Recently, some drunken people had fought in Tsarkala. One person was killed and two of them got physical injuries. Five people are under arrest now and are suspected of murder. The neighbors from the village of the deceased wanted to punish the murderer but the police made them calm down. The police department has instituted legal proceedings.
We can write about this tragic event in another tone too. For instance like this: some young people from Tsalkala were having dinner in a restaurant in the center of the city. When they were about to go home from the restaurant, they were attacked by several people that had moved to Tsalkala as a result of an ecological disaster in other regions. The ethnic conflict resulted in a murder of an Armenian and two Armenians got physical injuries. Several people that attacked them are under arrest now. But the local Armenians don’t believe in the court and want to punish the murderer themselves. Later the police department had to interfere and make the Armenians protesting calm down. As a result of the conflict with the police, several Armenians were beaten.
There are two other versions of this story too. One of them is short and doesn’t give any details about the incident. The other one…oops! There is a dangerous note in the other one: “Inter-ethnic conflict in Tsalka”.
And this exception was preferred both by the local and international Mass Media to publish. I don’t think that the articles printed in the mass media serve as a means for the rallies of Armenians after the murder in Akhalkalak and the protest to get autonomy. But it is clear that there is a coincidence here. So what really happened? Was this a conflict of drunken people or a conflict on ethnic background? The difference is clear to everyone.
According to my sources in Tsalka, when the conflict rose in that restaurant both ethnic groups were sitting there. Later this information was also given by the deputy head of the Georgian Armenians’ union MP Van Baiburt. Of course this conflict could have also been raised between other ethnic groups too because there are a lot of new ethnic groups there and it is clear that there may be conflicts between them. And in order to not let these conflicts get bigger, the government brought police forces into this region. But in spite of this there still are conflicts. But we shouldn’t look for the genesis of these conflicts in ethnic differences, but in the decision of the authorities to remove those groups to this region after the ecological disaster, where conditions are very bad and it is cold. Actually by doing so the authorities thought their problem was solved. But it is impossible to have police everywhere and in all restaurants. There is a need for a strategic approach to this problem because even if it may seem to have ethnic backgrounds, in any case the reasons are of social character. And this fire may get bigger and it may already become an ethnic conflict, due to the fact that it seems that the authorities don’t want to learn from the past. It is not easy; of course it is easier to build parks. But this is very important.