South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
Armenians torch their homes on land ceded to Azerbaijan
KALBAJAR, Azerbaijan — In a bitter farewell to his home of 21 years, Garo Dadevusyan wrenched off itsmetal roof and prepared to set the stone house on fire. Thick smoke poured from houses that his neighbors had already torched before fleeing this ethnic Armenian village about to come under Azerbaijani control.
The village is to be turned over to Azerbaijan on Sunday as part of territorial concessions in an agreement to end sixweeks of intense fighting with Armenian forces. The move gripped its 600 people with fear and anger so deep that they destroyed the homes they once loved.
The settlement — called Karvachar in Armenian — is legally part of Azerbaijan, but it has been under the control of ethnic Armenians since the 1994 end of a war over the NagornoKarabakh region. That war left not only NagornoKarabakh itself but substantial surrounding territory in Armenian hands.
After years in which sporadic clashes broke out between Azerbaijani and Armenian forces, full-scale fighting began in late September. Azerbaijan made relentless military advances, culminating in the seizure of the city of Shusha, a strategically key city and one of strong emotional significance as a longtime center of Azeri culture.
Two days after Azerbaijan announced it had taken Shusha, Armenia andAzerbaijan signed a Russia-brokered cease-fire under which territory that Armenia occupies outside the formal borders ofNagornoKarabakh will be gradually ceded.
Muslim Azeris and Christian Armenians once lived together in these regions, however uneasily. Although the cease-fire ends the fighting, it aggravates ethnic animosity.
“In the end, we will blow it up or set it on fire, in order not to leave anything to Muslims,” Dadevusyan said of his house.
He spoke while taking a rest fromsalvagingwhat he could from the home, including metal roof panels, and piling it onto an old flatbed truck.
The truck’s final destinationwas unclear.
“We are homeless now, do not know where to go and where to live. ... It is very hard,” Dadevusyan’s wife, Lusine, said.
Dadevusyan’sdismay extended to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Armenia and Russia keep close relations and Russia has a sizable military base in Armenia, so many Armenians had hoped for support from Moscow. Instead, Russia facilitated the ceasefire and territorial concessions and is sending in nearly 2,000 peacekeepers to enforce it.
On Saturday, miles-long lines of cars and trucks carrying fleeing residents jammed the road to Armenia.
Scores of local people flocked to Dadivank, an Armenian Apostolic Church monastery dating to the9th century, aspriests removed sacred items to be taken away. Many of the visitors took photos of themselves at the site nestled in the mountains near Karvachar, suggesting they did not expect to see it again.
Hundreds of thousands of Azeriswere displaced by the war that ended in 1994. It is unclear when any civilians might try to settle in Karvachar — which will now be known by its Azeri name Kalbajar — or elsewhere.
Any returns could be wrenching. Agdam, which is to be turned over this week, once was a city of about 40,000, but nowis an empty sprawl of buildings that were destroyed in the first war or later ruined by pillagers grabbing building materials.