Azernews.Az

By Rashid Shirinov

For most Armenians life abroad offers a higher material standard of living and more opportunities. It is no less true that the poverty, corruption and ongoing demographic implosion of Armenia can be crushing, and that daily life there for a great many people is equal to ‘survival’.

But people in Armenia suffer not only from economic hardships, but also social injustice and impunity for officials. Armenian soldiers are the one who suffer from this more than others. This also applies to those Armenian soldiers, who serve in the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh.

In addition to terrible conditions in the Armenian army units, the soldiers constantly die there in non-combat conditions and the real causes of the deaths are not being investigated.

Many families of the killed soldiers still unaware of the real reasons behind the deaths. Some of them have already given up, while others continue to fight for justice.

Every week the Armenian media reports about new deaths of soldiers in Karabakh allegedly because of the psychic weakness or illness.

Recently, the Armenian side reported that the 18-year-old soldier Karen Avetisyan died while serving in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan. His death was immediately labeled as a suicide – Avetisyan allegedly shot himself. However, the soldier’s parents got outraged after they heard this version of their son’s death.

“First of all, he was waiting 26th of April, his mother was supposed to visit him and they would spend one day together in Karabakh,” Hraparak newspaper quoted Avetisyan’s relatives. “He was very happy and very excited about this, therefore he could hardly be suicidal.”

Secondly, the bullet entered his head from the lower part of the right ear and exited through the temple. A suicidal person would not have shot himself that way.

“Finally, the preliminary investigation has yet to be completed, but the parents have already been told [by officials] that [Karen] has committed suicide. All of this was enough to convince the family that Karen was in fact killed,” Hraparak writes.

At Karen’s funeral, the paper continues, his uncle attacked one of the officers who had come from his military unit and had the imprudence to say: “Karen was going to the toilet… If he had gone half an hour later, he would have survived.”

“The uncle and everyone else were surprised at the officer’s words. So could it be that Karen Avetisyan did not commit suicide, as reported?” Hraparak asks.

Also, the Armenian population cannot understand why the alleged "voluntary" serving in Karabakh[the occupied land of Azerbaijan] applies only to the children of the poor families and representatives of national minorities in Armenia.

Thus, time goes by but Armenia continues to occupy Azerbaijani lands, sends there young boys from poor Armenian families and then, after these soldiers get killed in the army units, the Armenian authorities come up with another fake reason to their deaths. As a result, hundreds of Armenian families lose their sons, and the Armenian government does nothing to prevent these deaths.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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