Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Tbilisi: Measured potential for peacebuilding

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Tbilisi: Measured potential for peacebuilding

    Messenger.ge, Georgia
    Aug 3 2004

    Measured potential for peacebuilding
    Azeris and Armenians in Tbilisi feel removed from their homelands'
    distant conflict

    By Keti Sikharulidze

    Armenians and Azerbaijanis share many cultural similarities - in
    music, education and cuisine. Moreover, significant segments of both
    populations believe that their religious differences do not matter -
    says the results of a recent sociological survey conducted by
    Armenian and Azerbaijani researchers.

    Another notable result of the survey is that the majority of
    Azerbaijani refugees from Nagorno-Karabagh believe they can live in
    peace and friendship with their Armenian neighbors.

    While announcing the results last Wednesday at the Caucuses
    International Center of Journalists in Tbilisi, Professor Jeffrey
    Halley from the University of Texas Department of Sociology, said
    that both sides are eager to support this project. "People think that
    a closer social and economic relationship will help to resolve the
    conflict," he said.

    "The Azerbaijani population declared that a closer economic and
    military relationship would help resolve the problems. But while
    Armenians think the problems will be solved only if Azerbaijan agrees
    that Nagorno-Karabagh belongs to Armenia, they also declared that
    Azerbaijan refugees must return to their homes," said Professor
    Halley.

    As implied in its title - On the potential of the Azerbaijani and
    Armenian Peoples for Peacebuilding and Post-Conflict Cooperation -
    the survey aimed to measure the possibility of building a closer
    relationship between the people of the two countries.

    Approximately 1,000 people from Azerbaijan and 1,000 from Armenia
    were surveyed in 2003, as well as 200 Azeri refugees (IDPs) from
    Nagorno-Karabagh and 200 Armenians currently living in that region,
    which they claim as their own. Participants came from all age groups,
    with the majority aged between 26 and 60.

    According to the survey, both sides stressed that this conflict can
    be resolved only through working together. But as Halley told
    journalists, the Armenian and Azeri people blame their governments
    for this conflict, although many people in both countries felt
    strongly that forces beyond their government play a role in
    prolonging the conflict.

    Asked if the situation would change if the survey was held now in
    2004 instead of 2003, the president of the Armenian Sociological
    Association Roubina Ter-Martirosyan said: "We live in a dynamic
    world, and if we held this survey this year the situation would
    change for the better."

    Dr Sevil Asadova from Azerbaijan said that the results would not be
    markedly different, and added: "We have determined how to establish
    closer relations and have found the key to this problem. Our main aim
    was to learn what these people thought about this problem."

    Many Azerbaijanis and Armenian's living in Tbilisi, however, told The
    Messenger that these problems are distant for them, especially since
    they consider Georgia is now their homeland.

    "I do not know what is happening there, we are in a vacuum and know
    nothing. As it is far from me I do not feel their troubles and need,"
    said market clerk Valia Avakian, whose ancestors are Armenian.

    Saying that she personally could not imagine why Azerbaijan and
    Armenia should have a conflict, she added her family "is more
    concerned with the problems in Georgia rather than in Armenia and
    Azerbaijan. I am ashamed to say so, but it is true"

    An ethnic Azeri Ilgar Mamedov told The Messenger that he enjoys "very
    good relations with Armenians in Georgia."

    "When we meet each other, we try not to speak about that conflict at
    all to avoid embarrassment," he said.
Working...
X