84-Year-Old Araks Demirchyan Hopes To Retrieve Her Ancestral Property

84-year-old Araks Demirchyan hopes to appeal to the Prime Minister of Armenia and the European Court of Human Rights to retrieve the property of her mother and grandmother.

According to Ermenihaber.am, Araks keeps Ottoman and Arabic documents and translations in a safe. They contain the whole history of the family – the mother of Araks Demirchyan, Mariam Kachikyan-Demirchyan, had brought all the documents for real estate left in Turkey to Eastern Armenia.

Although Mariam Demirchyan often had talked about the abandoned estate and documents confirming the right to the property, Araks found out about the contents of the box only after her death.

The documents were translated, and their copies were transferred to the Genocide Museum. The originals are now kept in the safe of Araks.

During the Armenian Genocide, Araks’ grandmother Marta lost all male relatives in Kharberd. With three daughters, she fled to Aleppo. There in 1929, she restored the documents for houses and lands registered in her and her daughters’ names. She appealed to the high commission of the Aleppo province to restore her rights to property, but to no avail.

The translated documents testify to enormous wealth – mansions, pastures, and houses. As of 1929, property valued at 8,300 Turkish liras was registered in the name of Araks’ mother Mariam Kachikyan. Property valued at 9,700 liras was registered in the name of her grandmother Marta Kachikyan.

Over the years, Araks has addressed various authorities to get her inheritance back. She has even gone to Turkey and addressed an Armenian lawyer, but in vain – no one would take concrete steps. Araks’ last hope is the European Court and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

westernarmeniatv.com