Zori Balayan is an Armeniannovelist, journalist, sports doctor, traveler and sports expert. He was awarded the "Renowned master of the Arts" an Armenian official title.
Biography
Born in Stepanakert, Nagorno-Karabakh. He graduated the Ryazan State Medical University in 1963. From 1971 to 1973 he traversed the Kamchatka and Chokotskaya tundras on dog-sleds, traveling as far as the North Sea. In his essay Hearth, published during the pre-perestroika era, he tried to demonstrate the Armenian identity of Nagorno-Karabakh and identified Nakhichevan as historically belonging to Armenia. He further regarded Turks as an enemy of both Russia and Armenia. Azerbaijani historian Isa Gambar criticized Balayan's book in an article entitled Old Songs and New Legends. British journalist and author Thomas de Waal called Zori Balayan "chauvunistic intellectual warrior," whose book "Hearth" "might never have been allowed to spread". In 1988 he and Armenian poet Silva Kaputikyan were received by Mikhail Gorbachev and discussed the absence of Armenian-language television programs and textbooks in Nagorno-Karabakh schools as well as other concerns of Karabakh's majority-Armenian population. In October 1993, he signed the Letter of Forty-Two. Balayan is a journalist for the weekly Russian-language publication Literaturnaya Gazeta.
Controversy
There exists an allegation, mainly propagated by mainstream Azerbaijani and Turkish sources, that Zori Balayan confessed to the killing of an Azerbaijani child. The allegations are purported to be from a paragraph in a book entitled Revival of Our Souls or Revival of Our Spirits, supposedly written by Zori Balayan. Balayan, as well as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia, have come out denying him having ever written such a book. Ayse Gunaysu, member of the Committee Against Racism and Discrimination of the Human Rights Association of Turkey has said "it should be quite obvious, from the language used in depicting the torture, that the quotation was wholly made up." Onur Caymaz, a Turkish writer, who originally backed the allegation, stated that he was wrong and that Balayan hadn't written such a book.
The authorities in Azerbaijan allege that Balayan was involved in a terrorist bombing of the metro in Baku in 1994. General secretary of Interpol, in a letter to Balayan, stated that the agency considered the complaint politically motivated and that it had removed Balayan from its wanted list as a result.
