Gevorg Kulijanyan was born on 23 May, 2002 in Martakert. When he was 6 years old, he and his mother came to his grandmother’s house in Tsaghkunk village, Etchmiadzin. His mother died in the car accident. Gevorg’s father who was a military died in Artsakh three years ago.
“He liked to walk: wherever he went, he walked there and back, he liked to have everything by himself. I used to say, “Dear Gevorg, go by car” He said, you should to go by your own car or walk,” Gevorg’s aunt, the boy’s second mother, Kristine Hovhannisyan, told.
Gevorg loved his friends very much, and their village, Tsaghkunq. “They had their hiding place in every suburb of the village, they were constantly gathering. He was very hardworking, if they had nothing to do; they went to find work, worked, picked apples. When I said ‘why are you going, doing that hard work, it is not our time yet,’ he was saying, ‘Mom, there are things that I will not take money from you for, I have to work,” Christine said.
According to his friends, he always reached and helped his friends, even if they had fought and offended and saw that the friend needed help in some matter; he would come and help, and then leave without saying a word.
He was drafted into the army on 9 July, 2020, first served in Martuni, then moved to Stepanakert. “He loved service very much, everything military, he was a junior sergeant with the Yerkrapahs. He was a kept secrets, he said the soldier should be able to keep secrets,” the aunt who raised Gevorg said.
“The day before he died, he called at 12 at night, told me that he would sleep for a couple of hours, and I would call again. My brother waited until 4 o’clock. Gevorg called and was happy. He said, ‘It’s good that there is someone waiting for me until this hour,'” recalls George’s childhood friend, Gohar Balasanyan.
The last time he talked to his mother was on 31 October, he turned off the phone so that she would not hear the shots, and he did not say that they were also participating in the fight.
According to Virab, Gevorge’s closest friend, he had called him and told that they were going to Shushi, he might not call for a few days, let his friends go and cut wood for their house, the wood was not enough for the winter. “He did not call, we were calling back with different numbers to find him, a boy answered, he also said that he was dead, we did not believe him, we thought he might be confused,” Virab Balasanyan said.
“The mine fell, without thinking for a second he dropped his weapon and ran to help his friends, another mine fell and he died,” Gevorge’s friend Arthur Arshakyan says.
“It is unusual to talk about him in the past, to breathe this air without him, it is terrible. I do not know how we live, and then I do not know how we will live,” the mother said.
Georg Kulijanyan was killed in the battles for the defense of the homeland on 1 November, on the outskirts of Shushi.
