The Patriotic Thread

[Hovik]

Monte "Avo" Melkonian


April 1, 1962. Monte (on the left), age four, with
his family and three unidentified Boy Scouts.


1973. Monte, age fifteen, at a school party, Miki
City, Japan.


Monte (second row, on the left), with fellow Armenian militia fighters in the Naba'a neighborhood, East Beirut, 1978.


Monte (front row, on the left) with fellow militia fighters,
Bourdj Hamoud, Lebanon, 1978.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 2


Summer 1979. On guard duty with the Armenian militia in East Beirut, Lebanon. As a member of the Armenian militia in Lebanon for two years, Monte and his fellow militiamen fought street battles against the Phalangists and their right-wing allies.

A few months before this photo was taken, Monte had joined demonstrations in Tehran, Iran, against the Shah's regime, and had helped to organize a strike at the school where he worked. Later, he joined Kurdish rebels in Mahabad and Sanandaj, in western Iran.


Summer 1979. Monte in Beirut. After a rightist massacre of Armenians in September, 1979, Monte worked clandestinely on behalf of the Lebanese National Movement. In May 1980, he joined ASALA, a militant Amenian group that, among other things, attacked Turkish diplomatic staff in Europe. During the Israeli invasion in 1981, he served on the front lines in Southern Lebanon as an artillery spotter, helping to inflict heavy casualties on Israeli invaders (including a direct hit on an Israeli tank at the Khardali bridge). Throughout the summer of 1982, he fought on the front lines to help defend Beirut against a massive Israeli invasion that caused the death of over 17,000 civilians.


Summer 1979. Hitch-hiking on a freeway onramp
somewhere between San Francisco and Los Angeles. The snapshot was taken during
Monte's last visit to the country of his birth. The message on his cardboard
sign reads: ANYWHERE BUT HERE.


August, 1979. Monte (pushing wheelbarrow) at
Haftvan, Iran. On their way to Iranian Kurdistan, Monte and several friends
from Tehran helped the Land and Culture group build an adobe wall near a
church in western Iran. This is a background detail from a larger photo.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 3


March 2, 1982. From left to right: unidentified Armenian Secret Army (ASALA) guard; Monte; Armenian activist Alec Yenikomshian; Spanish journalist Jose Antonio Gurriaran. Monte translated during an interview at a safe house in West Beirut. More than a year before this photo was taken, on December 29, 1980, the Spanish journalist had been seriously injured by a Secret Army bombing in Madrid's Plaza de Espana. The photo is from Gurriaran's book, La Bomba (Barcelona, Editorial Planeta, 1982).


October 22, 1988. One of only two known photographs of Monte (on the right) in prison. This photo was taken in the exercise yard of the Maison Centrale of Poissy Prison, France. The inmate on the left wearing dark glasses is Mehmet, a Kurd from Turkey. Monte was arrested in Paris in November 1985 on charges of illegal entry into France and possession of a falsified passport, explosives, and an illegal handgun. During his three and one-half years in prison, he spent months in solitary confinement, went on hunger strike to demand status as a political prisoner, and helped organize nation-wide prison rebellions.


Fall 1990. With his fiancee Seta in the city of Yerevan, not long after first arriving in Armenia. Monte had been released from prison in early 1989, and by the time this photo was taken, he had spent over a year as a fugitive, in Yemen, Eastern Europe, and Yugoslavia.


September 13, 1991. Monte (top row, center), with other defenders in the village of Karashinar, in the Shahumyan region, just north of Mountainous Karabagh. The majority Armenian population of the region was under attack from Azeri forces.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 4


September 1991. On the Karashinar front, Shahumyan region.


September 14, 1991. Monte napping after a battle in the village of xxxluk, in the Shahumyan district, north of Mountainous Karabagh.


October 1992. Monte, center, with fellow fighters in the village of Mshkapat, in the Martuni District of Mountainous Karabagh. By this time, Monte had become one of six regional commanders of defense forces in Mountainous Karabagh. The officer in the tie to Monte's right is Colonel (later General) Hemayag Haroyan, a key figure in Mountainous Karabagh's defense planning. To Haroyan's right (second from the left in the photo) stands Abo Hairabedyan, one of Monte's most trusted officers in Martuni.


January 1993. Monte, now known by his nom de guerre "Avo," in a trench on the front lines in Martuni. In the last year and one-half of his life, Commander Avo lead the 4000 men under his command to one victory after another against a larger and better-armed enemy. He and Colonel Haroyan reorganized the Martuni fighters, drove Azeri forces out of the district, shot down enemy aircraft, and captured and destroyed scores of enemy tanks. As always, Avo fought on the front lines, and as a result he was wounded more than once in the course of the fighting.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 5


April 1993. Commander Avo and his wife, in front of the regional defense forces headquarters near the town of Martuni.


April 3 or 4, 1993. Commander Avo leads the Armenian offensive to capture the region of Kelbajar, between Mountainous Karabagh and the Republic of Armenia. A schoolgirl from Martuni described the commander's leadership style: "Avo doesn't say 'Charge!' He says 'Follow me!'"


October 1992. The commander and his wife in Martuni.


1993. Avo takes a break in the village of Mshkapat. "I'm less than zero," he remarked when someone asked him why he had taken '0-0' as his radio code.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 6


Merzuli village, Azerbaijan. This photo, taken in 2000, shows the spot on the road where Commander Avo fell in battle on June 12, 1993. A makeshift memorial to the commander is visible in the upper left-hand corner. Another trusted officer, Saribeg Mardirosyan, was mortally wounded in the same battle not far from this site.


Another view of Merzuli, from the spot where Commander Avo fell.


This partially-destroyed stone wall in Merzuli village shows the effect of a 73-mm canon round from an Azeri BMP-1 light tank. At 2:00 pm on June 12, 1993, a large piece of shell casing from the round that hit this wall struck Avo on the side of his forehead, causing instant death. This photo was taken in April 2000.


Avo's sleeping chamber next to his office at military headquarters, Martuni.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 7


Avo's "Villis" staff car, photographed two weeks after the June 12, 1993 attack.


July 7, 1993. Gomidas Avanesyan, Avo's driver, at Mikhaelyan Hospital, Yerevan. Gomidas is recovering from bullet wounds in the leg, wounds he sustained in the same confrontation that claimed the lives of Commander Avo and Saribeg Mardirosyan. Three and one-half years later, on the night of October 31, 1996, Gomidas would die along with six of his fellow fighters when they detonated an anti-personnel mine while returning from a reconnaissance mission.


June 25, 1993. The widow and children of Martuni resident and tank captain Saribeg Mardirosyan, who was mortally wounded in battle on June 12, 1993.


June 19, 1993. The funeral procession of Monte "Avo" Melkonian leaves Officers' Hall, just off Republican Square in the city of Yerevan. According to reports in Western newspapers some 200,000 mourners turned out that day to pay their respects to the fallen commander.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 8


The commander's simple grave at Yerablur Military Cemetery, near Yerevan.


Close-up of the gravestone.


Avo Hospital, in the town of Martuni, Mountainous Karabagh. The building formerly served as Commander Avo's military headquarters, and before that it was a summer dacha for Azerbaijani leader Heydar Aliyev.


Entrance to the Monte Melkonian Military Academy, Yerevan, Armenia.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 9


June 19, 1995. Unveiling a monument stone (khachkar) dedicated to Monte at the entrance to the State University dormitory in Yerevan.


Monument to Monte "Avo" Melkonian in the town of Hrazdan, Armenia.


This heroic-scale statue of Commander Avo, carved from pink-white marble, stands in the central square of the town of Martuni in Mountainous Karabagh.


A close-up of the monumental sculpture of Commander Avo in Martuni.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE

[Hovik]

Avo 10


Monument stone (khachkar) dedicated to Monte in Ararat Cemetery, Fresno, California. The marker, carved in Armenia from native tufa stone, was commissioned by Monte's parents.


General Haroyan recalled Monte's response to a question from an interviewer: What sort of future would you like to see for Armenia? "One might have thought that he would have responded 'victorious' or 'with secure borders,'" Haroyan reported. "But no. He responded: 'Without corruption and just.'"


May, 1993. Less than a month before Commander Avo's death, schoolchildren in the village of Gishi, in the Martuni District of Mountainous Karabagh, sang a song dedicated to their hero.

Photos and caption source: www.melkonian.org
Buy the latest book about Monte "Avo" Melkonian HERE