A tribute to Avetik Iskhanyan

A passionate defender of human rights in general and of the rights of the Armenian people in particular, Avetik Ishkhanyan died on February 16, 2025 of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). ALS (a degenerative muscle disease detected after the 2020 war) progressively deprived him of the ability to move, but it never prevented him from expressing himself in writing, as he published articles right up to the end. Until his death, he remained the subject of criminal proceedings instigated by the present government of Armenia which sought to silence him.

Family origins

Avetik Ishkhanyan was born in Yerevan in 1955, into a family deeply marked by the political persecutions of the Soviet regime: three of his grandparents had been arrested for political reasons and executed in KGB jails between 1928 and 1937. His maternal grandfather was Vahan Cheraz, who came to Gumri from Constantinople to care for the orphans who had taken refuge there after the genocide, and who introduced the scouting movement to Armenia. His father was the linguist Rapha?l Ishkhanyan, famous for his defense of the use of the Armenian language and Armenian-language education in Soviet Armenia, where the intellectual and political elite often preferred to enroll their children in Russian-speaking schools.

Action within the Karabagh Committee

The death of Stalin in 1953 allowed the rehabilitation of his grandparents, so that Avetik Ishkhanyan was able to study at Yerevan State University, graduating in Geophysics in 1977. After working in mining exploration for a few years, he resumed his studies in Leningrad (now St Petersburg), where he completed a brilliant thesis in mining geology in 1987. Turning down offers to stay on as a teacher in Leningrad, he returned to Yerevan, which was then in the throes of a political protest led by the “Karabagh Committee”, whose aim was to obtain the reunification of Artsakh (the autonomous region of Nagorno-Karabakh) with Armenia.

Inspired by his father's actions, Avetik Ishkhanyan initially chose to campaign for the defense of the Armenian language: in 1987, he created an association called Mashtots, whose aim was to promote the enrollment of Armenian children in Armenian-speaking schools. However, Mashtots' action was not directed against the Russian language (which Avetik had mastered very well since his studies in Leningrad), it aimed to rehabilitate the use of Armenian as an official language in Armenia, out of a concern for national dignity (and not nationalism, as he often pointed out).

In 1988, Avetik Ishkhanyan and four other comrades were chosen as “secret members” of the Karabagh Committee, responsible for continuing its activities in the event of the known members being arrested. This arrest took place on December 10, 1988, and for six months Avetik had to go underground to pursue the political struggle of the Karabagh Committee, whose members were eventually released following an international support campaign.

Commitment to human rights

In 1996, Avetik Ishkhanyan helped set up the Armenian Helsinki Committee, in order to take concrete actions to ensure respect for human rights in Armenia: for years, he tirelessly visited prisons, organized trainings for NGO members, sent observers to courts, demonstrations and polling stations. From 2005, he expanded his action thanks to financial support from the European Union, and ran numerous training sessions for association activists. He never aimed to mould them intellectually, and always urged them to “think for themselves”. The international support for Avetiks organization lasted only until 2019. Suddenly, all support ceased. My interpretation is that Avetik Ishkhanyan was considered as too difficult to manipulate and as insufficiently anti-Russian. He describes this shift in European policy in an “Open letter to ambassadors accredited to Armenia” that was published in 2023.

The last years

Deeply affected by the capitulation of the Armenian Prime Minister Pashinyan in 2020, Avetik Ishkhanyan took part in attempts to organize a government of national unity, but illness took its toll and he gradually lost the use of his legs. He continued to write, and his latest articles offer an extremely lucid insight into the policies of the great powers towards Armenia and the compromising of the Armenian government.

Avetik Ishkhanyan leaves behind him the memory of a man of great dignity, an incorruptible defender of justice within his country, also a defender of his people, and of the national dignity of Armenia. His sons and colleagues will certainly continue his mission. He leaves a collection of very sharp analyses of the political and geopolitical situation, which are definitely worth to be re-read.

?

Suggested readings

• Open Letter to the Ambassadors Accredited to Armenia

https://en.aravot.am/2023/10/27/336089/

??? ????? ??????????? ????????????? ??????????? - https://armactu.fr/hy/2023/10/27/13478/, https://168.am/2023/10/27/1949897.html

Lettre ouverte aux ambassadeurs accrédités en Arménie - https://armactu.fr/2023/10/27/13480/

• Quelle différence il y a entre les bolcheviks arméniens de 1921 et les membres de la junte de Pashinyan ?

https://armactu.fr/2023/05/17/10130/

• Helsinki Committee of Armenia

https://armhels.com/en/