39.650 aus Karabach vertriebenen Menschen wurde die armenische Staatsbürgerschaft verliehen, sagen Beamte

What about the rest? There was 100K if not 150K

I am really close with an Artsakhsti family I met thru a journalist friend in November of 2023. The father was killed and they fled with basically nothing a few days later. They had 5 orchards and bees in Artsakh. They were so traumatized at first – but still out of necessity – the mom and grandfather were working within a few months. I would bring up getting citizenship and they would cry about wanting to return to their home and I got the feeling everything was so fresh and traumatizing for them that I didn’t push it. It was really heartbreaking and on subsequent visits and conversations – I just tried to gauge if I thought they were ready for more concrete decisions. This past December when I visited them with one of my friends, we again kind of probed them about their thoughts about getting Armenian citizenship. I did this again in January and I made sure I knew about all of the programs available to them by writing and getting a quick response from the Armenian government. We visited them again in April and spoke about it. They applied for citizenship. I didn’t push them, but I think at this point I have their trust and friendship to help them be confident in their decision. They are renting a really subpar village house and they are good with the land. They need their own house, land and business again. The family is without a head – I mean – the grandfather is elderly. They feel safe and they are ok now in Armenia. We should be proud to have this family as fellow citizens.

I also would like to really emphasize compassion – even if you know some of them voted for or supported Russia backed candidates and you did not. These are really really traumatized people – starved people. Even the family I help and have really grown to love , I asked them how they survived the blockade and mind you they had fruits and honey which helped them personally – but the mom said, “We were always hungry hungry hungry.” I can picture her now as I am recalling this. They were all so thin when I met them and malnourished. Very few of us have lived through a blockade. Very few of us one day had a house and the next day didn’t have one, nor did our family members. It just must be so life altering because they were fed hope and believed that they would always be able to live in their homeland somehow with that manic leading on the other side and his gas and pipelines.