Why Were Families Evicted Midwinter, Their Homes Demolished and Left Outdoors? A Shurnukh Resident Speaks

On January 5, following the handover of 12 homes in the village of Shurnukh, Syunik province to Azerbaijan, the residents of those homes have found temporary shelters, but what will happen next remains uncertain.

NEWS.am spoke with resident Anahit Alekyan, whose two-story house was among the first to fall under Azerbaijani control. At present, Mrs. Anahit is renting a place in Kapan with her daughter.

It is notable that Anahit Alekyan is a participant of the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. She insists that Shurnukh has always been an Armenian village. “I participated in the war of the 90s, and I assess this situation very poorly. If in May 1989, those Azerbaijanis who lived in Shurnukh were offered money and housing and were subsequently evacuated from the village, why should they return now? Thirty years have passed, why should they come back again? How can lands captured at the cost of blood be given back like this? We have suffered so many losses in the village; my combat friends died,” she stated.

According to Mrs. Anahit, she hasn’t even managed to transfer all her belongings to Kapan and still owes the drivers of the moving trucks. “When I was informed that we had to evacuate on January 5, I managed to move only what I could to my daughter’s house; now I owe money to the drivers and don't know how to pay them. Many belongings were left behind,” she shared.

Anahit Alekyan explained that her source of livelihood was the land on which her house was situated. “Since the days of the Grad, I had planted various types of trees, plants, and berries; now all of that is left for them. I cannot live without my plot of land, without my own house. I do not want to leave Shurnukh. Why were families evicted midwinter, their houses demolished and left outdoors? No one knows if they will wake up in the morning,” she lamented.

The media also spoke with another Shurnukh resident, Mrs. Nairi, whose home, along with a barn, has come under Azerbaijani control. She mentioned that she is currently living temporarily in Goris. “There’s no more spirit left. We are homeless. We had built a very large, expensive barn, took a loan of 5 million, bought sheep, and managed to get the livestock out of the barn. We purchased one cow for 400 thousand, but sold it for only 140 thousand drams. We don’t know how we will pay off that loan. It has completely collapsed and remains there,” Mrs. Nairi recounted.