The Armenians and Azerbaijani in Tbilisi

David Stepanyan, Yerevan-Tbilisi. Exclusively to Vestnik Kavkaza

Six Armenian and 6 Azerbaijani journalists discussed opportunities for peacemaking between the nations at the journalist workshop “Professional Ethics and Journalists’ Role in the Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict” which took place in Tbilisi in early December. The meeting was organized by the International Alert British non-governmental organization. It was the third such workshop; the first one took place in the UK in December 2011; the second – in Bosnia and Herzegovina in March 2013.

According to the International Alert manager, Marina Nagai, the Tbilisi meeting was one of components of a wider project on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict within EPNK, where Alert participated along with four other European organizations. Two projects by Alert were combined at the Tbilisi workshop: an expert dialogue on studying other conflicts and working with Armenian and Azerbaijani journalists. Journalists had an opportunity to talk to each other and put questions to leading Armenian and Azerbaijani experts in the sphere of civil peacemaking – Mikel Zolyan from Yerevan and Avaz Gasanov from Baku. Experts Togrul Juvarly and Arut Mansuryan presented the film “Memories without Borders” on refugees from Armenia and Azerbaijan. Journalist Margarita Akhvlediani conducted professional trainings.

The Tbilisi meeting was subtitled “It is better to talk than to fight.”  Participants forgot about emotions and tried to listen to and understand each other. For some young journalists from both groups a meeting with Armenians/Azerbaijanis was first in their lives and they were confused a bit. Reality was too different from a picture painted by the propaganda machinery. The Tbilissi meeting was a rare opportunity for a dialogue between Armenian and Azerbaijani journalists who have similar problems in their work.

A common thread of the event was necessity of following journalist ethics. In the end, mutual hatred in both societies is exaggerated not only by politicians, but also journalists. If politicians do it in their own interests, reasons for such a behavior by journalists are unclear. Mutual hatred is clearly not in the interests of the two nations, especially in the context of renewal of the negotiating process on settlement of the Karabakh conflict after two years of silence.