As a result of the forced displacement of the Artsakh population by Azerbaijan, a humanitarian crisis has emerged in Armenia. Tens of thousands of people who have resettled in Armenia are now deprived of their right to a home, work, and a decent life. In such crisis situations, elderly people, women, and children become especially vulnerable.
From the onset of forced displacement, the Women’s Fund Armenia mobilized its resources to aid the forcibly displaced. The Fund, in collaboration with partner organizations addressing women’s issues in Armenia, provided humanitarian support to meet the basic needs of displaced people.
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In Gegharkunik, the Women’s Fund Armenia collaborated with the “Martuni Women’s Community Council” NGO. Anahit Gevorgyan, the NGO President, highlights that numerous Artsakh residents, displaced during the 2020 war, had resettled in various communities in the region. During this year’s forced displacement, many sought to settle in the same communities.
“From September 22, we started receiving calls from municipalities. Those days were the hardest. Most arrived almost barefoot, especially those from the bombed areas who had hidden in the forests for days,” recounts Anahit. The NGO, relying on the efforts of the community population, organized initial aid, spreading information, and collecting clothes and food. Anahit emphasizes the crucial role of community unity during those days when external support was limited.
“Then we applied to different foundations. We had some money, but we needed permission from the donor organizations. it would have taken us a lot of time, which we didn’t havе: we urgently needed to help the displaced people. In this matter, the Women’s Fund Armenia responded to us very quickly. Of course, the money was not big, but in the first period we were able to take care of people’s basic needs. For days, we provided people who spent the night on the roads with hygiene items, basic necessities and female pads,” says the head of the NGO.
Anahit Gevorgyan notes that before engaging in support of displaced people, serious preparatory work was done with the staff of the NGO. “We already had some experience in working with displaced persons during the 44-day war. As soon as the escalation and forced displacements began, we organized a meeting for our entire staff, presented how to deal with displaced people, how to do a needs assessment, taking into account their difficult psychological situation. We also discussed our experience during the 2020 war, the mistakes we made, we exchanged the information we all had, and after that we started working with displaced people,” she says.
The president of the NGO notes that women who are always focused on the well-being of their families usually forget their own needs, and when the organization took care of the specific needs of women, they felt touched. “You can’t imagine the women’s excitement when we gave them feminine hygiene items. Our women never speak about their personal needs and problems, and when they saw that someone cared about them and understood their situation and needs so delicately, they gave such emotional responses. “Women have very specific needs and they are usually ashamed to talk about them,” she says.
With subsequent support from the “Hayastan” All-Armenian Fund and USAID, the NGO ensures packages for displaced individuals include supplies related to women’s sexual and reproductive health and hygiene.
As displaced Artsakh residents transition to more stable lives, the NGO concentrates on meeting their household needs and facilitating community integration. Initiatives such as puppet making and needlework aim to provide women with activities to alleviate their challenges. “We are now collecting data on forcibly displaced people: age, preferences, professions. We already have puppet making and needlework groups. The first goal of these groups is for women to have some activity, to be able to relax a little from their problems. During those group meetings, we also talk with them about domestic violence. Awareness of violence among forcibly displaced women is very low,” she says.
Anahit shares a poignant moment when listening to an influential poem helped break the emotional barriers of displaced women, enabling them to release suppressed emotions. “During the first meetings, I saw that women were sitting with frozen and indifferent looks, each of them wrapped up in their own thoughts and problems. I decided to play for them Youri Sahakyan’s influential poem “Berd Dance,” which refers to the resistance and power of the people of Artsakh. Everyone present began to cry. Of course, I’ve always avoided putting people in that situation, but it seems to have helped them. We all cried, were relieved and moved on to the main topic. Crying, to some extent, helped women to get out of the closed state and were able to release the emotions accumulated in them, which were suppressed and unheard for a long time,” Anahit says.
As Anahit Gevorgyan notes, in this crisis period, both she and the entire staff of the NGO forgot about their problems and needs because, according to her, their situation is nothing compared to the feelings of the people of Artsakh, their loss and pain. “Our activity and suffering is nothing compared to their grief. Each of them is unhappy in her own way: a woman has just given birth and her husband is missing after the terrible explosion in Stepanakert. There is a family that lost 4 people in one year. This is my biggest pain, I don’t know how to help and comfort them. People have lost the meaning of their lives. You can’t help with anything, you can’t say any comforting words… What do you comfort them with, or what do you offer them in return? Bedding? Washing powder? We live in very absurd times,” says Anahit, repeating several times that they will continue to be with the forcibly displaced people from Artsakh, sharing with them all their worries and pains.
Interview by Yelena Sargsyan
Photos from the MWCC NGO Facebook page
