Armenia-Azerbaijan: BBC Azeri Facebook Diary

As part of the BBC Superpower Season, the BBC’s Azeri service approached Global Voices Online’s Caucasus editor to participate in its own reflection on the power of the Internet. Locked into a bitter stalemate over the disputed territory of Nagorno Karabakh, BBC Azeri were specifically interested in how new and social media could bring the two warring sides together.

The BBC Superpower season is in March. In these programs we discussed the power of Internet and the way it affects the lives of people.

The Internet has brought big changes to the lives of people starting from personal relations to business contacts. New media has opened up a new way not only for journalists. It has also inspired an audience and civil society towards free thought and social activism.

The wide use of social media has changed cultural and political values throughout the world. People are willing to communicate, participate and share their thoughts.

This new online project prepared by the Azeri service of the BBC within this Internet season is called Facebook diary.

Every day the participants of this project will follow social media sites like Facebook and Twitter and share their observations with readers of this site.

The first part of our Facebook diary is called Social media and conflict resolution.

As an observation, the main purpose of using Facebook is about the opportunities offered to users of social media as well as using it as a think-tank platform.

What opportunity does social media offer to peace activists from Armenia and Azerbaijan? Can new media tools change the current situation? What are the negative effects of social media in the light of nationalists using new media for an attack on the “enemy”?

Answers to these questions will be given by diarists writing on “Social media and conflict resolution” - Arzu Qeybullayeva from Azerbaijan and Onnik Krikorian from Armenia.

The series can be read in Azerbaijani on the BBC Azeri web site, or in three parts in English (Pt I, Pt II, Pt III) as well as French (Pt I, Pt II, Pt III) on Global Voices Online.