The idea to open a WikiClub in Stepanakert emerged in 2015, when the Armenian chapter of Wikimedia decided to set up WikiClubs in Artsakh as well as Armenia. Back then, I was a student at the Department of International relations of Yerevan State University, finishing my graduate studies and simultaneously editing the Armenian Wikipedia. When […]
MY NAME IS ANI, А DREAMY GIRL FIGHTING FOR HER DREAMS
When someone changes jobs frequently, switching career lanes, they say that the person cannot find themselves. Six years ago, I might have thought of myself this way, or said so if asked about my work. While studying at the Department of Economics and Law of the Artsakh State University, I worked as a hotel administrator. […]
ARMENIA AND ROMANIA: LEARNING FROM EACH OTHER
When you tell a European that you are from Armenia, you often get a clarifying question, “Romania?” The names of Armenia and Romania certainly sound similar. There is also some similarity in the histories of Armenia and Romania: both were under Byzantine and Ottoman rule, both served as battlefields in the Turkish-Russian wars, both were […]
BEING A MINORITY IN ROMANIA: FEATURES OF POLITICS AND LEGISLATION
Romania constitutes one of the little known cases of ethnic coexistence and political cohabitation. Some observers see the relations between the central government and ethnic groups as strained, while other experts look at the relations as a successful case of cohabitation. A country of 19.5 million people, 10.5 % of which is composed of ethnic […]
MY ADVENTURE IN ARMENIA
Well, that’s actually my first time at an institute writing my thesis, I had no clue about the environment I was about to meet and to stay for a while. Once again I was a frightened kid on his first day at school. I must admit that I was expecting meeting some kind of ancient gods […]
ZHANNA’S WAR MEMORIES: THAT VERY PERSON
Stepanakert, May 1994. A few days after the signing of the ceasefire agreement, I worked all day doing interviews and reports. In the evening, we went out for dinner with my friends. We chose a recently opened joint (it’s hard to say what it was: partcafé, part restaurant and part canteen), and it made us […]
SECRET CONVERSATIONS ON THE KARABAKH CONFLICT
In almost 25 years of visiting Armenia, Azerbaijan and Karabakh I’ve had hundreds of conversations about the conflict with all sorts of different people, from politicians to farmers. I’ve heard the same views expressed hundreds of times, with interlocutors telling me how justice is on their side and the other side is the aggressor. There […]
DERLUGUIAN: ILHAM ALIEV MIGHT SUDDENLY CHANGE THE GAME AND BECOME A PEACE-MAKER
“I actually see a prospect of normalization in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. It could be very sudden.” – Georgi M. Derluguian, Associate Professor, Social Research and Public Policy at New York University Abu Dhabi “The international environment currently engulfing the South Caucasus is facing an unknown future. All three regional powers surrounding the South Caucasus – […]
ZHANNA’S WAR MEMORIES: SISTER
In autumn 1991 large-scale artillery shelling and aerial bombardment of Stepanakert were launched. The life of the city moved to basements. The evacuation was almost impossible. I heard a lot of stories about that period of time, about life in basements. I heard stories about the children who managed to get out of basements in […]
ALEXAN HAKOBYAN – THE STATUS-QUO IN NAGORNO-KARABAKH WAS KEPT THROUGH PASSIVE MEANS DURING THESE 20 YEARS
An interview with Alexan Hakobyan, Member of the Karabakh Committee, PhD in History. The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict: Do we speak more about war than peace? Mr Hakobyan, why do the parties to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict at the international level, i.e. in the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group, speak about a peaceful resolution, yet within the […]