(Stepanakert) In the apartment of Janna Petrossyan, in Stepanakert, the temperatures display as outside minus zero. Like her, the inhabitants of Nargorny Karabakh have to get used to the electricity and gas cuts put in place in the face of a long-lasting Azerbaijani blockade.
“When the children go to bed, we put them in woolen clothes and wrap them in blankets,” explains this 67-year-old grandmother who lives in this disputed region.
This mountainous enclave, mainly populated by Armenians, but recognized by the international community as Azerbaijani territory, is almost cut off from the world by the blocking of the only axis connecting it to Armenia.
Since mid-December, Azerbaijanis posing as environmental defenders have been blocking the Lachin corridor, Karabakh’s only supply route, and some 120,000 inhabitants of the enclave have suffered power and internet cuts, but also problems with heating and access to food or medicine.
“When there is electricity, we rush to go to the kitchen and cook hot meals for my two grandchildren,” says Ms.me Petrosyan.
With her family, she has lately been living on vermicelli or rice soup, fruits and vegetables having disappeared from store shelves, which have to ration products.
“Azerbaijans exert psychological pressure on us… But our sons shed their blood on these lands that we will never abandon,” she says.
New crisis
Armenia and Azerbaijan clashed in the early 1990s, during the breakup of the USSR, for control of Nagorny Karabakh.
This first conflict, which claimed 30,000 lives, ended in an Armenian victory. But Azerbaijan took its revenge in a second war that claimed the lives of 6,500 people in the fall of 2020 and allowed Baku to retake many territories.
Russian peacekeepers have since been deployed in accordance with a ceasefire agreement brokered by Moscow.
For several weeks, however, Armenia has deplored that Russia – occupied by its offensive in Ukraine – has not prevented this new crisis.
According to Yerevan, the blocking of the Lachin corridor aims to organize “ethnic cleansing” in the region, while Baku considers these accusations “unfounded”, claiming that civilian cars can still circulate between Karabakh and Armenia.
Like thousands of people, Karen Sargsyan, a 56-year-old former mechanic, has lost his job since the blockade began.
“I had to close my car repair shop” because of “the shortage of spare parts and fuel, [en plus] power outages,” he said.
Faced with the numerous preventive power cuts organized to avoid an overload of the electricity network, most hospitals, schools and other kindergartens have also closed in recent weeks.
” It’s difficult ”
Like most residents of Stepanakert, Mr. Sargsyan spends hours queuing outside small stalls. Inside, the shelves are often empty, although there is still sugar, rice and oil.
“Of course it’s difficult, but we have already seen something similar, during the first Karabakh war in the 1990s,” says Karen Sargsyan.
” We help each other. If one of the neighbors has wood to make a fire, we meet at his place in the evening to prepare tea or coffee,” he adds.
In a maternity hospital in the largest city in the region, Inna Galoustyan deplores a lack of medication for ten days.
“Most basic surgeries have been postponed because it’s too risky to perform them in such extreme conditions,” said the doctor.
Since then, the Red Cross has been able to deliver medical aid, but some patients are still awaiting emergency treatment.
“If the patient is transportable, then we send him to Armenia with the help of the Red Cross,” said Mr.me Galoustyan. “But more than 600 seriously ill people have still not been operated on,” she regrets.