WILL JAVAKHQ BE GRANTED AUTONOMY?
Ruzan Amirjanyan, Brussels

A1+
[05:33 pm] 17 October, 2007

Sabina Freizer, the Project Director of the International Crisis Group
(ICG) on Caucasus, presented the ICG report on Javakhq at the Second
Convention of European Armenians.

The referendum due in Javakhq on October 16 was postponed till
November. The Javakhqi Armenians are concerned over four issues-
language, local self-government bodies, prison and the Armenian
Genocide.

According to Sabina Freizer, the issues have aroused controversial
feedback in Georgia. President Saakashvili states minorities should
be granted equal rights and backs decentralization. The recent laws
came to prove the reverse: power lies with the Georgians.

Georgians reject discrimination while Armenians complaint of the
language barrier, they cannot use the Armenian language in social
and political life. At the same time they accept that corruption has
significantly decreased in the country after the "Revolution of Roses."

Poverty and emigration are comparatively high in Javakhq. Georgians
fear that one day national minorities might demand sovereignty or
independence.

Freizer says Georgians are mistaken while equating autonomy with
separatism. Armenians of Georgia merely want cultural and religious
sovereignty.

Under the recent "Law on Education", Literature, History and Language
should be taught in the Georgian language. The Javakhqi Armenians
are really concerned over the law as they don’t master the language.

The ICG has requested the Georgian Government to allow Armenians
using Mother Tongue in communities where their number surpasses 20
per cent of the population.

(90% of the Akhalkalaki and Ninotsminda population are Armenians. There
are 250 thousand Armenians in Georgia. 120 thousand of them live
in Samtskhe-Javakhq.)

Samtskhe-Javakhq has never had an Armenian governor though most of
the population are Armenians.

Georgians get irritated each time someone speaks of federation or
confederation. They struggle for their identification via contradictory
methods. Georgia should realise that their stance is inadmissible
for Europe, Sabina Freizer said.