The residents of Artsakh’s (Nagorno-Karabakh) Lisagor village, who are under a bilateral blockade now due to the blocking of the Lachin (Berdzor) corridor and the Hakari bridge by Azerbaijan, are unable to cash out their money, as there are no ATMs in the village, and it is impossible to get to Artsakh capital Stepanakert or Goris, Armenia. Village head Gagik Nasibyan told Armenian News-NEWS.am about this.
"A very difficult situation has been created. We don't have ATMs and terminals, we can't withdraw money, we can't make transfers either. There is money in the account, but we are unable to cash out. We used to go to Goris or Stepanakert, but now, of course, we can't. In general, there is not much place to spend the money either because we do not have movement. But if it is urgently needed, we will not be able to use [it]," he said.
According to Nasibyan, in all cases, the village residents do not consider the option of going out through the aforesaid Azerbaijani checkpoint.
On April 30, Azerbaijani sources released videos showing that Artsakh residents "freely" use the Azerbaijani checkpoint on the Hakari bridge.
But as per Nasibyan, no resident of Lisagor has passed through that checkpoint since then, and there are no more residents of Lisagor remaining in Goris.
"People don't want to go through the checkpoint, they have fears, the danger is very big, they know that something can change at any moment; that's why they don't go," he said.
On May 5, and through the mediation of Russian peacekeepers, food and medicine were delivered to the Azerbaijani besieged villages of Artsakh. According to Nasibyan’s calculations, they will be enough for their village for about a month.
The Azerbaijani side, once again grossly violating the provisions of the tripartite statement of 2020 and continuously providing disinformation regarding the “transfer of weapons from Armenia to Karabakh,” closed the Hakari bridge on the Artsakh-Armenia border on April 23. Azerbaijan officially announced the setting up of an Azerbaijani checkpoint on the Lachin-Stepanakert motorway.
