human heart. In his films, he has shot
    `the beautiful, early Christian monasteries of Syria, the triumphant
    golden mosaics of Byzantine Ravenna and the decoration of the churches
    in Novgorod' and other places, but it is `only here in Artsakh that I
    truly came to understand the meaning of the words `a Biblical view of
    the world'...- a sense of the antiquity of the Earth itself and the
    ancient culture on it - also rears up in front of you in the
    landscapes, and on the city streets and in artists' workshops.'

    >From the first day of one of his visits to Artsakh, which took place
    in the year that the region was under fierce curfew, Baratov sensed
    the freedom-loving aspiration of the people of Artsakh, who fed from
    the heights of the spirit of creation. Philosophically defining the
    spiritual outlook of the men who first stood on the Armenian soil, the
    author writes: `A Biblical dimension of time and space is the most
    forceful shock and emotional experience that a person can experience,
    similar to leaving the concrete metropolis of the urbanised world and
    walking down the steps from a `plane onto the Earth of the first human
    civilisation.' And the purity of spirit in the metaphorical outlook of
    the author is symbolised by the sculpture of The Angel by Armen
    Hakopian (for the Church of Amenaprkich )the Saviour) in Shushi). The
    fate of the sculptor and his tragic death from an enemy bullet are the
    embodiment of his angelic sanctity. In 1989, Bartov was already in
    Moscow and working on his book `The Angel', when he heard the tragic
    news: the sculptor Armen Hakopian `was killed when he left his
    workshop to ask a riot policeman of OMON why he was shooting at the
    people. That was how one of the best sculptors of Artsakh died. He had
    continued to work creatively throughout those terrible days.' Thank
    God, after the liberation of Shushi, the saving Angel was set up on
    the church.

    A characteristic feature of Baratov's narrative style is his manner of
    retelling historical events through the understanding of the actions
    of the people - from the descent of Noah from Mount Ararat-Masis to
    the holy war of St. Vardan Mamikonian, from the decision of King
    Vachagan the Pious (480s - first half of the 5th century), the king of
    Artsakh and Utik, to retire to the village of Avetaranots after his
    great deeds, to the victory of Valerian Madatov, a native of that same
    village, over the huge Persian armies at Shamkhor, as well as the
    heroic defence of Shushi in 1826 by the Armenian people's volunteer
    corps, headed up by Agabek Kalantarian. And further, from the
    liberation of the fortress city of Kars during the Russo-Turkish war
    of 1877-1878 by a corps under the command of Kalantarian's grandson,
    General Hovhannes (Ivan) Lazarev to the open letter of academician
    Andrei Sakharov to the head of the Soviet State, Mikhail Gorbachev,
    calling for the will of the Armenians of Artsakh to be fulfilled and
    requesting him to make the constitutional decision to return the
    Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region to Armenia. The thread of
    historical fates and events from ancient times to the foundation of
    Tigranakert in Artsakh by Tigran II the Great, from the struggle for
    freedom in the 5th century to the victory in the victorious Artsakh
    war stretches throughout the book.

    The whole epic struggle is presented in Baratov's book and animated by
    the peaceful creativity of the Armenians of Artsakh. This struggle is
    linked with the continuation of the human race through Good and Peace.
    Illustrations of vines spread throughout the mountains, alternate with
    picturesque images and photographs of Artsakh weddings. The writer
    remembers with gratitude the poet Gurgen Gabrielian, who invited him
    to an exhibition in Stepanakert in 1989, where he met the artists
    Samvel Gabrielian, Grant Mnatsakanian, Arnold Meliksetian, and Robert
    Askarian, for `it was a remarkable evening. Outside, there was a
    blockade around the whole frontier of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous
    Region, cars were likely to be attacked on the open roads, there was a
    curfew imposed in the city, people had to queue for bread and yet they
    were still hanging pictures in the municipal centre and talking about
    sculpture and art...' The sculptural composition `We and our mountains'
    by the sculptor Sergei Bagdarsarian became the symbol of the steadfast
    spirit of the Armenians of Artsakh.


    The author begins the chapter `Death in Karabakh' (1992-1994) with the
    words of the late 18th century American politician, Thomas Jefferson
    (`We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created
    equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable
    Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of
    Happiness...That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of
    these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it,
    and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such
    principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall
    seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness') and the famous
    late 20th century Armenian historian Bagrat Ulubabian, who was
    inspired by history and the unswerving creative spirit of the
    Armenians of Artsakh, and wrote in reference to the vast civilising
    contribution of the Armenian people to the world treasury of culture
    and its justifiable battle to reinstate historical justice and
    independence: `Nations that have something worth saying to the world,
    do not die out.'

    The reportage style of the photographs demonstrates the barbarity of
    the acts undertaken in Artsakh by a doubly colonial regime - both of
    Soviet centralism and of Azerbaijani Baku. These photographs are
    accompanied by text which denounces state terrorism towards the
    peaceful Armenian civilians of Artsakh. The author writes that in the
    period of the Soviet regime `the corrupt communist feudal overlords in
    Baku kept tight control over all the riches of Karabakh... On 20th
    February, 1988, at the historic session of the Council of Peoples'
    Deputies of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region, in accordance with
    their rights under the Constitution of the USSR, the delegates
    announced their independence to the world... The new head of the
    Azerbaijani Communists, Vezirov announced to Nobel Peace Prize
    Laureate, Andrei Sakharov, `You don't give land away! You conquer it
    with blood!' On 27th February, 1988, following a plan devised by the
    Baku authorities, `gangs of Azerbaijanis in Sumgait set about killing
    ethnic Armenians in their homes, raping and burning Armenian girls and
    children in the streets and jeering at their corpses...But the people of
    Karabakh would not allow themselves to be cowed. They wanted to live
    with their heads held high, in freedom and pride. As a result, in
    September 1988, the Armenians were hounded out of Shushi and the
    `night of the long knives' was repeated in Kirovabad (the ancient
    Armenian town of Gandzak), Baku and hundreds of Armenian villages in
    Northern Karabakh, which was under the control of the criminal,
    despotic Azerbaijani authorities. Punitive units of the Azerbaijani
    OMON and the Soviet Army were sent out against unarmed civilians'.

    The ancient Armenian settlements of Getashen and Martunashen were
    subjected to attacks and deportations, the inhabitants of twenty-four
    Armenian villages in the Hadrut, Shaumian, Shushi and other regions
    were hounded from their houses. Photographic evidence (Armenian
    refugees and enemy tanks on the roads in Artsakh, numerous meetings in
    Stepanakert, the faces of the Armenians of Artsakh, indignant at the
    tyranny of the Azerbaijani authorities, children and babies in the
    arms of their mothers and grandmothers, huge queues for a loaf of
    bread, the tears and grief of the people), showing the events from the
    early period of the constitutional, legal separation of the Republic
    of Nagorno-Karabakh from the bankrupt and criminal Azerbaijani state
    are followed by photographs of military action.

    It took considerable efforts on Baratov's part to collate photographic
    evidence of the military action. He notes that for various reasons,
    the photo journalists of Karabakh did not record a complete picture of
    the war of liberation. There are no reports of the many months of the
    defence of the town of Martuni, of the battles for the villages of
    Machkalashen and Marzili, which first revealed the talent for military
    leadership of the archaeologist and historian Monte Melkonian, who
    came from the USA. `Monte called on all honest Armenians to follow his
    example to defend their Motherland'. The author poses the question:
    `Where are the photographic reports of Ter-Tadevosian and his
    brilliant and audacious storming of Shushi. Where are the shots of
    Seyran Oganian's glorious battle company, which succeeded in
    re-opening the corridor for humanitarian aid?'

    In order to find photographs from the recent war, the author went in
    search of photo journalists from other countries who spent time in
    Artsakh during the war. They shared their war records with him as far
    as it was possible. Baratov expresses his intense gratitude when he
    remembers Karen Gevorkian, Max Sivaslian (who although seriously
    wounded, still went back to the front once he was released from
    hospital), Stanley Green and others: `That was how I managed to
    collect together for this book the work of these brave and honourable
    people, who captured the face of the Karabakh war in their truthful
    work. This was a fight for freedom, in which 150,000 people, defended
    their homeland from the attack of Azerbaijan', with its seven-million
    population and oil riches, helped by the Turks and thousands of
    mercenaries.

    These photographs capture moments of terrible loss (a mother bent over
    her dead son, a dying soldier, his eyes closed in pain, a wounded
    fighter, drinking water from the hand of his brother-soldier, soldiers
    carrying their wounded comrades on makeshift stretchers). The faces of
    the freedom-fighters form a particularly strong impression. Among them
    are Ashot Ghulian, Shahen Meghrian and their companions, who died a
    heros' death. The freedom fighters found themselves strengthened by
    their homeland. In characterising their heroism, Baratov remarks:
    `Once these people had experienced the scent of freedom, they could no
    longer be cowed by blockades, deportations or agonies in the torture
    chambers of Azerbaijan... The Armenians could not complain, because
    there was no-one to complain to. No-one would listen to them. They
    fought and died.'

    Together with photo chronicles about the heroic and military deeds of
    warriors-liberators the works of documentary film makers are renowned.
    Among them the military chronicle of the Artsakh liberation epopee,
    documented in seven films (`The Karabakh Wounds' and the others) is
    notable. Its author, documentary film maker, Colonel of the Artsakh
    Army of Defence, the famous Bulgarian journalist Cvetana Paskaleva
    from the very first days (the battles at Getashen, May 1991) till the
    end of the war shot films about main events in all directions of
    military operations.

    Even after the liberation of Shushi (8th-9th May, 1992) by the NKR
    Self-Defence Forces, the zeal of the aggressor did not abate. In June
    1992, the President of Azerbaijan, Abulfaz Elchibei, aligning himself
    with General Franco, the head of the Spanish fascists (who said, `If
    necessary, I will destroy half of Spain'), announced: `If there is a
    single Armenian left in Karabakh by October of this year, the people
    of Azerbaijan can hang me on the central square in Baku.' However,
    having unleashed total war, monstrous in both its savagery and scale,
    Azerbaijan could not achieve its aggressive goals.

    At the start, the war was hard for the Armenian people. There was a
    shortage of weapons, munitions, medicines and food stuffs and the
    towns and villages of Artsakh were constantly being exposed to enemy
    bombardment and artillery fire from `Hail'-type mortar shells. Every
    day the inhabitants of Stepanakert were dying from strikes by `Alazan'
    rockets. The author tells about the sufferings of the people, through
    the recollections of the NKR Defence Army surgeon Valery Marutian, who
    served throughout the war. One of the photographs, shows Marutian
    operating on a man with an open wound in his abdomen; another shows a
    heavily-bandaged teenager; a third shows a wounded soldier on
    crutches; a fourth shows a dying soldier with a nurse by his head...
    Marutian, the surgeon, sadly remembers: `If we had previously learned
    to expect artillery fire from Shushi... the shells were now flying in
    from Agdam and Khodzhalu... There was nowhere left to hide. It was
    hell in the hospital: the wounded were groaning and there weren't
    enough operating tables or doctors...'

    The victory over the enemy was won by the Armenians of Artsakh at the
    cost of huge losses among the civilian population and the
    freedom-fighters. The Azerbaijani army relied on mercenaries,
    instructors from Turkey and Afghan mujahideen; this motley
    conglomeration of killers stood up against the Armenian soldiers of
    Artsakh and those who had answered the call and volunteered to join
    them: doctors, teachers, archaeologists, historians, writers and also
    professional soldiers: Arkady Ter-Tadevosian, Felix Gzogian, Anatoly
    Zinevich, Christopher Ivanian... One photograph shows Monte Melkonian
    bending over a military map while conducting the defence of Martuni.
    While telling about the heroism of the freedom fighters, Baratov
    notes: `No, death held no terrors for any of them. They fought, so
    that they and future generations to come could live in Karabakh. Many
    of them fell in battle on Karabakh's stony ground and became part of
    that land for ever.'

    The documentary shots of the soldiers of the NKR Defence Army during
    moments of calm are notable. These images, drawn out from the thick of
    military reality, were made by the freedom-fighters themselves, as
    they quenched their thirst in the shade of a tree next to a tank.
    Below is another shot of the same detachment - the soldiers, exhausted
    from the fighting are washing their feet in a river. In the next shot,
    after their rest-break, the soldiers are walking behind the tanks over
    their newly-liberated homeland.

    Baratov views the epic Karabakh war from the point of view of the
    struggle between Good and evil, between Light and dark. Good and Light
    in the book are the bearers of the creative essence. The author
    considers their victory as only natural and never under any doubt:
    `The sole aim of the young NKR was for its people to be able to live
    and prosper. As the war continued and the noose of the blockade was
    drawn ever tighter, the government persisted in introducing reforms in
    the Republic. Despite the fact that many schools had been destroyed by
    bombs and rockets, children and students still received an education
    and new houses and roads continued to be built. They were forging the
    future. The fascists from Azerbaijan, on the other hand, only
    destroyed cities, villages, killed innocent women and children, and
    burned their bodies on bonfires'. The author quotes the comment of an
    English woman, Baroness Caroline Cox, who was witness to the savagery
    of the bigots at the end of the 20th Century: `During my trip to
    Nagorno-Karabakh in April 1992 as part of a mission from the human
    rights organisation `International Christian Solidarity', it became
    clear that the village of Maraga in the North of the region had been
    devastated by the Azerbaijanis and many civilians had been killed. The
    fact-finding group that set out for Maraga discovered the surviving
    inhabitants of the village in a state of shock, houses burned, charred
    bodies and bare human bones lying where people had had their heads cut
    off with saws and their bodies burned in front of the members of their
    families...'

    When the international tribunal takes place for the criminals who
    unleashed war against the Armenians of Artsakh, the heads of the
    Republic of Azerbaijan will be condemned as war criminals for
    committing crimes against humanity and civilization. Then, following
    on from the articles on the genocide of the Armenians in Sumgait,
    Baku, Kirovabad (the Armenian town of Gandzak) and in all the towns
    and villages of Artsakh-Karabakh, where Azerbaijani bandits were at
    `work', one of the charges brought against them will be that defined
    by Boris Baratov: `The fascists from Azerbaijan declared total war on
    the people of Karabakh. This meant that each time the NKR defence
    force defeated their armed forces, they avenged these defeats by
    punishing the civilian population with particular savagery and
    destroying the great and marvellous historical monuments in Artsakh
    (Karabakh)'.


    In the chapter `Paradise Laid Waste' (1995-1996) Baratov tells about
    his journey to the NKR after Azerbaijan had lost the war. Once again,
    as seven years before that in his book `The Angel', his eyes are drawn
    upwards to the shining peak of Ararat, to that sacred witness of world
    and Armenian history: `At one time, this twin-peaked giant had been at
    the very centre of the Armenian state, and Artsakh marked its eastern
    outskirts... [According to Biblical legend] Noah's Ark had come to rest
    on the peak of Mount Ararat 5,800 years before. The Armenian Ararat
    Kingdom of Van had reached the zenith of its prosperity 2,750 years
    previously. The battle of Avarayr had taken place 1,545 years before.
    The Karabakh war had been over for two years'.

    Because of the weather conditions, the helicopter he was flying to
    Stepanakert, landed close to the Artsakh town of Berdzor. It turned
    out that in the helicopter along with Baratov were members of the
    Minsk OSCE Conference Group on Karabakh and among them were the
    co-chairmen of the Minsk Conference: the Finnish First Deputy Minister
    of Foreign Affairs Heikki Talvitie and Vladimir Kazimirov, who then
    represented Russia. As they waited for cars from Stepanakert, the
    whole group took shelter from the rain in the hut of some friendly
    bridge-builders. During a light meal, an informal conversation began
    and the author noted that all the members of the Conference were
    trying to expand the negotiation process. Soon an aide from the NKR
    Ministry of Foreign Affairs arrived and at midnight, they all reached
    Shushi.

    The next day, the author visited the Shushi Church of the Saviour,
    which had been used by the enemy as a munitions store during the war.
    After the liberation of the town, the Armenians immediately started
    restoration work on the church. On leaving the church, the author
    noticed a book on sale in a kiosk close to the church, written by the
    head of the Artsakh Diocese, Bishop Pargev. The book begins with a
    wise statement: `The soul of every person sooner or later makes itself
    known...'

    On the gates of the ruined houses of Shushi, you could still see
    inscriptions dating back to the time of the war. On the recommendation
    of the mayor of Shushi, who himself came from Berdzor, Baratov asked
    his deputy Mr. Khachaturian - a man born and bred in Shushi - to help
    him learn more about the town. Khachaturian drew a map of the town for
    the author and indicated the historical monuments. Making large
    incursions into history, the author tells the reader about the
    principal landmarks of the history of Shushi and opens the heroic
    pages of the struggle of the Armenians of Artsakh (the defeat of the
    Turks at the foot of the fortress of Shushi in 1726 - 1727, as well as
    in 1733 and on other occasions).

    Baratov also tells the reader about the history of poet Vagif, who was
    a member of the nomadic Turkish Dzhevanshir tribe. A nomad in his
    poetry as well, Vagif was to become a participant of all the violence,
    conspiracy and killings, which the invader Ibrahim-khan instigated in
    Artsakh since Vagif was his secretary. Over several years, two princes
    of Khachen of the house of Hasan-Jalalian were killed, the Gandzasar
    Monastery, the spiritual centre of the Armenians of Artsakh, was
    looted and Catholicos Hovhannes was murdered... Two hundred years later
    in Shushi in 1982, a concrete tower known as `Vagif's Mausoleum' was
    set up. The head of the Azerbaijan SSR, Gaidar Aliev came to its
    opening. As Baratov writes: `This pyramid of reinforced concrete built
    200 years after his death, was not a mausoleum for Vagif, but a
    monument to an era. It was a sombre and ugly symbol of those lying
    times - an era of deportations, massacres and mass murders. This was a
    monument to a regime'. Before this, as the author notes, Aliyev had
    undertaken `the ethnic cleansing of the Nakhijevan Autonomous Republic
    and ensured that all the Armenians were deported from there without
    outcry. It was 1982. The Armenians would be deported from Shushi in
    six years' time and the war in Karabakh would break out three years
    after that.'

    In 1992, the town of Shushi was finally liberated thanks to the
    heroism of the Armenian freedom-fighters. The architect Movses
    Titanian, together with Bishop Pargev, took over supervision of the
    restoration work on the Church of the Saviour. The architect told
    Baratov about the building of a music school and a memorial spring,
    dedicated to two brothers who fell in the fighting for Artsakh. Movses
    had come from Yerevan. When he was faced with the choice between a
    contract to work in Belgium or coming as the architect to Shushi, he
    chose Atsakh, planning a wide-scale restoration work in Shushi.
    Walking up to the centre of the town, the author and Movses the
    architect passed along the streets of Shushi, ruined during the war.
    In the late 19th century, the writer Muratsan, the historian Leo, the
    artist Stepan Aghajanian, the sculptor Hakob Gyurjian, the actor
    Vagarsh Vagarshian and the composer Spiridon Melikian had all walked
    along these streets to the church on their way to becoming part of the
    fame of Armenian literature, historiography and art. In the Shushi
    municipal museum the author was delighted with an original exhibition
    of photographs on the cultural heritage of the town. The photographs
    of Armenian books and Armenian cultural figures reveal the magnificent
    world of Shushi in the 19th century, as a centre of Armenian education
    and culture.

    >From Shushi, the author set off for the settlement Dagrav, in the
    footsteps of the great Armenian author, Raffi. By a spring, where the
    writer himself had once stopped, a huge tree has grown up from the
    willow wand which Raffi had stuck into the earth in order to indicate
    the spot to set up the khachkar which lay on the ground nearby. As a
    result of the cultural journey around Artsakh, Raffi published his
    fundamental historical work in Tiflis, `The Meliks of Khamsa' (`Five
    Princedoms').

    Baratov's journey to the ancient Armenian settlement of Tsar and the
    monastery of Dadivank open up yet another tragic page from the recent
    war. Over the course of his whole journey along the river Tartar, he
    was forced to bypass blown-up bridges, drive round electricity lines
    lying across the road and burned out military vehicles at the
    roadside. The magnificent pictures of the Dadivank Monastery are
    permeated with the author's true reverence. In studying the frescoes
    at Dadivank, Baratov makes an interesting excursion into the history
    of the apostolic period of St. Thaddeus. Drawing upon information from
    the works of Armenian historians such as Movses Khorenatsi (5th
    century) on the Armenian King Abgar and the apostle Thaddeus and also
    Movses Kalankatuatsi (7th century) on the apostle Egishe, the author
    comes to the conclusion that Raffi was correct and that the Cathedral
    Church of the Dadivank Monastery, built in 1214, was built in honour
    of the apostle Thaddeus.

    Because of the occupation of the ancient Armenian Princedom of
    Gyulistan (now the Shaumian Region) in Northern Artsakh by Azerbaijani
    forces, the author only managed to photograph a small basilica and the
    ancient fortress of Gyulistan, which as a result of the aggression of
    the authorities in Baku lay in the neutral zone. The photograph of
    soldiers from the NKR Defence forces next to the Gyulistan fortress is
    symbolic. In 1813, the peace accord between Russia and Persia was
    signed outside the walls of this fortress. According to this
    agreement, Karabakh became part of the Russian Empire `in perpetuity'.

    Baratov has an interesting method of travelling through Artsakh.
    Sometimes he uses ancient maps and sets off to locate historic
    monuments; sometimes he takes his camera and goes down paths that
    resounded to the guns of war, showing the wounds of war in the land of
    Paradise; sometimes he follows scientists who have visited Artsakh to
    collect god-given evidence of the greatness of the Armenian
    spirituality and creativity. This is what Raffi did and so did Iosif
    (Hovsep) Orbeli. The author writes: `Compared to the delicate
    decoration which he had seen in the churches in Ani, these bas-reliefs
    at Koshik Anapat in Northern Karabakh struck him as rather crude in
    their execution, but he remained riveted by them'. I.Orbeli entitled
    his book `Bas-Reliefs of Everyday Scenes on the Khachen Stone Crosses
    of the 12th and 13th Centuries'. Baratov sees the roots of Orbeli's
    scientific and creative work also in the successful expedition to Van
    in 1916. And so, interrupting his journey across Artsakh, our author
    follows Orbeli in his expedition to Van. Orbeli preferred to trust the
    assertions of Movses Khorenatsi and discovered the cuneiform
    inscription dating back to the time of the Ararat Armenian Kingdom of
    Van on the Van Cliffs. This inscription makes mention of Urtekhi and
    is the most ancient cuneiform reference to the name of Artsakh.

    After visiting the head of the Artsakh Diocese of the Armenian
    Apostolic Church at his residence in Shushi, one hundred metres from
    the Church of Christ the Saviour, the author writes the following
    about him: `He was a true intellectual and knew a great deal; Armenian
    history seemed like an open book to him. On the other hand, he was a
    profound believer, with the responsibility for a diocese, which had
    been reduced to ruins by the Soviet era. He wanted nothing more than
    to restore it'.

    At Berdzor, Baratov visited the Kashatakh Museum, which was founded
    due the efforts of the historian Aleksan Hakobian, the archaeologist
    Hakob Simonian and the Armenian monuments' researcher Samvel
    Karapetian. `The photographs opened up yet another visible page of the
    history of the ancient Armenian principalities of Artsakh and Syunik,
    of which this land had once been part.' The architectural beauty of
    the Titsernavank Monastery is shown in the photographs in this book.

    A group of photographs, in which the author captured the terrible
    wounds of war is particularly symbolic: the Church of the Blessed
    Virgin in the village of Arakyul, which was shelled by the Azerbaijani
    army; the dignified faces of an elderly couple, Gretta and Andrei
    Balayans, who have returned to their home after deportation to find
    that all that remains are ashes and - a flowering red rose bush
    nearby.

    The interchange of landscapes and historical monuments in the book -
    the palace of Prince Yegan, the Church of Togh, Amaras, Vankasar,
    Dadivank, Gandzasar, the capitol of the ancient Armenian church close
    to the Monastery of Bri Ekhtsi, the ruins of the 11th century
    Monastery of Varazgom, the bell-tower of the village of Amutegh, where
    according to legend, relics are buried which are linked to the name of
    the great Armenian military leader, Sparapet St. Vardan Mamikonian,
    the bridges over the river Araks and the river Ishkhanaget - give the
    reader a feeling of participation, as he journeys with the author
    along his whole route throughout these Armenian lands. The beauty of
    the natural surroundings of Artsakh is complemented by photographs of
    Artsakh carpets. The author has the following to say about the people
    who created these carpets: `Every young Armenian girl started to weave
    a carpet from her early girlhood, as part of her dowry. Today these
    hand-woven Artsakh-Karabakh carpets are famous throughout the world'.


    In the chapter `Twenty Years On', the author considers the election of
    a new President in 2007 in accordance with international standards, a
    milestone worthy of note. This is confirmation that the NKR has truly
    established itself as a state. The author considers 2007 was a
    significant year for Artsakh. All the regions of the NKR marked
    celebrations for various reasons. Archbishop Pargev blessed the
    newly-built Church of St. Hakob in Stepanakert. On 9th May a new
    general plan for the town of Shushi was unveiled. The excavations at
    Tigranakert in Artsakh on Mount Vankasar were also crowned with
    success. As the author notes, the grandiose scale of the walls of the
    Artsakh Tigranakert - one of the several cities built by Tigran II the
    Great and all given the name of Tigranakert - links it with the
    capital of Great Armenia, Tigranakert, built in Aldznik (in Western
    Armenia). In 2004 the author took photographs of the capital of Great
    Armenia and they were also featured in his book `The Armeniad', as
    well as in his latest book `The Chronicles of Karabakh.'

    The author's comment upon his arrival in Shushi twenty years on is
    worthy of note: `We had been wandering around Shushi for several days.
    When I say `we', I mean Anna and her notebook and pen and me and my
    Hasselblad... Bishop Pargev had become an archbishop. He had completed
    the restoration of the Cathedral of the Saviour in Shushi...' A
    bird's-eye view reveals the glorious panorama of the town. `It was no
    longer a town that had been burnt to the ground... it is not only the
    mayor's office and the school and the restaurants and the hotel and
    the bank and the music school that are now functioning in Shushi, but
    art centres, craft shops and tourist centres are being set up as
    well.'

    The pictures of military generals: Arkady Ter-Tadevosian, Vardan
    Balaian, Felix Gzogian, and soldiers from the detachments of the NKR
    Defence Forces during the military parade tell of the celebrations of
    the 62nd anniversary of the victory over Fascist Germany and the 15th
    anniversary of the liberation of Shushi. We see Archbishop Pargev and
    the members of the government during a church service in the Cathedral
    Church of Shushi, with Generals Movses Hakobian and Levon
    Mnatsakanian, the NKR President Bako Saakian and military exercises by
    the solders of the NKR Defence Forces. These shots inspire confidence
    in the steadfastness of the Armenian people in the defence and
    strengthening of the power of their Fatherland.

    This defence is provided for, both on the battlefield and on the
    ideological front. Despite the trustworthy evidence of Leonid Gurunts
    about the anti-Armenian policies of Azerbaijan during Soviet rule
    (`The friendship between nations. That wonderful phrase slips very
    easily off the tongue, doesn't it? But what remains of our friendship,
    if you were to take Karabakh, Baku, Kirovabad or Nakhidzhevan as
    examples? This year of 1975 is a year of the triumphal procession of
    Azerbaijani nationalism, Azerbaijani patriotism. Such a wild outburst
    of nationalism, such a wide-scale flight of Armenians from the
    republic [the Azerbaijan SSR] has never been seen before, even during
    the ferocity of the Bagirov era.'), the `journalist' Thomas de Vaal in
    his book `The Black Garden', which has run to two editions in English
    and was then printed in Russian, distorts the history of Artsakh and
    gives a garbled version of the evidence. He `purposefully forms a
    picture in the reader's mind, crudely distorting the events of
    1988-1994 in Karabakh'. Before the Turkish and Azerbaijani aggressors
    and their political mentors distort and remould the history of
    Karabakh to fit in with their view, they would do well to remember the
    confession of the Azerbaijani journalist Elmar Guseinov, quoted in
    Baratov's book: `We lost the war, because we weren't fighting for our
    own territory. Our refugees had no desire to return, because this
    wasn't their land...' It is highly characteristic of the morals of the
    Azerbaijani authorities and their abortive society that `the
    newspapers Elmar Guseinov edited were shut down and he was shot four
    times at point-blank range in the entrance hall of his house. He paid
    a heavy price for telling the truth about the Karabakh war. Thomas de
    Vaal fails to mention him.'

    The lies of Thomas de Vaal are only part of the huge lie which Turkish
    and Azerbaijani political leaders and their allies and mentors on the
    international area repeat in unison.

    In order to look at Western Armenia and Armenian Cilicia, the author
    had to travel by ferry from Sochi over the Black Sea and then drive
    through the cities of Western Armenia - Ani, Kars, Balesh (Bitlis) -
    to the Mediterranean. The pictures of the Armenian monuments Baratov
    took during this journey: the walls of Ani, the Church of the Holy
    Cross in Akhtamar, the fortress of Kars, the fortress towers of Ayas,
    the castle of Lambron, the port of Corycus, the citadel of Sis and the
    fortress of Hromkla - are all evidences of the historical truth. The
    author writes: `It is understandable why the government of modern-day
    Turkey has no desire to admit to the Genocide of the Armenians, since
    that would require them to pay out compensation and give Armenians the
    right to return to their historic homelands in Western Armenia and
    Cilicia... From the moment that the victorious nations coined the term
    `international obligations' and `international guarantees', they have
    always ended in tragedy for the Armenian people. This has been the
    same for the Armenians of Cilicia, the Armenians of Western Armenia,
    the Armenians of the First Republic of Armenia and the Armenians of
    Karabakh in 1914-1920'.

    At the contemporary stage of the renaissance and development of
    Armenian statehood in the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of
    Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) external political factors are to a
    considerable extent being moved off at a tangent on the so-called
    regulation of the `Karabakh conflict'. Instead of signing an act of
    capitulation, the over-thrown aggressor - the Republic of Azerbaijan -
    has, under the patronage of external powers, sat down at the
    negotiating table, in an attempt to find loop-holes for re-asserting
    its colonial regime. At the same time, in the full view of the world
    community, the pan-Turkish alliance of the Republic of Azerbaijan and
    the Republic of Turkey have been engaged in an act of state terrorism
    in blockading the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of
    Nagorno-Karabakh for the last 20 years.

    The victory of the Armenian liberation forces was achieved at a price
    of a huge number of victims and the heroism of the Armenian
    freedom-fighters. This victory was natural, for it sprang from the
    restitution of historic justice and the peaceful creativity of the
    Armenian people from time immemorial. Now the war is being continued
    on an informational, diplomatic and psychological level; at the
    borders shots continue to be exchanged because the over-thrown
    aggressor has not been punished in accordance with international law
    and cannot calmly accept defeat. The political interests of major
    powers continue to colour the assessment of the crimes which have been
    committed and continue to be committed to this day by genocidal Turkey
    and its underling Azerbaijan.

    The blood of the freedom-fighters which has been shed on the altar of
    the Fatherland represents the resplendent holy myrrh of the spiritual
    temple of freedom and creation. On the way to the summit of the
    magnificent Mount Dizapayt in Artsakh, there is a khachkar with an
    eagle and a cross `in memory of those who prevented the enemy from
    entering Hadrut'. On reaching the summit of Dizapayt, the author
    writes with the unconcealed joy of a trail blazer: `If there had been
    no ancient legends and stories about the Kataro Monastery, someone
    would have had to have invented them, in order to persuade men to
    climb to the top of Dizapayt and glory in the beauty of the world'.
    His climb to the summit was rewarded with the discovery of a spiritual
    peace in the church, where the pilgrims who reach the summit of
    Dizapayt `pray for illnesses to be cured and speak to God about their
    dearest wishes. People believe that in this solitary church in the
    clouds, the Almighty will hear their voice'.

    The shot of the interior of the church reflects the atmosphere of
    spirituality and warmth, radiating from the hearts of the believers.
    On the altar, next to the candles is a notebook, which contains the
    heartfelt, `precious messages, which strike to the depth of the human
    soul, from the women, men and children of Artsakh to God'. As the
    author puts it, a `prayer of a hard-working and noble people has
    resounded on the summit of Dizapayt. It is a Prayer for Peace'.

    Many leading scientists and artistic figures from various countries
    have put a high value on the contribution of Armenian culture to the
    treasure-store of world culture. Victory in the war of liberation
    needs to be reinforced every day and every hour, both by healing,
    peaceful construction and the strengthening of the defence of the
    Fatherland, and also by the protection, development and dissemination
    of civilised values. Boris Baratov's book serves this aim, as it is an
    important contribution to the preservation of the historic memory of
    generations of great actions on the part of our ancestors and the
    heroic victory in the Artsakh Patriotic war.

    Eduard L. Danielyan, Doctor of History




    From: A. Papazian
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