Self-described environmental activists in Azerbaijan who took part in the government-backed blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh are voicing discontent over their finances.
On May 26, a group of Azerbaijani NGO heads assembled in front of the presidential administration office in Baku, protesting against what they called cuts in their state grants.
The same people participated in a demonstration on a key road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia that lasted for 138 days and ended after it was made redundant by a new Azerbaijani customs checkpoint at the other end of the road..
From December 12 until April 28, the NGO representatives camped out in tents and periodically chanted slogans and brandished placards accusing the Armenian administration of Nagorno-Karabakh of "ecocide".
What prompted the NGO heads to come forward was the disclosure of a list of winners of a state grant competition by the Agency for State Support for NGOs on the same day. Some did not get on the list while others got far less grant money than they asked for.
Although there is no connection between the grant competition and the demonstrations at the Lachin-Stepanakert road, some clearly felt that they should be rewarded for the loyalty they showed the state in taking part in the blockade.
One protestor – Matanat Asgargizi, chair of Public Union for Support for Soldier Families – said she was upset that her organization was granted only 8,000 manats (about $4705) for a painting contest on the theme of Shusha, a key Karabakh town.
"We were the first ones to go [to the demonstrations]. We have been face-to-face with Russians [peacekeepers] and Armenians for weeks. They [authorities] say, 'Are you not ashamed for mentioning your presence in Shusha.' I don't think that I should be given 20,000 manats just because I was in Shusha. I am just wondering – why should these people who are always standing by their state be ignored?" she asked, in an interview with local news outlet Abzas Media.
Another NGO head – Tahira Mammadova, who went viral on social media in the early days of the blockade for accidentally killing a pigeon - was also disgruntled over the size of her organization's grant. "They promised 15,000 manats (about $8,820) for one project, but they didn't allocate it. And for a film about a Shusha martyr they allocated only 6,000 manats (about $3,530). This 6,000 manats is like an insult to me," she told RFE/RL's Azerbaijani service. (She did not take part in the protest in Baku.)
A member of the Board of Supervisors of the Agency for State Support for NGOs, Gunel Safarova, said the grants were cut because of the low quality of the pitched projects. "Besides, linking participation in Shusha with participating in the grant competition raises serious questions. The agency did not organize those demonstrations. They were a voluntary action. People who went there voluntarily did not go to later ask for grants. This is very absurd," she told Abzas.