Armenians for Peace, a group of Armenian Americans in Santa Clara County advocating for peace between the Armenian and Azerbaijan governments, held a protest at San Jose City Hall Wednesday to raise international awareness regarding the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Alla Petrosyan, an Armenians for Peace organizer and San Jose State engineering professor, said the purpose of the protest is to raise awareness in Santa Clara County as peacefully and loudly as possible.
“We’re fighting for peace,” Petrosyan said. “We’re sick and tired of the indifference the world is showing to that small peaceful nation [Armenia].”
According to a Wednesday article by The Wall Street Journal, the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan is centered in Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous territory with a population of about 150,000 people.
The region is known to Armenians as Artsakh and is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan, but it’s historically been occupied by ethnic Armenians, according to an Oct. 9 article by ABC News. According to the article, the region has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces since the end of a separatist war in 1994 that killed about 30,000 people and displaced around one million people total.
Petrosyan said Azerbaijan initiated unprovoked attacks against Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. She said it’s a century-old genocidal attempt initiated during the coronavirus pandemic to threaten global health and peace.
About 100 protesters gathered in front of San Jose City Hall from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. chanting, “What do we want? Peace! When do we want it? Now!” and “Shame on Turkey!”
Protesters marched west on Santa Clara Street toward The Mercury News on North Second and East St. John streets.
Petrosyan said Armenians for Peace asked the news outlet to cover their first protest in front of City Hall Oct. 7.
“The reason we’re protesting everywhere around the world is because magazines, news, articles [and] TV channels [are not] reporting as heavily as they should, nor reporting it truthfully,” said Elma Avakian, a protester and SJSU alumna, said over the phone.
“It is a little bit political for the U.S. since we have ties with Turkey . . . we’re letting a genocide slip under our hand because of political reasons.”
Areg Chobanian, an Armenians for Peace protest organizer and 2017 SJSU alumnus, said Azerbaijan is indiscriminately attacking Armenian military and civilians.
“We’re here trying to raise awareness . . . to the international community [so they will] recognize what has been happening,” Chobanian said.
Turkey, a longtime Azerbaijan ally, fully supported Azerbaijan in its war against Armenia by lending Azerbaijan its military-trained officers for decades, according to an Oct. 2 article by AP News. It’s the third largest supplier of military equipment.
“Turkey has American fighter jets, F-16s,” Petrosyan said in a speech during the protest. “Turkey is using its drones purchased from Israel and they are bringing in fighters, terrorists, Islamics [and] extremists from different parts of the world to fight against Armenia.”
According to the AP News article, the Turkish government denied the claims of sending Azerbaij-Syrian fighters and F-16 combat jets.
An Armenian for Peace organizer who asked to be referred to as Hykaz for safety reasons, said Azerbaijan bombed the city of Stepanakert, the capital of Nagorno-Karabakh, when the city had no military significance and was strictly a civilian city.
“[This is] an unprovoked war on the Armenian side,” Hykaz said. “We did not want war, we did not start this war.”
Since Sept. 27, 532 soldiers from both sides have died since the outburst of fighting flared up. Forty-two civilians died and hundreds are wounded because of the fighting, according to an AP News article Wednesday.
“We want to end this war as soon as possible because we have 18- to 20-year-olds dying every day,” Hykaz said. “Every single day there are civilians dying.”
Hundreds of homes, schools and hospitals were destroyed or damaged, forcing families to flee or retreat to underground, unheated basements, according to an Oct. 4 news release from the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The U.S. already reduced security assistance funding to Azerbaijan from $3.67 million in 2019 to less than $248,000 in 2020, according to a U.S. government Foreign Assistance website.
Protest organizer Chobanian said more protesters attended the Armenians for Peace protest Oct. 7 while many of the same protesters joined Saturday’s march in San Francisco in a rally organized by Bay Area Armenians, which had about 3,500 attendees.
“The point of these [protests] is to coordinate between different groups to keep the momentum, and be as present as possible as much as possible,” Chobanian said.
