What we do on the Nagorny Karabakh conflict
The town name on this Soviet-era sign has been changed from its former Azeri name 'Shusha' to 'Shushi', as Armenians know it
Conciliation Resources (CR) has worked with local and international partners since 2003 as part of a UK government-funded Consortium Initiative addressing different aspects of the conflict.
We are responsible for media and public awareness work. This aims to challenge stereotypes and improve the quality and diversity of media coverage about the conflict and peace process.
Our work also supports creative and strategic thinking among policymakers directly engaged in the Karabakh peace process. We actively lobby for greater participation by civil society.
New publication
The forced displacement of over 1 million people is a key legacy of the Nagorny Karabakh conflict in the South Caucasus. Forced displacement in the Nagorny Karabakh conflict: return and its alternatives presents the research findings of Armenian, Azerbaijani and international analysts, who grapple with policy related questions arising from this legacy. Their essays reveal the fundamentally opposed nature of Armenian and Azerbaijani approaches to resolving this issue. The publication provides evidence of popular attitudes towards the return of displaced persons, and explores possible means, likely obstacles and alternatives to return.
Current activities
- the Dialogue through Film project in which Azeri and Karabakhi Armenian young people are trained in film-making, then produce a series of films about aspects of life in their societies, including some joint films
- a platform that enables the exchange of views between Armenian and Azeri civil society experts on creative visions for a peaceful settlement, and feeds into strategic thinking among key Armenian and Azeri decision makers in the Karabakh peace process
- the ‘Minsk Process’ project that advocates for greater civil society participation in the peace process and aims to develop mechanisms for a more inclusive process. Read a joint press release about this work (November 2008).
Past activities
CR has completed various projects since 2003 establishing forums for debate, analysis and exchange between Armenians and Azeris. These included:
- a South Caucasus-wide network of local journalists and radio stations that produced and broadcast radio diaries about ordinary people’s daily lives
- an award-winning Russian language web forum with BBC Russian.com, allowing Armenians and Azerbaijanis to air their views
- work with CR’s Accord publication series to produce the 2006 Accord: The limits of leadership: elites and societies in the Nagorny Karabakh peace process
- support between 2003 and 2008 to Nagorny Karabakh’s most widely read newspaper, Demo, with the Institute of War and Peace Reporting (IWPR)
- the translation into Russian of a book about the conflict, Black Garden, Armenia and Azerbaijan through Peace and War, written by Thomas de Waal
- a monthly radio series for Azeri communities displaced by the conflict, produced with Internews Azerbaijan and the BBC World Service, and aired on the BBC Azerbaijan service and local radio
- an exchange of articles by Azerbaijani and Armenian journalists about the conflict and peace process, published in each country’s press and in a collected volume in 2008
- support to the Society for Humanitarian Research to organize and film debates and to publish material on paths to peace
Read more about our other work on the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict.
