By Stephanie Holmes BBC News

The lives of thousands of young Azeris and Armenians have been scarred by the bitter conflict over a mountainous region whose name means "Black Garden".

I kept asking God: 'Why? Why?' Every day, every hour, I asked: 'Why?' Nobody answered me Vafa Farajova, Azeri journalist

Some 30,000 people were killed during the war over Nagorno-Karabakh in the early 1990s, and little progress towards peace has been made since a 1994 ceasefire.

The struggle for the mainly Armenian-populated region of Azerbaijan remains unresolved, and hundreds of thousands of people are waiting to return to their former homes.

For nearly 20 years Azeris and Karabakh Armenians have had no contact with one another.

But a group of young journalists from both sides, who grew up during the war, are now taking part in a project that brings them together to make short documentary films.

They explore the impact of war on the two communities and the absurdities of daily life under the conditions of frozen conflict.

Massive expulsions

The shared background for all the film-makers is what Laurence Broers, an expert on the South Caucasus with conflict resolution group Conciliation Resources, describes as the "massive mutual expulsions" caused by the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

One million Azeris were driven out of Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding regions by Armenian forces, or fled homes in Armenia.

Some 400,000 Armenians were also displaced from Azerbaijan or the border regions of Armenia.

Twenty-year-old Suzanna Seyranyana, a Karabakh foreign language student, was apprehensive about meeting Azeris through the project.

"Before, I thought that the Azeris were our enemies, I never thought I'd be able to sit down with them, to have a cup of tea and a chat, but during the project I met Azeris for the first time and they've become my friends. I didn't feel any barriers between us," she said.

A dream

"I realised that it is not our fault," she continued. "People aren't guilty - neither Azeris nor Armenians. It was war. It feels like a dream, sitting with them, talking to them."

The films were made in the richly fertile mountainous region. Photo: Conciliation Resources

Yet there is reluctance, by both Armenians and Azeris to remember, recount and relive their experiences of childhood.

"I was five years old when the war broke out. I saw everything. I lived in a shelter for about two years. There was no light, no nothing. It was awful. I don't want to remember that period," Suzanna said, speaking quietly.

Vafa Farajova, a bright-eyed 31-year-old Azeri teacher and journalist explained: "We have forgotten our childhood and school-years."

But she still has vivid memories of abandoning her home in Zangelan, one of seven districts surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh occupied by Armenian forces during the conflict.

"When we fled, all the routes to Baku were closed, all the districts were occupied by Armenians so we had to escape across the river, via Iran," she said.

"We left everything - our home, everything... We didn't take my clothes, my pictures, my dresses or shoes. I felt awful, I cried. I kept asking God 'Why? Why?' Armenians and Azerbaijanis had had such good relations. Every day, every hour, I asked 'Why?' Nobody answered me."

Sense of the absurd

Making the films, which involved joint training sessions, gave them the chance to express their frustration about a conflict they see as senseless.

Many of the films combine sadness with humour. Photo: Conciliation Resources

A film by Azeri journalist Madina Nik-Najat, titled "The Bug-gobblers", unravels how conflicts begin, and the role of seemingly irrelevant differences in behaviour.

It juxtaposes members of two neighbouring groups, explaining why they simply cannot get on, mentioning different speeds of talking and methods of baking bread. The audience at a screening in London's Institute of Contemporary Arts laughed out loud.

Madina describes the film as "almost a comedy, showing that conflict will be present whenever there is difference".

Vafa's film introduces the audience to a former solider, blinded in battle, who bears the scars of the bullet which robbed him of his sight at his temple.

He has rebuilt his life. He has returned to university to become a teacher, got married and had a child but, asked if he would return to the battlefield, he replies unhesitatingly: Yes.

The project, organised partly by Conciliation Resources, aims to develop dialogue between young people from both sides of the conflict.

The idea is that the films will be shown to both Armenian and Azeri audiences, but there is no guarantee that this will happen.

Sevak Hayrapetyan, a 26-year-old Armenian student, nonetheless says he hopes the films may help increase understanding between Azeris and Armenians.

"The war was incomprehensible for me," he says.