Women exploited: author Zanoyan spotlights sex trafficking in Armenia
23:55, August 18, 2013
By Lucine Kasbarian
Sexual slavery, forced labor and the extraction of body organs: These
are the most common reasons for human trafficking, which represents an
estimated $32 billion per year in international trade.
In 2008, the United Nations estimated that nearly 2.5 million people
from more than 125 different countries were being trafficked into some
135 countries around the world.
According to the International Organization for Migration, sex
trafficking means coercing a migrant into a sexual act as a condition
of allowing or arranging the migration. Sex trafficking uses physical
or sexual coercion, deception, abuse of power and bondage incurred
through forced debt. Trafficked women and children, for instance, are
often promised work in the domestic or service industry but, instead,
are sometimes taken to brothels where they are forced into
prostitution, and their passports and other identification papers are
confiscated. They may be beaten or locked up and promised their
freedom only after earning – through prostitution – their purchase
price and their travel and visa costs.
Vulnerable populations in former Soviet states, such as Armenia, are
particularly susceptible to this global phenomenon. Since Armenia’s
independence, thousands of Armenian women and girls have been taken —
to Russia, Turkey, and some Arab states of the Persian Gulf — to be
initiated into prostitution.
A 2003-2004 investigation by Edik Baghdasaryan and Ara Manoogian,
journalists for and
, concluded that approximately 2,000
Armenian women were involved in the sex trade in the United Arab
Emirates, Bahrain and Oman. Their findings were documented in the film
and book, `Desert Nights.’
Earlier this year, Armenian-American author Vahan Zanoyan released `A
Place Far Away’ (Create Space Books, $16.95), a crime novel about sex
trafficking in Armenia. While the storyline reads like a sordid
suspense saga, the situations are largely based on actual events, the
result of on-the-ground research by the author.
In Zanoyan’s engrossing tale, the action shifts between the trafficked
Lara Galian and Swiss-Armenian investigative journalist Edik Laurian’s
attempts to uncover what happened to her and her relatives.
Sixteen year-old Lara lives with her family in the poor village of
Saralanj, located somewhere inArmenia. Unaware of her striking good
looks, Lara becomes the unsuspecting target of a local crime boss,
Sergei Ayvazian, who wishes to exploit her beauty. After Lara’s
skeptical father Samvel rejects Ayvazian’s offer to manage a lucrative
modeling career for Lara, Samvel is found dead in a ravine. Grieving,
sick and penniless, Lara’s mother reluctantly agrees to Ayvazian’s
proposal, and allows Lara to travel abroad. Once in Ayvazian’s
custody, Lara is beaten, raped and discovers the true nature of the
work that awaits her. Shuttled from Moscow to Dubai, Lara is
eventually sold, in a one-year contract, to a local sheik. While Lara
unwillingly goes along with her handlers, she nevertheless tries to
maintain her sanity and plot an escape. At the same time, journalist
Edik Laurian discovers and investigates Lara’s case in Armenia. As the
action unfolds, Edik, Lara, her family and a cast of dubious
characters struggle to dictate Lara’s destiny, in the lead-up to the
thrilling finale.
The following interview with Vahan Zanoyan took place in Yerevan on
June 20, 2013:
Lucine Kasbarian: How did you decide to write this book?
Vahan Zanoyan: I discovered the Armenian sex trafficking phenomenon
by accident. While on a business trip to Dubai, I ran into a beautiful
17 year-old Armenian girl. The girl was talking with another woman,
and I could tell the conversation was strained. It’s a long tale, but
it took six months to extract her story from her because the girl was
very scared. I compensated her for her time so that her pimps would
not get suspicious. Finally, she started to trust me and tell me what
happened to her. I spent close to two years researching the issue. To
be clear, Lara Galian is a composite sketch of four Armenian girls I
met in Dubai. All the names and locations in the book have been
changed to protect the innocent.
Lucine Kasbarian: What has the reaction been to `A Place Far Away?’
Vahan Zanoyan: The book has received very favorable responses and
reviews from media and readers. I don’t seek to make a profit from
this initiative. My aim is to raise awareness, assist the victims and
work on prevention.
All proceeds from the book go to the United Methodist Center on Relief
,a nonprofit organization that helps integrate and rehabilitate freed
victims of sex trafficking, and that has a significant presence in
Armenia; and Orran, a charitable organization that provides a safe
haven to the most vulnerable in Armenian society – such as homeless
youth forced to live on the streets. They are the first to be picked
off by traffickers.
Orran does preventive work, while UMCOR has shelters where they help
rehabilitate rescued victims. Rescuing the victims can be especially
challenging work since some pimps stage fake rescue attempts to fool
the girls. The pimps then lock them up, beat them and thus deter them
from considering genuine rescue attempts in the future. But there are
not enough resources or money to do everything that needs to be done.
LK: In June, your book was translated into the Armenian language. Tell
us about that.
VZ: To help launch this new edition in Armenia, I appeared on perhaps
every major talk show on Armenian television. A reception was held at
U.S. Ambassador Heffern’s home in Yerevan, which was attended by
around one hundred people, including journalists and organizations
engaged in the struggle against human trafficking.
Unfortunately, today’s Armenia is divided into the filthy rich who
don’t read, and the penniless class who love to read but can’t afford
to buy books. Thus, nowadays, Armenia does not boast a widespread
reading public as it once used to. That said, trafficking of Armenian
women is a hot topic in certain circles right now. My book costs 3,000
Dram [about $7.50 USD], which most native Armenians cannot afford. So
I’m not sure how well the book is selling in Armenia, even though it
did make it to the top of a bestseller list compiled by ArmenPress.
LK: What did you want to accomplish by writing this book?
VZ: I wanted to use gripping suspense to expose one of the most
significant issues of our time. I also wanted to help create awareness
about the criminal class in Armenia. If we sugarcoat that aspect of
life because of national pride, we are doing our country and people a
great disservice. Aside from telling the main story, I also wanted to
showcase the Armenian people, our history, our culture and our moral
courage. For example, I wrote about the beauty of Armenia’s landscape
as a way to remind people of our nation’s gifts, our undeniable assets
and to inspire the people who, more than ever, need a moral uplift.
LK: What message would you like to send to the young, poor or
disadvantaged women of Armenia?
VZ: Don’t fall for promises that sound too good to be true or appeal
to your vanity. When you face poverty, there are other alternatives. A
16 year-old will trust her own circle of friends or relatives, many of
whom might sell her off. This could include former childhood
classmates who have fallen in with a bad crowd, brothers who have drug
addictions to feed, or uncles who have gambling debts to pay. They
don’t think twice about bartering a friend or relative to feed their
habits.
LK: Do some of the girls escape and return home? Why do some stay even
after they have `paid their debts?’
VZ: For the vast majority of them, escape seems impossible. For many,
there are moral issues that can’t be overcome. How can a girl resume a
respectable life in Armenia if she has been dishonored through
prostitution? These thugs rule by fear. The traffickers, pimps and
madams are all Armenian. They pay off the police, too.
LK: What do you say to those Armenians who don’t want to call
attention to this trend because of how shameful it is?
VZ: We can’t say amot eh [it’s shameful], get embarrassed, and stay
quiet. Our silence makes us participants in this crime. The best thing
for traffickers is this kind of radio silence on their activities. By
exposing them, we help the victims. If I had the means, I’d freely
distribute the book to every Armenian over 18, both inside and outside
Armenia. Speaking out could also make public officials more diligent.
After the `Desert Nights’ documentary surfaced, Armenian authorities
began to take notice and action. Before this, the officials would
consider the casualties to be complicit in the crimes rather than
victims of crime.
LK: What would you like to see happen regarding human trafficking?
VZ: There are many great organizations that fight against the symptoms
of trafficking. One is House of Hope (). It
provides teenage girls from state-run orphanages with a safe home, a
family environment, and psychological support, as well as life and
job-training skills. While such organizations do valuable work, they
treat the symptoms affecting these girls but not the root causes,
which are the pathetic economic and social conditions in Armenia.
Seventy years of Soviet rule, broken homes, fathers who have left
their families to work abroad and did not come back — all these have
contributed to the decay of our collective moral fiber. In 1915,
Armenian women threw themselves into the Euphrates River to die rather
than be raped by Turks. Now, underprivileged Armenian women and
families are turning to prostitution as a survival option.
Some improvements are happening, and I’d like to see this continue.
The police in Armenia are more cooperative on this issue. We need more
people working with victims, prevention organizations, law
enforcement, and victim rehabilitation and reintegration programs.
There is a new flow of victims every day, so we must stop it at the
source while taking care of the existing victims. But as I said
earlier, the root cause is the horrible economic and social conditions
in the country. Unless that problem is addressed, this phenomenon will
only get worse.
LK: In writing this novel, you also managed to incorporate personal
views and a Diasporan’s desire to be understood by native Armenians.
For example, the character of Edik writes verse as he marvels at the
Armenian landscape. One reviewer said the descriptions were so
compelling it could bolster tourism to Armenia. The same Edik
ruminates about Armenian ancestral moral codes, saying, `The ultimate
human dignity was living within one’s means.’ Your family’s
repatriation experience is represented, too, as the Galians were
aghbars, a pejorative term for `brother’ that was and still is
assigned to some repatriates. Would you talk about this?
VZ: As you rightly say, the book is about more than the story of one
victim of trafficking. In a novel like this, I felt obliged to also
describe the country, both in its beauty, history, and in the goodness
of the common man, as well as in its deep-rooted problems, such as the
rule of the ruthless oligarchs, and the corruption, and fear that they
spread. The dynamic between the local Armenians and the Diaspora
Armenians is part of the post-independence Armenian reality, and could
not have been excluded from the narrative. The contrast between how
Diasporan Armenians generally react to situations toward which local
Armenians are largely indifferent has always intrigued me, and I
wanted to incorporate that aspect in the novel.
LK: The character of Edik also talks about how in post-Soviet Armenia,
authority figures could not be challenged without serious and often
fatal consequences, and how the `Western, activist approach has no
place in this psyche.’ Please talk about this concept.
VZ: One of the foundations of communist philosophy and the Soviet
system that ruled Armenia was the alleged precedence of the public and
collective good over individual rights. Individualism, which was the
important driving force of Western civilizations and philosophy, had
no place on the Soviet system. To this day I see this in Armenia
when, for example, I was following peoples’ attitude toward Raffi
Hovanissian’s way of presidential campaigning. Everyone knows the
current leadership is bad, but no one believes it can be changed. Can
you imagine that attitude in the U.S. or Western Europe? A handful of
oligarchs, no matter how elaborate their system of patronage and
bureaucratic loyalty, would not be able to rule a country when
everyone knows and sees what they are doing. And yet, they get away
with it in Armenia because people have been conditioned — under
seventy years of Soviet rule — to accept authority, not to challenge.
Only when that link in this vicious cycle is broken will Armenia
start the process of healing.
LK: In the narrative, you present an act of retribution that comes
about after authorities do nothing to apprehend and punish criminals.
Do you think there is a place for vigilantism in today’s Armenia?
VZ: Vigilantism is a dangerous thing to advocate, and that is not what
I am advocating. It is dangerous simply because it can easily lead to
new gangs, gang wars, and more destruction. So popular or widespread
vigilantism is not the answer. But there have been critical moments
in history when the situation gets so desperate that acts of `Divine
Retribution’ save the day. I think one celebrated case like that goes
a long way in shaking things up and waking dulled consciences, not to
mention giving people some hope.
LK: What’s next?
VZ: I plan to return to Dubai to do additional research for a sequel
book and follow up on the whereabouts of the unfortunate girls I’d
met.
LK: How can readers help?
VZ: They can help raise public awareness by circulating the
documentary film, `Desert Nights’:
They can circulate this interview. They can devise a way to send a
copy of this book to every member of the U.S. Congress. They can buy
print or electronic copies of `A Place Far Away’ for colleagues,
friends and decision makers. In September, I’ll be touring the Eastern
United States and Canada to promote the book. I will be delivering
presentations at Sts. Vartanantz Church in Ridgefield, N.J. on Sep 22
and the Armenian Diocese in NYC on Sept 26. Details are available on
the books’ Facebook page:
LK: Why did you choose self-publishing?
VZ: I tried to go the established route, but found it to be one of
the most exasperating experiences of my life. The prevailing practice
in the industry is to require authors to submit a one-page pitch
letter to agents for representation consideration. I resented trying
to encapsulate the thrust of what became `A Place Far Away’ into a
one-page synopsis, but nevertheless approached a total of 22 agents —
all to no avail. Since I didn’t care about the perceived prestige that
comes with being affiliated with a traditional publisher, I decided to
produce the book on my own to maintain editorial control. I have no
regrets.
Second photo: Lucine Kasbarian
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