YEREVAN, OCTOBER 6. /TASS/. A little more than a week has passed since Armenia imposed martial law amid the flare-up in Nagorno-Karabakh. Nevertheless, the country's capital these days does not quite look like a town under martial law. Shops, cafes and restaurants continue to function. People still stroll along the capital’s streets, and public transport and social infrastructure still operate. Sporadic humanitarian aid pick-up points and conscription offices full of volunteers across Yerevan signal that something is not quite right in the city though.
The word that’s on everybody’s lips is Artsakh, the Armenian name for Nagorno-Karabakh. People are discussing the armed conflict. "We don’t want war, we want to live in peace, but what can be done? If you're under attack, you need to defend yourself," a volunteer responsible for humanitarian aid told our TASS correspondent.
It seems that any man is ready to go to war now or at least help the people of Nagorno-Karabakh in one way or another. "There are so many volunteers, that army just does not need them,"
he went on to say. "It's mostly artillery, air defense, and tanks. That is why they send specialists into battle who can cope with military equipment."
Volunteers and their assistance
Crowds of people can be seen in different parts of Armenia's capital. The city residents cooperate, collect money and purchase essential goods for the victims. All this humanitarian aid is immediately packed in boxes. Stuffed all together are packs of pasta, canned food, clothes, medication, and a lot of water. Upon boxing up another batch, the volunteers send it off on trucks to the capital of the unrecognized republic - Stepanakert.
"Our trucks drive at night with their headlights turned off, because the road is constantly under fire," said Garik, a student at Yerevan State University. The students organized their collection point right under the walls of their higher educational institution.
An excited female student packing boxes says that her boyfriend is now on the frontlines of the conflict, but then smiles and adds: "We met during the protests [in 2018], and I told him: since we survived the revolution, we will survive the war as well."
"Young people are ready to fight, but we choose peace. We are doctors, and if necessary, we will go to the front," says another female student, Ashkhen. "But we want the war to end as soon as possible, and we help as much as we can." "Thanks to my friends from Russia, in Krasnodar, Sochi and Moscow, they all help, they want to send us" humanitarian aid "on a cargo plane," she adds.
From time to time, automobile processions liven up the streets, as cars decked out with the flags of Armenia cruise through the city streets, with drivers incessantly honking their horns.
Everyone off to the front
The enlistment office is usually not the place where you can easily get into, especially if there is a meeting of officers about the conscription of volunteers. It happened by chance. It turned out that a volunteer collecting "humanitarian aid" had fought in the first Karabakh war - in 1992-1994 - he personally knows many officers and persuaded them to talk to a TASS correspondent. In general, when the residents of Yerevan find out that the journalist in front of them is Russian, they do their utmost to try and help, they offer water, food, and cognac at one o’clock in the afternoon and even find housing.
The officers were also very friendly and respectful, offering water and cigarettes - Armenians often smoke indoors - but flatly refused to introduce themselves or be recorded. They only said that they were organizing the volunteers' departure.
"We have volunteers coming from all over the world," said a general in the recruiting office. "There are many young people and those who have gone through the first war. Therefore, we decided to create mixed units of veterans and young people. It turned out to be a good fit."
"But now there is no shortage of people at the front," he assured. "We already have five companies here, we are not sending them yet." At the end of the conversation, the general resolutely stated that Armenia "is ready to fight to the end."