On September 19, Martuni electrician Komitas Ghahramanyan had one option: to ensure the safety of the children. He chose the detention center as a hiding place for them.
“I was at work, I came home in the afternoon, they started shooting, I realized that there was a war. I sent the children to the police station, where the convicts were sitting. It was vacant at that time, it was the safest place,” 55-year-old Komitas Ghahramanyan told Forrights.am.
After more or less ensuring the safety of the children, he went to the Martuni municipality to understand how he could help the city in that difficult situation.
“I went to the mayor, Aznavor Saghyan, and he said that there were children in Karvin, go and bring them to the shelter.” Karvin is a settlement adjacent to Martuni.
“Then he said we will go to Kohak (the hill), the enemy has advanced, we must not let them to come closer. There were seven of us. We went in my Ford. I had received weapons from the municipality. Then, it was not possible by car; we walked about three kilometers, until we reached our folks, they had retreated about 300 meters,” says Komitas and remembers that they participated in hot battles.
Kamitas says that they lost two victims, he was wounded, he heard about the death of Mayor Aznavor Saghyan in the hospital. “At night, the enemy had closed the Martuni-Stepanakert Road, we could not move, but they could not enter Martuni, they came from Shushi.”
After being wounded, Komitas was taken to the Stepanakert hospital. He was unable to return to Martuni from the capital. His family members and other Martuni residents were forcibly displaced from their city along the road blocked by enemy troops. “When the Azerbaijanis came, they were crowded on the road. They came and passed. I’ve heard that they took clothes from people.”
Komitas found himself in a difficult psychological situation during those days: on the one hand, his family was surrounded, and on the other, was the situation in the hospital after the explosion of the gasoline depot. “They were bringing in seriously injured people. In the end there was no one to take care of anyone, everyone was thinking about themselves. I had to have surgery too. The doctor said, ‘I can’t, it’s not possible. The shrapnel is still in my neck.’”
The shrapnel is in the body of a 55-year-old man and it periodically makes itself felt. He is currently having financial problems, therefore is unable to receive medical care.
There are five people in Komitas Ghahramanyan’s family and they currently receive 250,000 drams in support from the state as compensation for rent and utilities. After the changes that will come into effect in March 2025, only an adult son will be able to get this support. “I need to think about one thing: I need to find a more suitable job. I am a third-group disabled person, I wanted to get a job, but they didn’t accept me. I am half a person, my hand works only by 50 percent, I don’t have a higher education,” he said, noting that he was hired by a company that managed a canteen in one of the military units in Ararat province, but they made him work 12 hours a day, he was able to do that work for two days, and he quit due to physical exhaustion. “I was hired as a bread baker: I would go at seven in the morning and come back at seven in the evening,” he said.
Narek Kirakosyan

Narek Kirakosyan
Narek Kirakosyan is a journalist, works on the principle of "a person is an absolute value".