Christine Vardanyan

Case 1

In 2003 friends of Borik Ghazaryan and Hrachya Darmanyan, residents of the town ofTalinin the Aragatsotn Marz, invited them to the city ofOryolin theRussian Federationto work on a construction site. In spite of his age (he is 58-years-old) Borik accepted the offer hoping to at last finish the construction of his half-built house when he came back home. The two friends went to Oryol and began working. Everything seemed to be fine and they would often go to the riverbank when they had time off. But one ill-fated day, October 25, 2003, they got into argument by the river with a group of Russian boys and girls. The point at issue was, according to Hrachya Darmanyan, his dark skin.

 “They began insulting me, calling me black-skinned, and Borik, who looks more like a Russian than an Armenian, was defending me,” Hrachya recalled. Seeing that the argument was heating up, Borik offered the group some money and asked them to leave them alone. But the group started to hurl more insults at them saying: “You have come to our land and now you want to bribe us?” The argument turned into a scuffle. Hrachya managed to get away as they rained blows on his friend until he was motionless. Believing him dead, they took Borik to the morgue. After three days in the morgue, Borik regained consciousness and realized that he was alive. With the help of morgue workers he was transferred to a hospital, where Hrachya and his other friends found him after a long search.

 “The doctors refused to help him, saying ‘Who asked you to come here and get beaten?'” Borik's wife Lusvard recalled. Realizing that his days were numbered Borik asked his friends to take him home. On November 7, 2003 they returned toArmeniaand seven days later Borik died.

“When he came I hardly recognized him – nothing was left of the strong Borik I knew. I treated his wounds and when we took him to the hospital the doctor said that there was no hope – his gall bladder was perforated, other internal organs were damaged as a result of the beating. The doctor also said that if he had been treated in time he would have certainly survived,” Borik's wife said. After Borik's death his relatives didn't go to the police to find and punish the perpetrators.

“It's all the same, we knew that it was not possible to expect any help. First, it happened inRussiaand second, financially it wasn't possible. And now almost every day an Armenian is killed and the guilty are never punished,” Lusvard said, holding out hope that one day justice would triumph.

Case 2

“In 2005 I was working temporarily in theKrasnodarprovince on a construction site. One day when I went shopping I encountered a group of young men. They were Russians. They began asking questions like who I was, where I came from. I said I was Armenian, doing construction work. They began mocking and insulting me. Seeing that it was impossible to get rid of them, I offered them money. Strange to say, they took the money and I escaped,” recalled Vaghinak Grigoryan, a resident of Talin in the Aragatsotn Marz, adding that they had gotten a few blows in before he offered them the money.

The violence against Armenians that has taken place inRussiain the recent years has mainly gone unnoticed and unpunished. Acting Spokesman of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Vladimir Karapetyan said, “Our ministry called upon the Russian agencies to immediately take measures to deal with these killings and conduct impartial investigations and stressed, at the same time, that it was necessary to take steps to prevent such crimes.”

Russians aren't the only ones taking advantage of guest workers

Talin resident Garnik Grigoryan goes toRussiafor work almost every year, returning toArmeniaonly for a few weeks at the New Year. He doesn't complain about his work. “If I did the same work inArmeniaI would be paid $300 instead of $700 or even $1,000 if there are no middlemen.” Every time he goes toRussiahe has to ask for someone to mediate. “It's easier to go if there are friends or acquaintances there, but I go there with the help of middlemen (people who take groups to work inRussia). I sign a contract with them for a certain period of time and only then do I buy my plane ticket. The contract stipulates that a portion of the amount be paid to the middleman. For example, if I'm paid $1,000 a months I give him $300 and he, in his turn, takes care of the legal issues,” Garnik said.

Garnik doesn't complain about how he is treated by Russians but he is not so sanguine about Armenians. “Russians respect us, if only because they would never do what we do for the same price, at the same quality and besides, they can't do such difficult professional work. But Armenians, instead of treating us better, even deceive us and after we finish our work they sometimes don't pay, arguing that we didn't do quality work or we didn't do what they wanted from us.”

Another resident of Talin, Vaghinak Grigoryan, who worked in Anapa, faced a similar situation. “Armenians run a racket – they beat us and take away the money they paid. Of course, generally, not the people who paid us who do the beating; they ask other guys and later they divide the money among themselves. As for us, we are powerless to do anything,” Vaghinak said. He remembers another case when not only did these people take the money a worker had earned but they threatened to kill him as well.

“Once, a Russian girl was killed, her body thrown into the sewer, and the blame was put on Armenians. There were two groups of Cossacks – from Kuban and fromRostov. The latter were more dreadful. If it was possible to somehow restrain the Kuban Cossacks by offering them money, but in the case of Rostov Cossacks it was impossible – they would put their grandfathers' medals on their chests and walk into our houses without asking and attack us,” Vaghinak recalled. Vaghinak's family was turned out of their house that way, and they somehow managed to return toArmenia. “At that time I was registered at the house of a very old man and was renovating it. Just imagine what I felt when I came home and found out that my family wasn't there. Later I found out that they were on their way toArmenia. But I couldn't leave my work unfinished,” he said.

Sevak Beglaryan has worked inRussiaas a foreman for many years but he prefers to deal not with Armenians but with Russians. “Since a new law regarding the registration was passed inRussia, this year I'm trying to avoid unnecessary problems. In general, if there were no problems related to the law and registration, it would have been easier to work with Armenians because Russians can't do the quality work Armenians do.”

Aristakes Vardanyan is not afraid of problems with representatives of the law-enforcement agencies. He takes with him only people he knows well and has worked with before.

If accidents happen at work, the foreman of the given team or the person who delivered the worker takes care of all related expenses. Such an accident happened to Poghos Poghosyan, a 23-year-old resident of the Armavir Marz, when he was working inRostov. A stone fell on his right foot and fractured it, and his foreman settled all the issues related to the treatment, paid Poghos for the work he had done, and sent him toArmenia.

The Law “On Migration Registration of Foreign Nationals and Stateless Persons in theRussian Federation” adopted on January 15, 2007 created considerable difficulties for our countrymen working inRussia. Whereas in the past, migrants were required to register in quarters with a certain floor space (no less than 12 square meters per person; in other words, seven people could not stay in a one-room apartment without being automatically considered illegal migrants) now this restriction has been lifted. According to the head of the department on migration programs of the Migration Agency of Armenia, Irina Davtyan, “The migrant has the right to settle wherever he or she wishes to; only one thing is required – to inform the appropriate migration officials.”

According to the new law, those who travel toRussiaappeal to appropriate agencies and get permission to register, and in this case they are not required to have jobs. According to Irina Davtyan, “If all the required documents are handed over, the employer has no right to turn the migrant down.” It might seem that there will be no problems for people working inRussiabut this is not the case. The law is valid only for those who enterRussiaafter it was adopted. “It turns out that the old workers are working illegally and they will have to leave the country and re-enterRussiato obtain the required work permits,” Irina Davtyan said.