Eight months ago, more than 100,000 ethnic Armenians fled from the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia, due to threats of ethnic cleansing and persecution by neighbouring Azerbaijan. That’s over 80% of the population of the region.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict had been the longest-running conflict in post-Soviet Eurasia. This mountainous territory in the South Caucasus had been internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan but had operated as a de facto autonomous republic, governed by ethnic Armenians, since the 1990s.

Since 1988, Azerbaijan and Armenia have fought two wars over the status of Artsakh.₁A major escalation occurred in 2020, resulting in thousands of deaths on both sides over six weeks of intense fighting.

The most recent escalation happened on September 19, 2023, when Azerbaijan launched a one-day military offensive to reclaim Artsakh, effectively ending the enclave’s self-declared independence. This offensive followed a nearly ten-month humanitarian blockade of Artsakh by Azerbaijan, severely restricting residents’ access to food, fuel and medicine.

The takeover triggered a rapid mass exodus to Armenia, which has a population of around 3mn, causing a significant health and humanitarian crisis.

The humanitarian catastrophe has profoundly affected children and young people. UNICEF estimates that nearly 30,000 children were displaced to Armenia from Artsakh, including 21,000 school-aged children.

Refugee children in Armenia have faced significant disruptions in their education in recent years, underscoring the urgent need to expand educational opportunities for them.

Five teenage girls who fled Artsakh in the autumn of 2023 are starting anew in Armenia. They have joined the Armenian Newsroom of Harbingers’ Magazine, a project born out of a partnership between the Oxford School for the Future of Journalism and the Women’s Fund in Armenia.

For three months, they will study journalism in person under the supervision of OXSFJ tutors in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia.

Nare Arushanyan, a 16 year-old photographer from Stepanakert, the capital city of Artsakh, now living in Yerevan, describes the difference between the two cities: “It [Yerevan] is your home, but it doesn’t feel like you’re at home.”

She notes that her photos reflect this change – in Artsakh, she was “more filled with passion, with love,” resulting in colourful and bright photos, but after the war, her work completely turned into black and white. “It is because life before was more colourful than it is now.”

Nare, who taught herself photography at 14, wants to capture “the essence” of her subjects. “I photograph because I understand. I feel something,” she says. Her powerful photos have been published in various journals, raising awareness about the situation in Artsakh.

Beyond photography, she also volunteered during the blockade, providing food to those in need, sometimes walking up to ten kilometres a day due to the lack of transportation.

Alyona Sargsyan, 17, also feels a stark difference between mountainous Stepanakert, where she enjoyed “Zhingyalov hats”, an Armenian speciality, flatbread stuffed with finely diced herbs, and Yerevan, where she still doesn’t feel “as free”.

Alyona had the impression that people in Armenia didn’t care about what was happening “just a few kilometres away”. She plans to write about Artsakh, highlighting the challenges faced by forcibly displaced people and her own difficulties, such as the lack of psychological and financial support, as well as the scarcity of work.

Laura Danielyan, aged 17, also hails from the “wonderful” Stepanakert. Interested in both journalism and psychology, she plans to study the latter at university. Among the topics she wants to write about are the history, culture and traditions of Artsakh, to “highlight the wealth that has been lost”.

She has been posting about Artsakh on Facebook since before the blockade in September 2023 and intends to continue her efforts.