Recently the pan-Armenian Forum of heads and representatives of Armenian society took place in the Yerevan Sports and Concert Centre. The centre is named after Karen Demirchyan, a good son of Armenia, who was killed by Armenian nationalists in 1999 in the parliament of Armenia. At that time the world saw the bestial grin of stupid, unreasonable and cruel nationalism.
The initiators of the forum repudiated a speech by the leader of the Dzhavakhk community, Agasi Arabyan. The reason for it is the position of the head of the Armenian delegation from Tbilisi, Van Bayburt. He is guilty in simple conscientiousness toward the country of which he is a citizen. Probably this feature was displayed in this event too.
However, Arabyan’s ideas have found reflection in the Yerkramas newspaper, which has a certain character. This character coincides with the direction of Armenian-Georgian relations imposed by such “Arabyans.”
A thesis on the absence of value reference points against the background of pseudo-patriotic pathos. Thus, value reference points are provocations and exaggerations of problems, conflicts instead of proper work on settling the problems that appear during the establishment of new statehood and civil integration in a complex multiethnic society.
The key point of Arabyan on Dzhavakheti Armenians is that they are a part of the Armenian community. This is offensive for Armenians, as the Armenians living in Georgia are not a community, they are a native population of the country. It doesn’t matter when and how they settled there. They have been living here for centuries, they are an indispensible part of Georgia, where today a civil nation is forming, for the first time in history. Crucially, there was no environment for civil (not religious or ethnic) identification. However, Mr. Arabyan doesn’t see this.
Unfortunately, I don’t speak Armenian and I don’t know what Akhaltsikhe, Akhalkalaki and Ninotsminda mean in Armenian, as they were called by Arabyan Dzhavakhk towns. But I know what they mean in Georgian: New Castle, New City and St. Nino. However, I don’t want to lower myself to the level of ethnic national discussion.
There are facts and their interpretation. Which point of view is right is up to the reader’s choice. For example, why do Armenians leave Aspindza, Borzhomi, Adigeni? “No jobs or good social conditions.” However, Georgians live there in the same conditions. Why don’t they leave then? Why don’t the majority of Armenians leave? Because they consider Georgia to be their motherland, don’t they? As for ethnic identification, how many state schools, where children are taught in Armenian, are there in Russia, France or the USA? In Georgia there are dozens of them.
As for learning the Georgian language in order to work for the state, the authorities of the country understand that learning the state language is a difficult and long-term process. They are not getting stuck on it. It is more important to get people to trust the authorities and be able to communicate with them directly. Otherwise there would be no officials of Armenian origin in Akhalkalaki and Ninotsminda. But there are.
A flexible approach leads local Armenians becoming interested in the Georgian language. And Armenian is considered to be a regional language. Legalization of this reality is a question of time and understanding that the regional language could be launched parallel to the state one.
Arabyan complains that the Georgian laws forbid the establishment of political parties according to ethnic origin. And they are right. Georgia is trying to build a civil society, where citizenship is the crucial factor of social and political motivation.
The current president of Georgia (unlike Zavid Gamsakhurdia) has never been accused of Armenophobia. Moreover, some Georgian chauvinists accuse Saakashvili of hidden Armenophilia, and try to find Armenian roots in his surname. They blame him for the equalization of the Georgian and Armenian Churches, the building of an excellent highway between Dzavakheti and Armenia, and Dzavakheti and Tbilisi, and so on.
The nationalistic concern of Georgian chauvinists is similar to the exaggerated emotions of their Armenian colleagues. Let’s hope that both Georgian and Armenian peoples will be wise enough to cast out them.
Georgy Kalatozishvili, Tbilisi. Exclusively to VK.
