Coexistence in the South Caucasus

Coexistence in the South Caucasus

Marneuli, Georgia – a bustling market, just 40 or so kilometers from the border with Armenia, and it’s as if peaceful coexistence between ethnic groups in the South Caucasus was just an everyday occurrence. Armenians, Azeris and Georgians sell their goods side by side just days before the New Year, often sharing the same stalls. An ethnic Armenian switches between Georgian and Azerbaijani while the nearby café serves as a meeting place for everyone, regardless of ethnicity.

Even with Armenia and Azerbaijan locked into a bitter stalemate over the disputed territory of Nagorno Karabakh, Armenians from Armenia proper get along fine with Azeris from both Azerbaijan and Georgia. Traders look confused when they’re asked why or even how. It’s a reality that nationalists, and even the media in Armenia and Azerbaijan, seldom – if ever – mentions. And despite the fact that traffic between the Armenian and Georgian capitals passes through what is a mainly ethnic Azeri region.

Thirty five kilometers away, the two ethnic groups even co inhabit the same village.

Ethnic Azeris are in the majority in Tsopi, but 30 percent are Armenians. A group of ethnic Azeri men wax lyrically about Armenian girls, but then turn despondent when asked if intermarriage occurs. It doesn’t usually, although ethnic Armenians residents say they would have no problem if it did. But they do live side by side, speaking each others’ language and sending their children to the same school. What should be a wonderful example of tolerance and coexistence, however, is unfortunately falling apart.

It’s difficult to tell who is Armenian and who is Azeri in Tsopi, with both groups sharing more in common with each other than, say, the Georgians. Their children play, study and grow up together and it’s almost as if the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan never occurred. The same is true in Tbilisi, where members of Georgia’s two largest ethnic minorities also live. An Azeri tea house in one of the old parts of the Georgian capital is even owned by ethnic Armenians.

Two customers speak to one of them in Armenian before reverting to Azerbaijani. Surprise, surprise, they’re from Baku. With such a diverse clientele it’s perhaps no wonder that the owners speak Azeri, Armenian, Georgian, and Russian.

It’s just a stone’s throw away from a statue of Azerbaijan’s late president, Heydar Aliyev, and about the same distance from the Turkish baths and the Armenian Church where Sayat Nova, the 18th century Armenian troubadour who wrote most of his songs in Azerbaijani, is buried. A few minutes down the road is a Jewish synagogue, some Georgian churches, and a mosque which largely serves ethnic Azeris. Tbilisi truly is a melting pot of culture, unlike Yerevan and Baku since the tit for tat expulsion of Azeris and Armenians which occurred at the beginning of the Karabakh conflict.

Nationalists and political figures in both Armenia and Azerbaijan maintain that Armenians and Azeris can never live side by side together in peace again. Neighboring Georgia, however, shows that this is very far from the truth.

January 4th, 2010 by Onnik Krikorian

http://cau.blogs.tol.org/2010/01/04/teaser-coexistence-in-the-south-caucasus-сосуществование-на-южном-кав/