Compromised Lives Amidst the Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict:

Displaced Persons and Refugees in Azerbaijan and Their Access to Education

“I was five years old when we left Lachin [town in Nagorno-Karabakh]. [..] My mom did not want to leave. She wanted to stay. [pause] I do not remember much, except the poppy flowers…poppies on the side of the road as we drove away from Lachin. [..] We had no idea that we were leaving Lachin for a long period of time and hoped we would come back a short while later.” — Halima, ethnic Azerbaijani IDP living in a temporary settlement in Baku (excerpt from the documentary below)

Short documentary film with subtitles, “Dahliz” (Corridor) by Igrar Gurbanzade (August 2017)

More than 597,000 IDPs like Halima, who fled the war due to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, still dream of returning to their homes in spite of protracted peace negotiations (UNHCR, 2009). The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict that resulted in a war between Armenian armed forces and Azerbaijan between 1991–1994, escalated because of intensified ethnic violence and clashes between Armenians and Azerbaijanis in the mountainous Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan (see Figure 1). As the Soviet Union neared its demise towards the end of the 1980s, ethnic violence between Armenians and Azerbaijanis reached its peak after the Nagorno-Karabakh parliament voted to join Armenia (BBC, 2016). Due to armed clashes, in addition to hundreds of thousands of IDPs, Azerbaijan became a host country for 250,000 ethnic Azerbaijani refugees deported from Armenia (UNHCR, 2009).

Figure 1. Map of Azerbaijan and neighboring countries (Source: RFE/RL, 2017)

Despite such a large-scale displacement crisis, the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has been largely left out of the global refugee and IDP narratives. In this essay, I raise awareness about victimized refugee and IDP lives in Azerbaijan. Furthermore, I discuss the reasons why the politicized nature of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, fueled by national discourse around IDPs’ and refugees’ right to return, has led to compromises in educational access.

Despite numerous multilateral mediation attempts to resolve the conflict, there seems to be no hope for thousands of IDPs, who have been left in limbo for more than 25 years, to return home in the foreseeable future. Considering the prolonged nature of the conflict, most recent statistics also factor in around 230,000 children who were born into IDP families during this period and claim that the overall number of refugees and IDPs is over 800,000 (IDMC, 2014; UNHCR, 2009). To integrate such a large population of IDPs and refugees into society, the Government of Azerbaijan (GoA) has taken measures to enact a law on social protection of IDPs and refugees and to build infrastructure to address issues related to housing, health, education, employment, among many other areas (UNHCR, 2009). Most importantly, in 2008, the GoA completed its commitment to close down all twelve emergency camps established in different parts of the country and relocated IDP and refugee families into new, vastly improved housing (Tagwerker, 2008). However, according to IDMC (2014), the majority of IDPs still do not have access to adequate housing and are forced to reside in public buildings, recreational facilities, student dormitories, shanties, just like the one Halima and her family lives in (see Figure 2).

Figure 2. Types of housing IDPs have settled in (Source: IDMC, 2014)

With such a dispersed refugee and IDP population in diverse types of housing, access to education has been one of the main challenges. Despite exemption from any type of school fees, textbook purchases and even tuition support at the postsecondary level, around 60 percent of IDP children attend segregated primary and secondary schools organized and run by refugee and IDP communities themselves (IDMC, 2014). We know very little about the quality of education, access to it or performance of students in these government-funded community schools, yet without a doubt it is an obstacle for successful integration of these children into Azerbaijani society (UNHCR, 2008). The GoA argues that one of the rationales for such segregation is “to maintain the social fabric of displaced communities, which in turn will make integration easier when they return” (IDMC, 2014, p. 7). Refugees and IDPs view these community schools as signifiers of their past and hopes they hold for the future. Nevertheless, such questionable reasoning that prevents refugee and IDP children from full integration has been mostly fueled by the politicized nature of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. In other words, complete integration of refugees and IDPs into Azerbaijani society might suggest that there is no need for them to return to their homes even if the occupied territories are returned in the future. In the meantime, the GoA leverages the visible presence of refugee and IDP communities to exert pressure on Armenia and international actors to facilitate the withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces and return of occupied territories, while compromising full integration of refugees and IDPs into the Azerbaijani society.

I believe many refugees and IDPs would also agree with and support this politicized national narrative without realizing that it actually harms their children’s chances of becoming successful adults and how it worsens their overall well-being. They are essentially giving up their right to quality education, and ultimately better wellbeing, in exchange for a potential return to their homes. Just like Halima, thousands of refugees and IDPs are still hopeful that one day they will be back in their homes, neighborhoods, schools but until that day we are left with the following loaded questions: Is it morally just to compromise current refugee and IDP livelihoods in exchange for their right to return in the unknown and unforeseeable future? And more importantly, how do we reconcile the controversy between the urgency of refugees’ and IDPs’ educational access and politicized national narrative around their right to return? The answers to these complex questions are not easy. However, considering the frozen nature of the conflict, furthering national narratives around the refugees’ and IDPs’ right to return at the expense of their livelihoods is neither effective nor morally just.

References

Azerbaijan: After more than 20 years, IDPs still urgently need policies to support full integration. (2014). Internal Displacement Monitoring Center. Retrieved 6 December 2017, from http://www.internal-displacement.org/europe-the-caucasus-and-central-asia/azerbaijan/2014/azerbaijan-after-more-than-20-years-idps-still-urgently-need-policies-to-support-full-integration/

Azerbaijan: Analysis of gaps in the protection of internally displaced persons (IDPs). (2009). UNHCR. Retrieved 6 December 2017, from http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/protection/convention/4bd7edbd9/azerbaijan-analysis-gaps-protection-internally-displaced-persons-idps.html

Bodies of Slain Azerbaijani Troops Retrieved 48 Hours After Nagorno-Karabakh Clashes. (2017). Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Retrieved 6 December 2017, from https://www.rferl.org/a/azerbaijan-troops-bodies-recovered-karabakh-clashes/28336545.html

Nagorno-Karabakh profile. (2016). BBC News. Retrieved 16 January 2018, from http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-18270325

Tagwerker, N. (2008). Azerbaijan closes last of emergency camps. UNHCR. Retrieved 6 December 2017, from http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/news/latest/2008/2/47aaf6734/azerbaijan-closes-emergency-camps.html