Letter from Nowhere: off the map

[Yervant1]

Letter from Nowhere: off the map

 

The leafy boulevards of Stepanakert, capital of Nagorno-Karabakh, are

beginning to attract visitors, but to most of the international community

the republic doesn't exist

 

- Dan Peleschuk

- Guardian Weekly, Tuesday 21 August 2012 13.59 BST

 

Breakaway ... a boy joins in as Stepanakert residents celebrate after a

2006 referendum overwhelmingly approved a constitution declaring

Nagorno-Karabakh an independent state. Photograph: Karen Minasyan/AFP/Getty

 

In many ways, Stepanakert resembles a small American town on the

rise. Its main boulevards have been repaved, locals stroll through the

renovated central square past its elegant fountain, and hotels have

sprouted on every other block to hold the new influx of visitors.

 

There's just one thing: it doesn't really exist, and neither does the

ethnic Armenian Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, of which Stepanakert is the

capital. According to the rest of the world, the region belongs to

Azerbaijan, and no one - not even Armenia, Karabakh's patron state -

recognises it.

 

But that doesn't stop the self-proclaimed country from celebrating its 20

years of de facto independence this year. Patriotic banners flutter above

Stepanakert's streets, and posters of the soldiers who during a bloody war

in the early 1990s helped wrest the land away from Azerbaijan line the

sidewalks.

 

Not long ago much of the city was in ruins and the economy virtually

non-existent. Today locals meander along leafy streets lined with new

banks, stores and government buildings. A tourism industry is slowly taking

root, as travellers from across the world descend on the tiny republic,

population about 141,000, in increasing numbers.

 

But under the surface are scars of a war that left more than 30,000

dead and many displaced. War is the only reason the Nagorno-Karabakh

Republic exists. War - the memories of it, the fears of its return-is

what makes it tick. Perhaps the best reminder of this is Aghdam, the

ghostly shell of a former Azeri settlement levelled by Armenian forces

in 1993. Just a short drive from Stepanakert, the one-time city of

around 30,000 was reduced to grassy craters and jagged stone remnants

of former apartments, schools and community centres. Visible from the

only road that leads north to Karabakh's famed ancient monasteries, it

is easy to notice.

 

Yet ordinary Karabakh Armenians are trying to capitalise on the

relative post-war stability. Even as border tensions have escalated in

recent months, which have seen deadly skirmishes between Armenian and

Azeri forces, small-time businessman Ashot Simonyan says foreign

visitors have continued to stream through his spare rental apartments.

 

"Everyone who comes here really loves it," he says with a salesman's grin.

"We have everything a tourist needs - it's completely normal here."

 

Every week Guardian Weekly publishes a Letter from one of its readers

from around the world. We welcome submissions - they should focus on

giving a clear sense of a place and its people. Send them to *

weekly.letter.from@guardian.co.uk