Social Innovation Camp Caucasus, Tbilisi, Georgia 8-10 April

Do you believe in social change in the Caucasus, want to make a difference, or have identified a pressing social need in any of the three societies, including on regional level, that needs addressing, but don’t know where or how to start?

If you answered yes to any or all of those questions then next month’s Social Innovation Camp (SI Camp) scheduled for 8-10 April in Tbilisi, Georgia, is exactly what you’re looking for.

Due to take place as part of the Social Media for Social Change conference at the same time in the same venue, SI Camp Caucasus will bring together ideas and participants from Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia to demonstrate how new online tools can empower individuals and strengthen the existing activities of social media for the first time in the South Caucasus. After all, the needs in the region are many, but the potential to implement change has been until now limited.

That, however, is all set to change.

Social Innovation Camp is about solving social challenges in new ways - by bringing together ideas and digital tools to create web-based innovations in just 48 hours.

First Social Innovation Camp in Caucasus will gather 40 participants - designers, entrepreneurs, social needs experts, marketing, legal, advertising gurus from Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia to work on an idea of a potential social start-up that can make a change and compete for a prize.

No Borders Here - Interview with Arzu Geybullayeva

With the conflict in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh still unresolved, journalists and civil society activists in Armenia have few opportunities to meet with their Azeri counterparts, and vice versa. But increasingly, blogs and social networks offer new possibilities for dialogue across a cease-fire line in place since 1994. Other online tools offer immediate audio and video communication between the two countries, free from monitoring or interception. If adopted as general practice by journalists and activists, such tools could represent a revolution in cross-border cooperation.

For this final segment in our multimedia series on overcoming stereotypes in the South Caucasus, I interviewed Arzu Geybullayeva, an Azerbaijani political and regional analyst, about her work on civil society, women’s, and cross-border issues using new media tools. It was a rare direct conversation between Yerevan and Baku, conducted with the voice-over-Internet service Skype.

Documentary: From Home to Home

An ethnic Azeri originally from Armenia reads aloud the Armenian inscriptions of the tombstones in his village in Azerbaijan. An ethnic Armenian from Azerbaijan videos the Azeri graveyard in his village in Armenia, speaking over the tape in Azerbaijani before sending it off to the families of those that used to live there instead of him. In a region where negative stories and stereotypes of the “enemy” abound, it’s an example of a promise kept between two peoples until this day that is seldom told.

From Home to Home by Seda Muradyan and Arsen Gasparyan is an exception to that rule, and tell a fascinating story of a mutual pact between two sides still effectively at war over the disputed territory of Nagorno Karabakh, but who continue to respect the past in the hope of contributing to a better future.

In 1989, the conflict over Nagorno Karabakh had been escalating for a year. The Soviet regime proved unable to curb the violence. Armenians living in Azerbaijan and Azerbaijanis living in Armenia were forced to leave.

Two villages — Kzlshafag (now Dzyunashogh) in Armenia and Kerkenj in Azerbaijan — lay hundreds of kilometers away from each other. Until 1989, Kzlshafag was inhabited by Azerbaijanis, and Kerkenj, by Armenians.

The people in these two villages found a solution of their own: they swapped villages and countries, and made a unique deal.

La superación de los estereotipos negativos en el Cáucaso del Sur

Tbilisi, la capital de Georgia y, quizás, el corazón del centro cultural en el Cáucaso del Sur. Visitando Tbilisi siempre me da placer, después de todo, sobre todo porque, quizás, el único lugar en la región de Tbilisi, donde los armenios, azeríes y georgianos pueden reunirse y hacer amigos, a pesar de siglos de hostilidad mutua y post-conflicto Soviética, que abrió una brecha entre las personas tales similares y comunes. Para los armenios y azeríes es especialmente cierto, dado el conflicto que aún congelados en Nagorno-Karabaj.

Ubicado en el vecino Azerbaiyán, pero habitado principalmente por personas de etnia armenia, Karabaj fue el primero de muchos conflictos violentos que acompañaron la desintegración e incluso provocó el colapso de la antigua Unión Soviética. Matando a más de 25.000 personas, millones de personas en ambos lados se vieron obligados a huir de sus hogares, mientras que Azerbaiyán ha perdido el 16 por ciento de su territorio en el momento de la firma del acuerdo de alto el fuego de 1994. Analistas regionales y la comunidad internacional, sin embargo, temen que una guerra de un día podría estallar de nuevo.

Desde entonces varios intentos ha habido para llegar a un acuerdo de paz definitivo, pero las políticas aplicadas por los nacionalistas y las fuerzas políticas en ambos lados de la línea de alto el fuego que los dos grupos étnicos no pueden convivir juntos, todos estos intentos de reducir a la nada. La percepción subjetiva y la interpretación de la historia, pero más aún poner en un callejón sin salida, ha llevado a la triste realidad que, como resultado en esta etapa, ninguna de las partes dispuestas a transigir. Irónicamente, sin embargo, tales posiciones irreconciliables con frecuencia parecen absurdas, dado que los armenios y azeríes en Georgia pueden coexistir.

La coexistencia de armenios y azeríes en Georgia

Algunos puede parecer sorprendente que algunos grupos étnicos pueden y deben convivir pacíficamente en Tbilisi, la capital de Georgia, sin embargo, la situación no es tan evidente en las regiones de Armenia, Azerbaiyán y Georgia. Pero, quizás, que en sí mismo es un estereotipo masiva. Armenios y azeríes, por ejemplo, han argumentado desde hace tiempo de que antes del conflicto de Karabaj viven pacíficamente al lado del otro en los centros urbanos, tales como Bakú y Ereván, pero no en las zonas rurales. Hasta cierto punto esto es cierto, pero no completamente.

En Marneuli, en una ciudad con una población de 20.000 personas, los residentes afirman que el 15-20% de la población es de etnia armenia. El resto son personas de etnia azerí. Además, a pesar de los nacionalistas de línea continua a ambos lados por el hecho de que ningún partido no se puede confiar, los armenios de Armenia para llegar a Tbilisi, en realidad, tiene que parar en zonas donde la mayoría de los 280.000 habitantes son azerbaiyanos que viven en Georgia , y lo hacen sin ningún problema. Además, el mercado de Marneuli, armenios, azeríes y georgianos se dedican al comercio con el vecindario.

Blogger de Georgia - Dodka compartió sus impresiones durante su visita a la ciudad para el proyecto de Steady State – Transition Online.

Casa de té de propiedad de los georgianos y azerbaiyanos en Marneuli, donde los comerciantes de Armenia, Georgia y Azerbaiyán la cena. Té trae @ caucasusproject.

Cumplimos azerí, que tiene dos mujeres - una de Armenia y de Azerbaiyán. Finalmente, accedieron a ser entrevistados @ caucasusproject.

Armenio que vende pescado, dijo que el de Azerbaiyán, Armenia, Rusia y Georgia idiomas y trabaja en conjunto con los vendedores de Azerbaiyán @ caucasusproject.

Tsopi . Azerbaiyanos y los armenios no tienen problemas con los demás. Tienen los mismos problemas - el empleo, o más bien su falta de @ caucasusproject.

La ama dijo que su hijo hace unos meses fue una boda - la mitad de los invitados eran los armenios, los otros - los azeríes @ caucasusproject.

La mujer de Armenia dijo que no le importaría si sus hijos se casan por la de azerí o georgiano

En Tsopi escuela. Las terribles condiciones, sin ventanas, ni calor, NADA más que las torres orgulloso de la bandera de la nueva red de Georgia. Triste.

Armenia: 21st Anniversary of the 1988 Earthquake

Monday marked the 21st anniversary of the 1988 earthquake which devastated many areas in northern Armenia leaving around 25,000 dead and many more homeless. Yet, despite a huge inflow of money from international donors for reconstruction, conditions still remain harsh more than two decades on with thousands still living in domiks — temporary accommodation such as simple shacks or even metal containers.

Precise numbers for the number of families in Armenia’s second largest city of Gyumri still living in such a situation are still unknown, but it is believed to be around 4-7,000. But while the government has promised to provide them with apartments by the end of the year, bloggers continue to focus on the problems faced by many. Peaches and Pomegranates visited Gyumri a day before the anniversary.

It was a fitting time to be in the city as Monday will be a remembrance day for those who lost their lives during the devastating earthquake. Gyumri also lies close to the Turkish border. […]

[…]

I fell in love with the small city. Despite the sadness sown by the earthquake, a subtle beauty exists in the crumbling 19th century buildings. […]

Mobile reporting from Armenia’s second largest city

Vartik Ghukasyan is 71 and alone. An orphan, she never married and now struggles to live on a pension of 25,000 AMD (about £30) a month in a rundown hostel in Gyumri, Armenia’s second largest city still reeling from the devastating 1988 earthquake and the economic collapse following the collapse of the former Soviet Union. Official statistics from the 2001 census puts the population of what used to be the cultural heart of the country at 150,000. Some even say it might have grown to 160-170,000 in the eight years that have followed, but few local residents take such claims seriously. Pointing to low school attendance figures, they estimate the actual population might be no more than 70,000.

And it’s not hard to see why. Despite hundreds of millions of dollars that flooded into the city to finance reconstruction after the earthquake which left around 25,000 people dead and many more homeless, Gyumri is the center of Shirak, a region that most in Armenia have forgotten. Impoverished, and with unemployment higher than the national average, travel agents continue to advertise flights to parts of Russia from the local airport. As in many other parts of Armenia, with few job prospects inside the country, the only hope lies outside.

But, in the environment of a global economic crisis, there are now also fewer opportunities even there.