Federica Di Sario

The war in Nagorno-Karabakh saw many young diaspora Armenians returning to their ancestral motherland in the attempt to make themselves useful in every way possible.

The Zvartnots airport was already familiar to Swiss-Armenian artist Thénie (she asked not to share her surname out of privacy concerns), who used to travel extensively to her ancestors’ motherland over the past years. This time, though, her feelings were not quite the same when she arrived at the airport ten kilometres west from Yerevan, Armenia, and neither were those of the rest of the people on the plane. A week earlier, on September 27th, renewed fighting had erupted along the line of contact in Nagorno-Karabakh, the bone of contention of an over 30-year long antagonism between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and showed no signs of resolving itself soon.

It had taken her a few days to realise that what was going on had little to do with what the country had experienced so far, and a week to take the decision to pack her stuff and leave for Armenia. “I had no idea how I was going to make myself useful once I would have arrived, but I knew I couldn’t keep working in an awkwardly calm environment,” she recalls. “Remaining in Geneva pretending nothing had changed had become intolerable.”

When the fighting began in late September, there was nothing to suggest that things would have diverged from the usual script: in July, similar skirmishes had lasted several days before fading away, while 2016 had witnessed a bloody confrontation going on for four days.

In retrospect, such naivety has now a bitter taste for Thénie: “The Azeris had a sophisticated strategy: their repeated attacks had the effect of an anaesthetic, fooling us we were set to stay in limbo forever.” The limbo she alluded to was the “frozen conflict” people under the age of 30 had always known as their sole reality, despite the ongoing clashes at the border.

Displaced children from Nagorno-Karabakh attend the art workshops conducted by Thenie and Maida.

Since 1994, when the first Karabakh war drew to a close, the enclave had remained under the control of ethnic Armenians, although the lack of a definitive peace treaty had accustomed the people of Karabakh to coexist with repeated ceasefire violations.

But this September, differently from previous flare-ups, Azerbaijan could rely on Turkey’s outspoken backing, which took the form of costly drones and mercenaries from Syria, a scenario for which Armenia’s military forces were dramatically unprepared.

There is so much to be done: Just like Thénie, an unclear number of diaspora Armenians has flocked to the tiny Caucasian state ever since the outbreak of the conflict, urged by an indistinct need to participate in the war efforts.

With an estimated diaspora of 7 million, which is nearly twice the local population, Armenian descendants living abroad are well known for being responsive whenever the motherland calls, typically making donations and advocating for the nation’s interests. But when mounting hostilities made clear the country needed a different type of assistance, many 20- and 30-year-old chose not to go missing.

Birthright Armenia, an association whose purpose is to facilitate the integration of diaspora young people during peacetime, said to have received 46 applications for both short- and long-term programmes, partly recovering the blow provoked by coronavirus fears at the start of the year.

In order to meet a growing list of needs, the institution has shifted its offerings to allow incoming volunteers to help out where needed. “Now more than ever, our country is in need of all sorts of specialists, not just social workers and psychologists: we’re aware anyone has something to bring to the table,” says Sevan Kabakian, who acts as country director. “But we don’t want Armenia to become a charity case: those who come for volunteering are encouraged to build a meaningful relationship with the country.”

Children participate in Thenie and Maida’s art workshop. The UN estimates that over 100,000 people were displaced in the six-week-long conflict.

While the association offers a reliable framework to the diaspora, many prefer to come with little or no planning, trusting their connections and the country’s notorious resourcefulness.

Case in point, by her second day, Thénie had found a partner, Maïda Chavak, a French-Armenian illustrator with whom she started organising art workshops for children coming from the war zones. For over a month, the two artists have visited several of the social centres that were created overnight in response to the rising number of displaced families in Yerevan.

“We went wherever there was a structure seeking what we had to offer, contacts often came by word of mouth, which means most of the times our schedule was decided on the very same day,” Maïda explains.

“At first, I wished I were a surgeon! I assumed that, as an artist, I didn’t have something valuable enough to offer in a state of war, but I quickly changed my mind when I realised there is so much to be done,” she says, unconsciously repeating an observation I’d heard from Thénie too.

A generational moment

For young diaspora Armenians like Thénie and Maïda, the war deflagrated in Nagorno-Karabakh is far from happening in a vacuum, but looks rather as the culmination of an existential threat that has its point of origin in the genocide perpetrated against ethnic Armenians in 1915.

At that time, 1.5 million Christian Armenians living under the Ottoman Empire were killed, marking the first genocide of the past century. Nowadays, many Turkish officials continue to deny that the massacre has actually happened, making it even harder for Armenians to overcome such a traumatic legacy.

For this reason, running into a war zone may seem like a no-brainer for a generation that has grown up with the idea that it has to fight for their land.

A child showcases their artwork resulting from a workshop organised for displaced children in Nagorno-Karabakh.

“When we talk about the Armenian diaspora, we first need to understand why there’s been one in the first place,” says Sevana Tchakerian, a French-Armenian musician and educator who found herself in Yerevan at the beginning of the war and cancelled a tour to conduct music workshops for displaced kids.

“Hadn’t there been a genocide, we would have never left our country. What we are witnessing is an echo of what our grandparents have been through”.

What makes people run into a war zone