Armenian media reveals details of fire at barrack

The Armenian soldiers who died on January 19 in a fire in the rural house that was turned into a "barrack" lived in terrible conditions.

No one lived in the house for about a year before the soldiers were accommodated, Caliber.Az reports, citing Armenian media.

There was not even electricity in the house.

"At that time the father of one of the soldiers laid electrical wires at his own expense so that the soldiers at least had electricity. The wires were old, ragged, and weathered from the rain. He laid the wires, but the Defence Ministry didn't even install an electric meter, and for a whole year the soldiers used electricity without a meter, probably paid for by the municipality,” a local resident told Armenian media.

“The command said it had informed the chief of rear, everything would be done, but it went on like that for a year. During this time not a single high-ranking military official or representative of the Defence Ministry came to see the conditions in which the soldiers live."

Answering the question of Armenian journalists whether the house could have been heated with an electric cooker, the man noted: "We could have, but who would have brought them a cooker? There was total dereliction.”

There is another such hut in the village of Azat, where Armenian soldiers live; they use the owner's meter and pay monthly: “They pay, but from their own pocket or the Defence Ministry provides funds, I do not know any more.”

The resident was surprised to hear the Armenian Prime Minister's "official version" that soldiers used petrol to light the cooker, which caused the fire. "All their heavy equipment was running on diesel. Where did petrol come from?" the man wondered.