‘Am I Irrelevant Because I Stayed Alive?

[onjig]

‘Am I Irrelevant Because I Stayed Alive?’ Participants of April Fighting Ask for Verification of Their Service

It has been reported in recent months that military authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh have been failing to make the respective entries in the military cards of recently discharged Armenian soldiers on their participation in the four-day fighting last April at the Karabakh-Azerbaijan border. There have also been some instances when servicemen complained that officials were crossing out the entries that had already been made and thus depriving them of certain privileges they would otherwise be eligible for in the sphere of health and education. Several former servicemen of the NKR army, human rights defenders, and a spokesperson for Armenia’s defense ministry discussed the issue at a joint conference on Friday.

“Fortunately, no one died at our position; but if they did, wouldn’t you have called their parents and told them they had died in combat? How am I any different? If my friends and I were lucky enough [not to get killed], why shouldn’t we considered combatants? Had we not returned, you would have given our families a medal and said we had died defending our homeland… Well, am I irrelevant now just because I managed to come back alive?” Areg Janoyan, a soldier who fought in April at a combat position in Jabrayil, said addressing the ministry representative.

Read more:

http://epress.am/en/2017/03/04/am-i-irrelevant-because-i-stayed-alive-participants-of-april-fighting-ask-for-verification-of-their-service.html