Saturday 4 July 2015

Armenian News ... A Topalian ... Rare Footage discovery of Genocide in Congress Library


dailystar.com.lb
RARE FOOTAGE OF ARMENIAN GENOCIDE SURVIVORS 

DISCOVERED IN US CONGRESS LIBRARY
July 2, 2015


BOLOGNA, ITALY -- Rare, moving images of survivors of the 1915
Armenian genocide will be shown in Bologna on Thursday as part of the
29th edition of the city's "Cinema Ritrovato" (Rediscovered Cinema)
festival, Agence France-Presse reports.

A significant historical source that was discovered completely by
chance, buried away and forgotten in the US Library of Congress, the
silent film dates from 1923 and includes images of children packed
onto boats in Turkey and lines of refugees trudging along roads.

The film is being shown as part of a selection intended to honour
Armenian cinema a century after the beginning of the slaughter of
Armenians at the hands of Ottoman Turkish forces.

Also on show during the festival are "Namus" (Honour), a 1925 work by
Hamo Beknazarian that is considered the first Armenian film, "Sayat
Nova" (The Color of Pomegranates) a 1969 film by Sergei Paradjanov and
"Naapet", Henrik Malyan's 1980 film about a genocide survivor.

Other rare documentary images include a five-minute film shot by the
French army of Armenian refugees in camps at Port Said in Egypt.

But the jewel in the festival's crown is the four minutes of "Armenia,
Cradle of Humanity" shot in Turkey soon after the end of the killing -
a time thought previously to have only been recorded in still images
such as those of German photographer Armin Wegner.

Mariann Lewinsky, one of the festival's curators, came upon the film
by "a miracle" as she clicked through the internet data base of the
International Federation of Film Archives (Fiaf).

Who shot the film and how it got to the Oregon Historical Society
before being deposited in the Congress library is a mystery, says
the Swiss researcher as she runs the recently-restored reel.

"I sent a little email to my colleagues in the library and they told
me, 'Yes we have something, but we don't know what.'

"I insisted a bit and asked if I could come and see the condition of
the film."

Normally such a demand would take a bit of time to get a response but
Lewinsky was quickly sent some photos and a telephone contact number.
"The images were extraordinary, boats full of children, trains."

Having obtained the reel, she quickly dated it to 1923, but her first
thought was the people shown could be displaced Greeks - a theory
that was dropped when she recognised a well-known Istanbul palace in
the background of one shot.

Colleagues confirmed that, after the end of World War One, British
forces assembled Armenian orphans in the building for evacuation.

"It is a miracle," Lewinsky said.

A century on, Lewinsky believes a new Turkey is emerging in which
Kurds, Greeks, Armenians and ethnic Turks are moving towards "moments
of reconciliation".

Films like "Armenia, Cradle of Humanity" can only help this process,
she says, invoking her hope that it could be shown at a small silent
film festival in Istanbul in the near future.


anc.org.au
AUSTRALIAN VIDEO FOOTAGE OF ARMENIAN GENOCIDE 
REFUGEES UNEARTHED
Friday, 19 June 2009 

SYDNEY: Research conducted by the Australian Institute for Holocaust 
and Genocide Studies has just unearthed video footage from 1919, 
featuring Armenian Genocide refugees in Sydney.

The newly-discovered film will be shown at a public screening for the 
first time as a preview to the ANC Australia's screening of movie 'My 
Son Shall Be Armenian'.

Armenian National Committee of Austalia President, Mr. Varant 
Meguerditchian said: "The video footage adds to the now 
overwhelming documentary evidence found in Australia, affirming the 
historical truth of the Armenian Genocide and forging forever the 
common history of Armenia and Australia." 

He added: "In light of this video evidence, it is now imperative that 
Australia formally recognises the Armenian Genocide and the role 
everyday Australians played in assisting the victims and survivors."

The main feature film to be shown at this event - 'My Son Shall Be 
Armenian'. It is a story that follows the initiatory voyage of director 
Hagop Goudsouzian, who, accompanied by five Montreal men and 
women of Armenian origin; return to the land of their ancestors in
 search of survivors of the Armenian Genocide of 1915.



ARMENIA TREE PROJECT
PRESS RELEASE
June 26, 2015
ATP Honors Genocide Centennial by Launching 'Living Century
 Initiative' 
WATERTOWN, MA--Around the world, people have been asking:
"April 24th has come and gone. What's next for the remembrance of 
the Armenian Genocide?"

Armenia Tree Project has initiated a new campaign called the Living Century
Initiative, which enables Armenians to plant trees in remembrance of the
Genocide.

"Through the Living Century Initiative, we are establishing 10 forests in
northern Armenia that are aligned with the major Western Armenian
communities that were devastated by the Genocide," explains Executive
Director Jeanmarie Papelian. "We are inviting Armenians from around the
world to sponsor trees in living memory and in honor of their relatives and
ancestral communities. LCI provides an opportunity to plant the new Adana,
Kharpert or Marash forest, or wherever your family roots may have been."

ATP has planted more than 4.7 million trees in over 1,000 locations
throughout Armenia and Artsakh. These locations include Nor Kharpert, Musa
Ler, and Zeytoun--transplanted names from communities in historic Armenia.
"We have an ambitious goal to plant 300,000 trees by year's end, including
250,000 forestry seedlings as part of the Living Century Initiative," notes
Papelian.

The 10 Living Century forest sites correspond to regions in historic Armenia
and will be planted in the Shirak, Lori and Kotayk regions of modern
Armenia. They focus on areas where ATP has been planting forests since 2004.
"Our team has met with the local community leaders, and they are excited to
work with us to establish these new forests as links to our ancestral
homeland," she adds.

Jeanmarie visited one of the new planting sites in May with outgoing
director Tom Garabedian. Tom's grandparents came to America from Kharpert,
and the Living Century Initiative was inaugurated by planting a trees in the
new Kharpert memorial forest in Arevashogh. This site in the Lori region is
dedicated to families whose ancestors hailed from Kharpert before the
Genocide.

"We hope you will join us in this celebration of life and perseverance
through the planting of new forests throughout Armenia," concludes Papelian.

ATP has launched a new website dedicated to the Living Century Initiative
where supporters can read more about the campaign, learn about the historic
Armenian communities and make a gift to help populate these new forests. On
the website you can select your ancestral city, town or village, or make a
general donation to any of these new planting sites. For more information,
visit www.livingcentury.org


news.am
ISRAELI AMBASSADOR ABOUT ARMENIAN GENOCIDE: 
MAJORITY IN PARLIAMENT IS FOR RECOGNITION
01.07.2015


YEREVAN. - We really feel changes in the parliament on the Armenian
issue, Israel's Ambassador to Armenia Shmuel Meirom told Armenian
News-NEWS.am.

"The majority in the parliament is for this, but still this is decision
of the government, not the parliament. So may be in the future,"
Ambassador said asked where there are any changes in Israel's position,
especially after the statement made by Knesset Speaker.

Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein has recently called to rethink Israel's
stance on the Armenian Genocide. Edelstein called Israel's position
on the Armenian Genocide "too hesitant and too restrained.


keghart.com
EXPLODING TWO REPUGNANT ANKARA CLAIMS
Jirair Tutunjian, Toronto
29 June 2015 

One of the ornate pillars of Turkey's Genocide denialism is to blame
the victims for their slaughter. The repugnant layers of duplicity,
supported by Turkish historians and the doctored state archives,
claim that Armenians were deported (Turkey had no intention to
commit genocide, the fairy tale goes) because they were plotting
to rise against the Ottoman Empire, dismember it and establish an
Armenian republic. Historians have shot down the self-seeking Turkish
rationalization but the light-touch police state keeps churning out
its packaged falsehoods. Another widely-disseminated Ankara fable is
that Turkish government archives (1915-'23) are open to Armenian and
third-party researchers.

LIE NUMBER ONE

Michelle U. Campos, the author of "Ottoman Brothers: Muslims,
Christians, and Jews in Early Twentieth-Century Palestine" (Stanford
University Press, Stanford, California, 2011), shatters the Ankara
lie about Armenians planning to tear apart the Ottoman Empire.

Military Service

Here are excerpts from the Campos book which refute the tired
anti-Armenian allegation. On the eve of the First World War,
"...various groups and individuals proclaimed their willingness
to serve in the Ottoman army. Armenian lawyer, famed novelist and
Member of Parliament Krikor Zohrab, proclaimed given that 'military
service for the various elements of the nation is the fundamental
condition of safeguarding civil equality under the constitution,'
the Armenian community was committed to 'serv[ing] the Motherland as
citizen-soldiers..." Zohrab's words carried weight among Armenians
since he was the most prominent voice of the community. He also was
a friend of future genocidier Talat Pasha, the minister of interior.

Unfair Parliamentary Representation

Although the Armenians had supported the Young Turks during the coup
which had brought down Sultan Abdul-Hamid II in 1908, they didn't
complain when they were vastly underrepresented in parliament. Of
the parliament's 260 members, 214 (82%) were Muslims, 43 (16.5%) were
Christians, and 4 were Jews. "A visiting French deputy complained about
the overall underrepresentation of Greeks and Armenians, starkest
in the province of Edirne, which did not have a single non-Muslim
among its nine elected representatives despite a sizable non-Muslim
population." Armenians continued to cooperate with the government,
demonstrating that they wanted to see a 'democratic' Ottoman Empire
to become a reality. [The Ottoman population of almost 21 million
was 25 percent non-Muslim].

Support for Young Turks

To give the Young Turks another chance to put the country on the
right track, the Armenian leadership restrained itself from coming
down too strong in their condemnation of the government when 20,000
Armenians were massacred in the Adana region in 1909.

Soldiers and Cash

Campos adds: "...in 1908, the Hebrew paper 'The Deer' published a
notice that the Armenian organization ARF (Tashnagtsoutyoun) had
publicly declared that there were forty thousand Armenians ready to
give their lives to defend the empire against external aggression
and internal anti-constitutionalists; likewise, the ARF claimed,
if the government was short of cash the Armenians were prepared to
raise two million Ottoman liras for its benefit. The 'Deer' noted that
as a result the Ottoman Turkish press was unanimous in praising the
'loyal Armenians.'"

Despite the loyalty Armenians had repeatedly demonstrated, "among
the official [Turkish] bodies there was a real reluctance to arm and
train suspect minorities of the empire, particularly the Orthodox and
Armenian communities. As well, the issue of conscription threatened
to reawaken the conflict over electoral representation," says Campos.

No Demand for Independence

In the years preceding the Genocide, Tashnagtsoutune, the leading
political party, advocated federalism. As Serouj Aprahamian wrote
in 'Asbarez' (May 26, 2015), the party promoted "constitutional
reform and equality among all nationalities. Their demands dealt
with decentralization, parliamentarianism, universal suffrage, land
reform, ethnic solidarity, and so on..." The party didn't talk about
independence.

At their Erzerum meeting (August 1914) Tashnagtsoutune leaders stated
that Armenians were obliged to support their respective countries
[Ottoman Turkey and Russia]. Shortly after, 1,080 Armenian shops were
burned down in Diyarbakir. Three months later (Nov. 19) mass execution
of Armenian soldiers began at a frantic pace. The following day, the
order was sent to remove all Armenian functionaries serving in the
government. In other words, despite the mass execution of Armenian
soldiers, Armenians had continued to work for the murderous government.

Volunteering citizen soldiers, raising money for the national budget,
acting as the commercial and cultural backbone of the country, taking
the role of the modem between advanced European countries and Ottoman
Turkey, and contributing to society in every possible way (per capita
far more than Turks) were not sufficient proof of loyalty to convince
Young Turks not to proceed with their "Turkey Without Armenians"
conspiracy.

LIE NUMBER TWO

The second big lie perpetrated by Turkey is that its archives are open
to qualified scholars, although they're shut tight as Fort Knox. Ten
years ago Mehmet Uluizik, a Turkish researcher living in Germany,
began collecting documents from the Prime Ministry Ottoman Archives
for historian Taner Akcam and for his own research. When he asked
for documents related to the Armenian Genocide, he was interrogated
by Turkish officials and asked whether he was a secret Armenian. He
later received death threats from more than one source.

Two years later, he learned that he was barred from entering Turkey.

Government documents alleged that he was "among those who are coming
to Turkey with the intention of harming the security and general
order of the Republic of Turkey, or with the aim of collaborating
on aiding such persons." The researcher took his case to court and
won. After winning, he assumed he would be free to study the archives,
but Ankara had another trick up its sleeve. The National Intelligence
Organization declared the researcher was a persona non grata, and
was barred from entering Turkey.

Let's hear it again from the egregious President Erdogan piping that
his country's archives are wide open.

Selective access is no access, Mr. President. Besides, after a
century, how many of Turkey's documents are intact? How many have been
destroyed, tampered or doctored? Would a murderer, who has had ample
opportunity--a century to be exact--to remove incriminatory evidence,
leave his fingerprints at the murder scene?


ORHAN'S INHERITANCE
Library Journal Reviews
July 1, 2015
by Laurie Selwyn

Ohanesian, Aline. Orhan's Inheritance. 7 CDs. 8:15 hrs. HighBridge.
2015. ISBN 9781622315598. $29.99. digital download. F

Ohanesian's debut follows two families--one Turkish, one Armenian--from
the end of the Ottoman Empire to the 1990s in this harrowing story of
death, life, love, sacrifice, resilience, and hope. Learning that his
grandfather left their ancestral home to an Armenian stranger in a
California retirement home, Orhan searches for answers to questions
raised by his grandfather's will, only to discover that the woman
beneficiary had no legal relationship to him or his father--possibly
voiding the will under existing Turkish law. Orhan's research also
introduces him to the Turks' and Armenians' turbulent history and the
Armenian genocide. Assaf Cohen's professional, emotive reading draws
in listeners. VERDICT This will appeal to fiction listeners with an
international and historical bent. ["Ohanesian's beautifully written
debut brings to life a historic tragedy that Turkey still denies ever
happened.... Moving and unforgettable": LJ 4/15/15 starred review of
the Algonquin hc.]--Laurie Selwyn, formerly with Grayson Cty. Law Lib.,
Sherman, TX

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