My mother has two dates of birth: one on her passport, and the real one. He was born in January in the late 60s in Beirut, Lebanon. But since his birth was not registered for another 10 weeks, official documents gave the date in March. With every phone call he made to the bank or prescription he picked up at the pharmacy, when asked for his date of birth to confirm his identity, he was forced to give a false confirmation.
Immigrant families like mine know that what’s on paper isn’t always true. Sometimes the paper tells little fibs, like my mother’s date of birth, and sometimes the paper tells monstrous lies that affect millions of people.
For the last century, Turkey has used the power of paper to deny the Armenian genocide. Textbook of Turkish history teach young students that there is no genocide; instead, the Turks fell victim to Armenian aggression, leaving them with no choice but to target the traitors who conspired against them. A Turkish textbook estimates that 57,000 Armenians died. Although the actual number will never be known, historians put it in around 1.5 million.
This history of violence is being repeated today. But many people know nothing about Azerbaijan’s recent attacks on Armenians in the Caucasus because, over the past four years, limited coverage has often distorted the truth.
In 2020, with the support of Turkey, Azerbaijan started the latest genocidal campaign against the Armenians, this time in the Artsakh region, also known as Nagorno-Karabakh. Although this autonomous region is inhabited and controlled by Armenians, the owners of the land are seized on paper.
Claiming this land as its own, Azerbaijan civilians were beheaded. It was a blast residential area with cluster ammunition. Even after a ceasefire was called in November 2020, attacks continued and tensions rose. Then, from December 2022, Azerbaijan trapped and starved the men, women and children of Artsakh under an illegal blockade, cutting off access to food, medicine and humanitarian aid. In September, after nine months of psychological and physical torture, Azerbaijan launched the last attack which would force the territory to surrender and the Armenian population to flee, in effect ethnically cleansing Artsakh of a people.
While Armenians from Artsakh are documenting and sharing the horror of the mass exodus on social media, Armenians in the diaspora are witnessing the suffering and watching – in real time – a modern reiteration of the death march that our ancestors took. Meanwhile, the international community failed to see beyond what was said on paper.
Much of the little joint reporting that has been done on this conflict – reporting that has largely disappeared over the past year – will include some version of the misleading claim that Artsakh is making. internationally recognized as Azerbaijan. In other words, among the first facts often established by the media in Artsakh is that the land belongs to Azerbaijan on paper, creating a sense of justifying its violence.
The statement is a lie; it is true but not true. In the 1920s, though The population of Artsakh is 90% ArmenianThe USSR debated which Soviet republic of the region would be officially aligned with. Armenia is poor and facing a refugee crisis after the Armenian genocide, while Azerbaijan is sitting on huge reserves of oil. So, the Soviet Union prioritized economy over autonomy.
For decades, Armenians have been petitioning to change the borders. More than 100,000 arguedemanding recognition of Artsakh as Armenia. They were denied the change for fear of provoking demands for further border adjustments by countries throughout the Soviet Union. When the USSR collapsed in 1991, war broke out in Artsakh between the majority ethnic Armenian and Azerbaijani populations. The war continued for years, killing more than 30,000 people on both sides, until in the end, Armenia won. But still, the border does not change on paper. Despite being inhabited and controlled by Armenians, and operating as an unofficial extension of Armenia, Artsakh remains “internationally recognized as Azerbaijan.”
Since losing the military in the 90s, Azerbaijan has been working a state-sponsored cultural eradication campaign similar to Turkish tactics. In Azerbaijani literature, positive references to Armenia or Armenians have been removed. It’s as if we can’t be in Azerbaijan, unlike fictional characters.
And now, we can no longer be in Artsakh. In September, a the decree was signed stated that the region will dissolve and cease to exist as of January 1, 2024. Currently, the Armenian region of Artakh no longer exists on paper.
With Artakh, Azerbaijan is getting closer to achieving its joint goals with Turkey. If you look at the map, you will see that the only thing between Azerbaijan and Turkey, on paper and land, is Armenia and, therefore, Armenians. Officials in the country described the Turks and Azeri as “one nation, two countries,” which explains the long-standing intention to connect the disjointed borders build transportation corridors through Armenia. This would clearly violate Armenia’s territorial sovereignty; but, because of media reporting is unscrupulous and the failure of the international community to condemn the violence of Azerbaijan, these allies have been emboldened to ignoring the integrity of the Armenian people and nation.
But there is something more concrete than paper. Armenians have lived, and died, in this land for millennia. The stones and stones of the thousand-year-old Armenian churches and monasteries are carved with Armenian inscriptions. Centuries-old tombstones are engraved with Armenian names. Why are these carved facts not presented together with what is told by sources as thin, transparent and fragile as paper?
Because we have failed to ask this question, this evidence – Armenian cultural heritage – are actively destroying by Azerbaijan, as if our presence is being erased from their books.
And we are all to blame. We are not taught for paper questions. We know no limits. If we don’t want our ignorance to be weaponized by those in power, we need to know whose interests the paper serves. It is our responsibility to ask about the longer, deeper story that needs to be told.
Taleen Mardirossian is working on a collection of essays documenting the violence of removal inflicted on her ancestors. He teaches writing at Harvard University.