Nagorno-Karabakh: the fight of a French doctor on the way to Armenia
People taking refuge in a bomb shelter in Stepanakert, Azerbaijan, Monday October 5, 2020. Areg Balayan / ArmGov PAN Photo via AP
Text by: Nicolas Falez Follow
2 min
As the conflict continues in Nagorny-Karabakh between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces, the large Armenian diaspora is mobilizing.
This is particularly the case in France where communities of Armenian origin have collected tons of medicines and supplies intended for combatants and civilians.
French people of Armenian origin have also chosen to go there, like this doctor whom RFI met.
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Anesthesiologist-resuscitator in a Parisian hospital, Dr Jean-Michel Ekherian will take off for Yerevan this week, with two fellow doctors and several boxes of medical equipment in their luggage.
But without knowing yet if they will be able to enter the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.
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To read also: No truce of the bombings in Nagorno-Karabakh
“
You have to pass, but you shouldn't pass stupidly either,”
explains the doctor.
If ever there is a rain of bombs, we will be of no use at all.
We have to go through an area or in a period where we can go to the operating room in the bunkers to be able to exercise our profession and provide assistance as much as possible.
"
Jean-Michel Ekherian is 65 years old, he was born in France in a family of survivors of the Armenian genocide.
It was in 1988 after a terrible earthquake that he discovered Armenia for the first time.
Since then he has returned there regularly for humanitarian actions.
For him, Nagorno Karabakh is at the heart of the Armenian identity: “
It is not a secession like one can dispute a ground behind the church.
It is not that at all.
In fact, it is a region which is ancestrally Armenian.
We cannot allow a second genocide to occur when we unfortunately suffered the first genocide of the 20th century.
"
According to their representatives, around half a million French people are of Armenian origin.
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To read also: Nagorno-Karabakh: towards an open war between Armenia and Azerbaijan?
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