The presentation of a disc with films produced by Karabakh Armenians and Azerbaijanis as part of the “Cinema Dialogues” project took place at Golden Tulip Hotel in Yerevan on Thursday. It is already the fourth year that the project has been implemented, with as many as 22 films telling about the lives of ordinary people, Armenians and Azerbaijanis, who suffered from the conflict already produced within its frameworks.

The project is being carried out with the support of the British organization, Conciliation Resources, the Yerevan and Baku offices of the international media development organization, Internews, and the Stepanakert press club. This is the only area where direct communication between Karabakhis and Azerbaijanis takes place.

The films “My Enemy, My Friend” and “Caucasian Niece” were shown during the presentation. The first of the two mentioned films tells about two human rights activists who managed to free hundreds of people from captivity in Karabakh and in Azerbaijan.

Conciliation Resources project manager Jenny Norton said that the main goal is to enable people on either side of the conflict to talk to each other, understand each other and overcome the image of an enemy.

Harutyun Mansuryan, who coordinates the project from Armenian Internews, said that there is also another goal: to show the human factor in wars, to prove that war is not a solution to problems.

Have they managed to meet their goals? The Karabakh participants of the project approached by ArmeniaNow would give different answers to this question. Film director Arina Khachikyan said that she had never seen Azerbaijanis before and communicating with them was interesting for her, although at first, she said, she was very afraid. Film director Armine Martirosyan confessed that in a certain way the project even had an opposite effect on her as she has made sure how difficult it is to work with a side that takes you as an enemy.

The films were also shown in Karabakh capital Stepanakert where they aroused a heated discussion. Many of the speakers said that such projects are premature, that journalists were trying to be “more Catholic than the Pope” and thus were weakening the positions of Karabakh. However, opinions were also voiced that communication and joint projects are needed because without contacts the demonizing of the opposite side is getting more and more refined and that it is thanks to projects like this that it becomes possible to alter opinions of at least a small circle of people.