Armenians on Azerbaijanis in the Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict. Shaping the Image of the Enemy

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is an intractable conflict that has been the agenda of the international community for over two decades, has gone through sporadic outbreaks of violence, as well as multiple and failed peace mediation attempts. Hence, despite the resolution efforts, the conflict persists, sustaining the parties’ main grievances and entailing victimization, long-lasting trauma, and disruption. This paper aims at exploring how the image of the enemy is reflected in the official discourse of the Armenian leaders about Azerbaijanis during 2004-2016, and how trauma and victimization shape this type of image. For the present paper, I have selected 10 speeches belonging to the Armenian Presidents and Foreign Ministers in office and held at various national meetings and international forums which I collected from governmental and non-governmental websites.