The letter-appeals sent to international courts and organizations are not stopping the vandalism. Azerbaijan continues to spread its anti-Armenian propaganda and Armenian-Azerbaijani ties keep getting worse. During the social events dedicated to the Sumgait massacres, people have called out that they have to respond to Azerbaijan by following the principle of Azerbaijani. What caused an even bigger scandal was when Armenians found out that Azerbaijan had named Ramil Safarov a national hero for killing Armenian spy Gurgen Markaryan two years ago. Cultural figures are speaking out on the current anti-Armenian propaganda spread by Azerbaijan.
Sos Sargsyan-actor: I read an article by an Azerbaijani writer a couple of days ago and he writes that it doesn’t matter how Safarov killed the Armenian spy, the important thing is that the nation’s reputation went up. We must respond to them the same way. We must stand up for our historical and cultural values. Armenians have to stop their speeches about Christianity. I don’t know what we have to do, but if necessary, perhaps even kill.
Yervand Manaryan, actor: If someone wakes up in the morning and decides to commit a crime, then he will do it. Safarov is a criminal; he has killed someone. What can we do? To kill him would be ridiculous because Azerbaijan already considers Armenia as a country that “hires murderers”.
Suren Hasmikyan, art critic: We Armenians must realize that we are living in a time when each person plays his or her role. There are Christian followers, as well as Islam followers and they “go against each other” when necessary. For example, the fight against comic sketches is simply ridiculous and this serves as a means of taking advantage of Islam fanatics. We have to be more careful so that they won’t play with us again. Of course, we can’t forget about our national values. We can keep screaming in front of embassies, but let’s admit, that is just an act. Dostoyevski has said: “There is no complete ideology that can affect others.”
We don’t even take advantage of the victories that we have had. Look at how Azerbaijan is treating our national values and solving issues with Armenia. Today it’s Nakhijevan, Karabagh may be next. Everyone has lost hope that we will get Nakhijevan back, keep our historical/cultural values alive and actually live there, but we can take this opportunity to show the world that what Azerbaijan does in Old Jugha now, it will do the same in Amaras or Gandzasar later.
Shushan Petrosyan, singer: One who kills someone while he is sleeping or destructs cultural monuments can not be considered human. Azerbaijan pretends to have a civilized society, but in reality it is very far from that. I would have liked to see Armenians react to the murder of Gurgen Markaryan the day it happened or even get hysterical. We only reacted when we found out that Azerbaijan had named that criminal a national hero. Why didn’t we start a scandal back then? We had to broadcast the murder on television and in the press, instead of staying quiet all this time. What’s worse is that we were indifferent up until he got the title of national hero. I would like to see people get more serious about each issue concerning Armenia. I am not in favor of responding to Azerbaijan with another murder. What, are we going to go and destruct their monuments?
Samvel Mkrtchyan-writer, translator: In my opinion, burning Azerbaijan’s flag in the middle of Republic Square is just another hooligan act. We can all do that in our backyards every day. That says a lot about how weak we are and that we don’t have authorities ready to fight for our nation. It’s OK for people living in GREAT countries to burn flags of foreign countries in backyards. The anti-Turkish and anti-Azerbaijani show on February 28 was simply a way to make us forget about the Karabagh conflict for a while. I am predicting that Kocharyan threw the blame on Arkadi Ghukasyan for that.