In Blockaded Armenia, ‘We Can’t Even Cry’ : Soviet Union: Azerbaijanis have cut off rail shipments. Fuel is scarce and food may run short.

It was cold, and Ria Minassian was serving a cold supper to her family, trying to preserve gas for the stove.

Outside in the street, which is usually crowded with traffic, there were few cars. Motorists were preserving their fuel, too.

“The situation is so difficult,” Minassian said to a visitor. “I am afraid that one of these days I won’t find food for my family. But we have had so many bad things happen to us these last two years that our hearts are getting hard. We can’t even cry.”

This is the Soviet republic of Armenia, and Armenians are virtually at war with their neighbors in the Soviet republic of Azerbaijan.

A few days ago, Azerbaijanis imposed a blockade of rail lines into Armenia, and the result is being felt: According to the Armenian state press agency, factories are working at less than half of their capacity, hospitals and schools have no heat, and building reconstruction in areas shattered by last year’s earthquake has been stopped.

Since the blockade took effect, no trains have come into Armenia from Azerbaijan. Nearly 400 trains carrying goods for Armenia are backed up, according to the press agency. Only 23 trains have come into Armenia in that period, all on the line from the republic of Georgia.

“It couldn’t be worse,” Stepan Poghosian, a deputy in the Armenian legislature, said. “The enterprises are beginning to close, the trains don’t come, and soon there will be a lack of electricity and gas. Some supplies will come in on planes, but it will not be enough.”

About 85% of Armenia’s food, fuel and building supplies comes in by rail from Azerbaijan. These and other materials are assembled at rail yards in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, and loaded on trains that travel a route that parallels the frontier with Iran, passing through both Armenia and Azerbaijan.

This is the third time since last August that Azerbaijani nationalists have blockaded Armenia. Armenian officials say that on the previous occasions, supplies were brought to Armenia through Georgia, but political unrest there has now raised new problems.

“Before,” Poghosian said, “we were sure we could receive food from Georgia. But now they have their own problems, and we are not so sure. If the situation in Georgia gets worse, it will be very hard for us. It will be possible to receive fuel only by air.”

As a result, life in Yerevan has become even harder than usual, and in the Soviet Union life is usually hard. Food is not yet particularly scarce, but long lines are forming at the shops as Armenians buy in quantity, fearing hard times ahead.

At Yerevan’s two leading hotels, it is so cold that guests wear their coats and scarfs in the restaurants and bundle up heavily when they go to bed. In private homes, thermostats are turned low and heavy sweaters are required.

Everywhere there is talk of Baku and the blockade, talk of when--or if--Soviet troops will appear. Since Thursday, the sound of helicopters has been heard with increasing frequency.

In one home Friday, conversation stopped as the whup-whup of helicopters took over, and the entire family rushed to the porch, craning their necks for a glimpse of the aircraft through the haze.

People stay close to radio and television sets to get the latest reports of the fighting on the frontier with Azerbaijan.

“It’s terrible not to know how bad it will get,” Vahagen Papian, 42, said over tea in his Yerevan apartment. “I thought we had stockpiled supplies, weapons--at least petrol. After all, this has happened to us before. But we have nothing. We are completely unprepared.”