Armenian Genocide News
Obama Refuses to Recognize Armenian Genocide
By Asbarez
Apr 24th, 2010
WASHINGTON–President Obama, once again, refused to recognize the
Armenian genocide in his annual message on this the 95th anniversary
of the genocide. This marks the second year that he has broken his
campaign pledge to properly recognize the genocide.
Below is Obama’s statement:
****
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
April 24, 2010
Statement of President Barack Obama on Armenian Remembrance Day
On this solemn day of remembrance, we pause to recall that ninety-five
years ago one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century began. In
that dark moment of history, 1.5 million Armenians were massacred or
marched to their death in the final days of the Ottoman Empire.
Today is a day to reflect upon and draw lessons from these terrible
events. I have consistently stated my own view of what occurred in
1915, and my view of that history has not changed. It is in all of
our interest to see the achievement a full, frank and just
acknowledgment of the facts. The Meds Yeghern is a devastating
chapter in the history of the Armenian people, and we must keep its
memory alive in honor of those who were murdered and so that we do not
repeat the grave mistakes of the past. I salute the Turks who saved
Armenians in 1915 and am encouraged by the dialogue among Turks and
Armenians, and within Turkey itself, regarding this painful history.
Together, the Turkish and Armenian people will be stronger as they
acknowledge their common history and recognize their common humanity.
Even as we confront the inhumanity of 1915, we also are inspired by
the remarkable spirit of the Armenian people. While nothing can
bring back those who were killed in the Meds Yeghern, the
contributions that Armenians have made around the world over the last
ninety-five years stand as a testament to the strength, tenacity and
courage of the Armenian people. The indomitable spirit of the
Armenian people is a lasting triumph over those who set out to destroy
them. Many Armenians came to the United States as survivors of the
horrors of 1915. Over the generations Americans of Armenian descent
have richened our communities, spurred our economy, and strengthened
our democracy. The strong traditions and culture of Armenians also
became the foundation of a new republic which has become a part of the
community of nations, partnering with the world community to build a
better future.
Today, we pause with them and with Armenians everywhere to remember
the awful events of 1915 with deep admiration for their contributions
which transcend this dark past and give us hope for the future
By Asbarez
Apr 24th, 2010
WASHINGTON–President Obama, once again, refused to recognize the
Armenian genocide in his annual message on this the 95th anniversary
of the genocide. This marks the second year that he has broken his
campaign pledge to properly recognize the genocide.
Below is Obama’s statement:
****
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
April 24, 2010
Statement of President Barack Obama on Armenian Remembrance Day
On this solemn day of remembrance, we pause to recall that ninety-five
years ago one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century began. In
that dark moment of history, 1.5 million Armenians were massacred or
marched to their death in the final days of the Ottoman Empire.
Today is a day to reflect upon and draw lessons from these terrible
events. I have consistently stated my own view of what occurred in
1915, and my view of that history has not changed. It is in all of
our interest to see the achievement a full, frank and just
acknowledgment of the facts. The Meds Yeghern is a devastating
chapter in the history of the Armenian people, and we must keep its
memory alive in honor of those who were murdered and so that we do not
repeat the grave mistakes of the past. I salute the Turks who saved
Armenians in 1915 and am encouraged by the dialogue among Turks and
Armenians, and within Turkey itself, regarding this painful history.
Together, the Turkish and Armenian people will be stronger as they
acknowledge their common history and recognize their common humanity.
Even as we confront the inhumanity of 1915, we also are inspired by
the remarkable spirit of the Armenian people. While nothing can
bring back those who were killed in the Meds Yeghern, the
contributions that Armenians have made around the world over the last
ninety-five years stand as a testament to the strength, tenacity and
courage of the Armenian people. The indomitable spirit of the
Armenian people is a lasting triumph over those who set out to destroy
them. Many Armenians came to the United States as survivors of the
horrors of 1915. Over the generations Americans of Armenian descent
have richened our communities, spurred our economy, and strengthened
our democracy. The strong traditions and culture of Armenians also
became the foundation of a new republic which has become a part of the
community of nations, partnering with the world community to build a
better future.
Today, we pause with them and with Armenians everywhere to remember
the awful events of 1915 with deep admiration for their contributions
which transcend this dark past and give us hope for the future
GENOCIDE CONFERENCE IN ANKARA CANCELLED
Armenian Weekly Staff
Thu, Apr 22 2010
ANKARA, Turkey (A.W.)-A symposium on the Armenian Genocide titled "1915
Within Its Pre- and Post-Historical Periods: Denial and Confrontation,"
which was to be held in Ankara, was cancelled on April 21 after facing
political and bureaucratic hurdles.
Organized by the Ankara Freedom to Thought Initiative (AFTI), the
symposium was not only going to address history, but explore issues
like the confiscation of Armenian property and reparations.
Confirmed participants included Ragip Zarakolu (publisher), Recep
Marasli (author of The Armenian National Democratic Movement and 1915
Genocide), Sait Cetinoglu (activist and writer), David Gaunt (genocide
scholar, author of Massacres, Resistance, Protectors: Muslim-Christian
Relations in Eastern Anatolia During World War I), Henry Theriault
(professor of philosophy, Worcester State University), Baskin Oran
(author, professor of political science at Ankara University; one of
the initiators of the apology campaign of Turkish intellectuals),
and Khatchig Mouradian (doctoral student in Holocaust and genocide
studies, Clark University; editor, the Armenian Weekly).
Theriault and Mouradian were scheduled to speak about Genocide
recognition and reparations.
Armenian Weekly Staff
Thu, Apr 22 2010
ANKARA, Turkey (A.W.)-A symposium on the Armenian Genocide titled "1915
Within Its Pre- and Post-Historical Periods: Denial and Confrontation,"
which was to be held in Ankara, was cancelled on April 21 after facing
political and bureaucratic hurdles.
Organized by the Ankara Freedom to Thought Initiative (AFTI), the
symposium was not only going to address history, but explore issues
like the confiscation of Armenian property and reparations.
Confirmed participants included Ragip Zarakolu (publisher), Recep
Marasli (author of The Armenian National Democratic Movement and 1915
Genocide), Sait Cetinoglu (activist and writer), David Gaunt (genocide
scholar, author of Massacres, Resistance, Protectors: Muslim-Christian
Relations in Eastern Anatolia During World War I), Henry Theriault
(professor of philosophy, Worcester State University), Baskin Oran
(author, professor of political science at Ankara University; one of
the initiators of the apology campaign of Turkish intellectuals),
and Khatchig Mouradian (doctoral student in Holocaust and genocide
studies, Clark University; editor, the Armenian Weekly).
Theriault and Mouradian were scheduled to speak about Genocide
recognition and reparations.
FORMER IAGS PRESIDENT'S LETTER TO TATE GALLERY ON
GENOCIDE DENIAL
Armenian Weekly Staff
Thu, Apr 22 2010
Below is a letter the former president of the International Association
of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) sent to the director and the curator of
the Tate Gallery, noting that "is beneath the dignity of the Tate
Gallery to succumb to the pressure of genocide deniers for any reason."
***
Sir Nicholas Serota, Director, The Tate Gallery Mr. Matthew Gale,
Curator, The Tate Gallery
Dear Sir Nicholas Serota and Mr. Gale,
It has come to my attention that the Tate Gallery has responded to
massive pressure from the Turkish denialist lobby and has posted
a disclaimer about the use of the term "genocide" in the materials
accompanying the Tate's excellent Arshile Gorky exhibit.
As the immediate past President of the International Association of
Genocide Scholars (the major body of genocide scholars in the world),
founding President of Genocide Watch, and Professor of Genocide Studies
and Prevention at George Mason University, I must request that the
disclaimer be immediately removed from the exhibit. It contains
statements that are untrue. It is beneath the dignity of the Tate
Gallery to succumb to the pressure of genocide deniers for any reason.
The term genocide is not only "emotive," as you have noted, but
more importantly, it is a scholarly and legal term and it applies
fully to the Turkish mass killing of the Armenians. Britain's own
internationally respected Queen's Council, Sir Geoffrey Robinson
stated in a report of October 2009 that from an international legal
perspective, "the treatment of the Armenians in 1915 answers to the
description of genocide."
Contrary to the statement in your disclaimer, the British government
has never stated that it has "found no pre-meditation and that,
therefore, the wartime events of 1915 do not constitute a 'genocide'
in the legal definition." In fact the House of Lords in 1915, using
evidence from a report written by Lord Bryce and the great historian
Arnold Toynbee, accused the Ottoman Empire of "making government
by massacre part of their political system," and of "systematically
exterminating a whole race out of their domain."
British Foreign Ministers Arthur Balfour and Lord Curzon, and Prime
Minister David Lloyd George were instrumental in creating the tribunals
that convicted the Young Turk triumvirate - Talaat, Enver, and Jemal
- of "massacres of hundreds of thousands of their own subjects"
" which reduced the Armenian population "by well over a million."
The trials of these "crimes against humanity," as the British
government called them, proved the key charge of "pre-meditated mass
murder." The triumvirate was convicted and sentenced to death. Their
crimes precisely fit the modern definition of genocide.
So the statement in your disclaimer that "the British Government has
found no pre-meditation and that, therefore, the wartime events of
1915 do not constitute a 'genocide' in the legal definition" IS FALSE.
The disclaimer must be removed from the exhibit.
What strikes genocide scholars as most important to note is that the
Polish legal scholar Raphael Lemkin coined the term genocide in large
part on the basis of the Turkish mass killing of the Armenians in
1915. Lemkin's determination to get the United Nations to adopt the
Genocide Convention was first shaped by the Armenian Genocide, as he
notes in his own memoir, and then was realized after the Holocaust.
Lemkin, who invented the term "genocide" was the first legal scholar
to use the term Armenian Genocide. Every scholarly book on genocide
has a section on the Armenian Genocide. The International Association
of Genocide Scholars has repeatedly and unanimously passed resolutions
affirming that the massacres of Armenians constituted "genocide."
I realize that the Tate Gallery has been put under pressure by
the Turkish government to post its disclaimer, and I respect the
difficulties this pressure presents for the Gallery. Nevertheless I
suggest that if you must post a statement by the Gallery, that you
revise your statement so it is in accord with the facts. Language
such as the following might accomplish your purpose:
"While the British government for various reasons has never officially
used the term genocide in its description of the mass killings of
Armenians in 1915, it is important to note that Raphael Lemkin, the
legal scholar who coined the term genocide did so in large part on the
basis of the Ottoman government's extermination of the Armenians in
1915. The International Association of Genocide Scholars, the largest
body of genocide scholars in the world, has repeatedly affirmed that
the scholarly record and the legal and archival evidence prove that
genocide is the accurate and necessary term to describe the mass
killings of the Armenians. It is for these reasons that we have
described the massacres as "widely held to be genocide."
Thank you for your time and consideration. I hope to hear from you.
I would be happy to discuss this issue with you. My phone number is
1-703-448-0222, and my e-mail address is genocidewatch@aol.com.
Sincerely, Professor Gregory Stanton Immediate Past President,
International Association of Genocide Scholars Founding President,
Genocide Watch Professor of Genocide Studies and Prevention, George
Mason University, USA
Armenian Weekly Staff
Thu, Apr 22 2010
Below is a letter the former president of the International Association
of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) sent to the director and the curator of
the Tate Gallery, noting that "is beneath the dignity of the Tate
Gallery to succumb to the pressure of genocide deniers for any reason."
***
Sir Nicholas Serota, Director, The Tate Gallery Mr. Matthew Gale,
Curator, The Tate Gallery
Dear Sir Nicholas Serota and Mr. Gale,
It has come to my attention that the Tate Gallery has responded to
massive pressure from the Turkish denialist lobby and has posted
a disclaimer about the use of the term "genocide" in the materials
accompanying the Tate's excellent Arshile Gorky exhibit.
As the immediate past President of the International Association of
Genocide Scholars (the major body of genocide scholars in the world),
founding President of Genocide Watch, and Professor of Genocide Studies
and Prevention at George Mason University, I must request that the
disclaimer be immediately removed from the exhibit. It contains
statements that are untrue. It is beneath the dignity of the Tate
Gallery to succumb to the pressure of genocide deniers for any reason.
The term genocide is not only "emotive," as you have noted, but
more importantly, it is a scholarly and legal term and it applies
fully to the Turkish mass killing of the Armenians. Britain's own
internationally respected Queen's Council, Sir Geoffrey Robinson
stated in a report of October 2009 that from an international legal
perspective, "the treatment of the Armenians in 1915 answers to the
description of genocide."
Contrary to the statement in your disclaimer, the British government
has never stated that it has "found no pre-meditation and that,
therefore, the wartime events of 1915 do not constitute a 'genocide'
in the legal definition." In fact the House of Lords in 1915, using
evidence from a report written by Lord Bryce and the great historian
Arnold Toynbee, accused the Ottoman Empire of "making government
by massacre part of their political system," and of "systematically
exterminating a whole race out of their domain."
British Foreign Ministers Arthur Balfour and Lord Curzon, and Prime
Minister David Lloyd George were instrumental in creating the tribunals
that convicted the Young Turk triumvirate - Talaat, Enver, and Jemal
- of "massacres of hundreds of thousands of their own subjects"
" which reduced the Armenian population "by well over a million."
The trials of these "crimes against humanity," as the British
government called them, proved the key charge of "pre-meditated mass
murder." The triumvirate was convicted and sentenced to death. Their
crimes precisely fit the modern definition of genocide.
So the statement in your disclaimer that "the British Government has
found no pre-meditation and that, therefore, the wartime events of
1915 do not constitute a 'genocide' in the legal definition" IS FALSE.
The disclaimer must be removed from the exhibit.
What strikes genocide scholars as most important to note is that the
Polish legal scholar Raphael Lemkin coined the term genocide in large
part on the basis of the Turkish mass killing of the Armenians in
1915. Lemkin's determination to get the United Nations to adopt the
Genocide Convention was first shaped by the Armenian Genocide, as he
notes in his own memoir, and then was realized after the Holocaust.
Lemkin, who invented the term "genocide" was the first legal scholar
to use the term Armenian Genocide. Every scholarly book on genocide
has a section on the Armenian Genocide. The International Association
of Genocide Scholars has repeatedly and unanimously passed resolutions
affirming that the massacres of Armenians constituted "genocide."
I realize that the Tate Gallery has been put under pressure by
the Turkish government to post its disclaimer, and I respect the
difficulties this pressure presents for the Gallery. Nevertheless I
suggest that if you must post a statement by the Gallery, that you
revise your statement so it is in accord with the facts. Language
such as the following might accomplish your purpose:
"While the British government for various reasons has never officially
used the term genocide in its description of the mass killings of
Armenians in 1915, it is important to note that Raphael Lemkin, the
legal scholar who coined the term genocide did so in large part on the
basis of the Ottoman government's extermination of the Armenians in
1915. The International Association of Genocide Scholars, the largest
body of genocide scholars in the world, has repeatedly affirmed that
the scholarly record and the legal and archival evidence prove that
genocide is the accurate and necessary term to describe the mass
killings of the Armenians. It is for these reasons that we have
described the massacres as "widely held to be genocide."
Thank you for your time and consideration. I hope to hear from you.
I would be happy to discuss this issue with you. My phone number is
1-703-448-0222, and my e-mail address is genocidewatch@aol.com.
Sincerely, Professor Gregory Stanton Immediate Past President,
International Association of Genocide Scholars Founding President,
Genocide Watch Professor of Genocide Studies and Prevention, George
Mason University, USA
hurriyetdailynews.com
For the fear of God: A requiem for Armenians
MUSTAFA AKYOL
Friday, April 23, 2010
Ninety-five years ago, on this very day, a dark episode began in the crumbling
Ottoman Empire. Around 250 Armenian intellectuals and community leaders
were arrested in Istanbul and deported to Anatolia, never to return.
The real catastrophe began a month later. The Union and Progress government,
the Young Turk Party that overtook the empire with a military coup in 1913,
passed an Expulsion Law, giving itself the authority to deport anyone that is
deemed as a threat to national security.
Armenians were the real target. Soon, in almost every city and town in eastern
Anatolia, they were forced out of their homes and destined to the far and arid
Syria. In some places, they were transported by trains, but most were forced to
march for hundreds of kilometers, often without food and water. Many perished
on the road, out of famine, dehydration and disease. (The photos showing these
victims, especially the starving children and babies, are painful for anyone with
a conscious.) In other cases, there were massacres committed by the locals,
driven either by hatred or the lust to confiscate the victim's properties.
The ‘slaughter’
In total, at least 600,000 Armenians, and probably more, perished in 1915, in
one of history's most tragic ethnic cleansings. I, as a Muslim Turk, feel only pain
and remorse for those tortured souls, whose memory deserves remembrance
and respect. Yet, the same memory also leads me to ask why this great
catastrophe took place, and how my nation created it.
A combination of fear and nationalism, as I understand, was the driving force.
In 1915, the Ottomans were at war on three deadly fronts (with the British and the
French at Gallipoli and the Middle East, and with Russia on the East), and
Armenians were increasingly seen as in league with the enemy. The Ottoman
elite, and especially the Balkan-originated Young Turks, had seen how the Greeks
or Bulgarians ethnically cleansed great portions of their Muslim populations during
their national uprisings. Now they feared the same thing would happen in Anatolia,
with an independent Armenia emerging under Russian tutelage.
The “pre-emptive” logic of the Young Turks can be seen in the memoirs of Halil
Menteşe, a close friend of Talat Paşa, the mastermind of the whole tragedy. In the
summer of 1915, he visited Talat at his home, and found him miserable. “I got
telegrams from Tahsin [the governor of Erzurum] telling about the situation of the
Armenians,” Talat explained:
“I could not sleep all night. It is not something that the human heart can endure.
But if I did not do this to them, they would do it to us.”
I heard the same logic from my own grandmother as well, who always lived in
Yozgat, in which Armenians were mass-murdered in 1915. “There was a rumor
that the Armenians would ally with the Muscovite to kill all Muslims,” she once
said. “Then the elders stormed the Armenian church and found many guns and
ammunition. This, they thought, proved the rumors.”
What followed, my grandmother would sadly add, was the “kesim,” or “the slaughter,”
of the Armenians - who, alas, probably piled up those weapons out of fear as well.
In the Turkish mind, this if-we-did-not-do-this-to-them-they-would-do-it-to-us logic
was also reinforced by the mass atrocities that Armenian militias committed
against Muslims in 1916-17, when they had a chance for “revenge” due to the
Russian advance in the eastern front. Turks kept on remembering the horror
stories from that period, whereas most Armenians only remembered 1915.
We humans, after all, have a tendency to remember our own losses rather than
those of others.
The mufti vs the governor
But now, I believe, is the time to be fairer. For our part, I think we Turks have made
a terrible mistake for decades by totally overlooking the enormous suffering that the
Armenian people went through in 1915.
Yet in fact, there were exemplary figures who put justice over nationalism even then.
In Boğazlıyan, a district of Yozgat, the mufti of the town, Abdullahzade Mehmet Efendi,
had protested the governor who was a willing executioner. The Muslim cleric also
bore witness against the governor in the Ottoman military tribunal trial of 1919, stating,
“I fear the wrath of God.”
The same Muslim conscious can also be seen in the transcripts of the same tribunal,
at which the Unionists were tried for their crimes against Armenians. A passage tells
about how “the elders and leaders” of Çankırı, accompanied by their mufti, put a
request to the mayor of the city with the following words:
“The Armenians and their children from the neighboring vilayets [provinces] are being
driven like cattle to the mountain for slaughter. We do not want these types of things to
occur in our vilayets. We are afraid of the wrath of Allah.”
The same transcript adds, “these individuals had left with tears in their eyes, after
securing the assurances of the mayor that this type of act would not take place in their
vilayet.”
Those God-fearing individuals, I believe, were the best of my nation in 1915. And now
more of us are remembering their spirit, and even joining them in their tears.
Bill Handel has millions of listeners in Los Angeles.
Today, he discussed the Armenian Genocide and took the Turks (and Obama) to task.
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