Spotlight Artsakh

Irina Merdinyan traveled into the heart of a tragedy to help the forcibly displaced Armenians of Artsakh. In the midst of that experience, she was confronted with pain, confusion, anger and fleeting moments of joy.

Several hundred forcibly displaced people from Artsakh have found refuge in the Armenian village of Ranchpar. As they struggle to make sense of their loss and create a new life, they hang on to the hope that, like the storks of the village who return each year, they too will one day return to their native Artsakh.

With women and girls making up over half of the displaced people from Artsakh, what kinds of health and safety risks are they facing, and who is there to help?

Specialists from the Ministry of Internal Affairs are working to alleviate the anxiety of the forcibly displaced children from Artsakh by offering psychological first aid. Their journey is captured in this photo story by Ani Gevorgyan.

As the ethnically cleansed Armenians of Artsakh streamed into Goris, they were met with hundreds of volunteers, among them diasporan Armenians, many of whom now feel a deeper connection and a stronger sense of purpose.

As the forcibly displaced Armenians of Artsakh struggle to comprehend the magnitude of their loss, memories of the homes and lives they were forced to leave behind suffocate them. Theirs is a story of being ripped from their roots, of pain and dispossession.

More than 500 forcibly displaced Armenians from Artsakh are now in the village of Zorak in Armenia’s Ararat region, where several families are living together in one house, some even in their trucks. Photojournalist Ani Gevorgyan tells their story.

Over 100,000 forcibly displaced Armenians of Artsakh are now in Armenia facing the crippling challenge of starting over after losing everything. They also face an uncertain future with regard to their status.

Mellisa, a six-year-old from the village of Harav in besieged Artsakh, should have started first grade this year. However, she will not be attending school, and neither will her four older siblings.

If they had survived it, and done so with grace and empathy, then what is to prevent us from doing the same, writes Shoushan Keshishian, about Vasuki, a survivor of the blockade of Jaffna, Sri Lanka.