Robert Kocharyan’s Activity In The Memory Of His Neighbors In Stepanakert
Gita Elibekyan
"Radiolur"
09.05.2008
When the Artsakhi war started, many got involved in it. Robert Kocharyan, the second President of the Republic of Armenia, rarely stayed home. He was one of the leaders of the Artsakhi Movement, one of the first volunteers of the liberation war. His neighbor, Mrs. Elmira, 67, remembers: “He was driving around the city in a “Zaporozhec” to see what was happening. He was organizing our movement, while many young people had fled.”
Elmira Karapetyan worked at the same agro-chemical laboratory with Emma Kocharyan, where they both received apartments in a two-storey building in Stepanakert: “We were good neighbors,” Mrs. Elmira says. “We gave advices to each other, we were dining and drinking coffee together. Mrs., Elmira says that they rarely saw Robert Kocharyan after the war started, but every time they saw him, they would get convinced we were going to win. “Every time we saw Robert Kocharyan, he would convince with a smile peculiar to him that everything was going to be all right, that we would win, that our struggle was just. He would inspire us, and we would believe.”
Mrs. Elmira recalls also that in the basement Kocharyan’s wife and mother were also giving hope to the neighbors. “On New Year day, when the enemy was bombarding, Bella was decorating a New Year tree. She was always saying everything would be all right, we would once decorate the New Year tree at home, not in the basement. Their hopes really came true: today we decorate the New Year tree in our homes.”
Mrs. Elmira says many were convincing Bella Kocharyan to leave the city with her children, but she refused. All the neighbors lived in basements. The small windows of the basements were closed with bags of sand. It was dark. When the enemy was attacking from Shoushi, they moved to Kocharyans’ basement. When the attacks came from Aghdam, they all would move to Karapetyans’ basement.
Today Mrs. Elmira lives in the same apartment. The building has been reconstructed: the war had left traces everywhere. Mrs. Elmira and her family live on the ground floor, the first floor belongs to Kocharyan family. According to the neighbor, they often come to Stepanakert. They entrust the keys to Mrs. Elmira. From time to time she airs the apartment and every time members of the ex-President visit Stepanakert, they meet Mrs. Elmira.