Turkey's refusal to recognize Genocide strains relations with West

U.S. Commission:

Turkey's continued refusal to address the Armenian Genocide remains a
source of tension between U.S. and other Western democracies and
Turkey, said the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom
(USCIRF) in its annual recommendations released on May 2.

USCIRF is a bi-partisan federal body created by Congress through the
International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 "to monitor the status of
freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief abroad, [...] and
to give independent policy recommendations to the President, the
Secretary of State, and the Congress."

In the Turkey portion of its 2007 report, USCIRF details formal
restrictions and other violations of freedom of religion for both
majority Muslims and minority Christian communities. It notes,
however, that "the consequences of some of Turkey's state policies
toward religion have been particularly detrimental for religious
minorities," such as Armenians.

"Built into the founding of Turkish identity was the implicit
understanding that citizens other than ethnic Turks residing in Turkey
are potentially suspect, since they allegedly harbor a secret desire
to secede from and hence, dismember the country," says the report.

"This fear of dismemberment, which has fueled a strain of virulent
nationalism in Turkey, continues to hold sway in some sectors of
society, resulting in state policies that actively undermine ethnic
and minority religious communities, and, in some cases, threaten
their very existence. The Commission learned in meetings that the
Greek Orthodox and Armenian Orthodox communities are focal
points for this perception and its resultant policies."

The report points to prosecution and subsequent murder Hrant Dink
over ""insulting" the Turkish state because of his use of the term
"Armenian genocide" in his public remarks and written publications" as
"just one example" of such policies.

The report says that even though "during the Commission's visit, the
issue of the Armenian genocide was not raised by any interlocutors,
the continued refusal of the Turkish government to recognize the event
continues to be a source of controversy in Turkey's relations with
other western countries, including the United States." Visit
http://www.uscirf.gov to read the full report.

RWANDA GENOCIDE EXHIBIT REVISES WORDS ON ARMENIANS

UNITED NATIONS, April 30 (Reuters) - An exhibit on the lessons of the
genocide in Rwanda opened on Monday, three weeks after Turkey forced
its delay because of references to the murders of Armenians during
World War One.

The language on the Armenians was changed to say "Ottoman Empire"
instead of "Turkey" and does not include the number of people killed
on panels in the exhibit that include photos, statements and video
testimonies.

There was no immediate reaction from Turkey but Armenian envoys and
sponsors of the exhibit, the British-based Aegis, said they were
satisfied with the compromise.

Originally, the lettering on a panel said: "Following World War One,
during which 1 million Armenians were murdered in Turkey, Polish
lawyer Raphael Lemkin urged the League of Nations to recognize crimes
of barbarity as international crimes," Smith said.

The new wording says: "In 1933, the lawyer Raphael Lemkin, a Polish
Jew, urged the League of Nations to recognize mass atrocities against
a particular group as an international crime. He cited mass killings
of Armenians in the Ottoman empire in World War I and other mass
killings in history. He was ignored."

Some 1.5 million Armenians perished at the hands of Ottoman Turks,
according to historians. Turkey, whose diplomats had protested the
exhibit, denies any systematic genocide, saying large numbers of
both Christian Armenians and Muslim Turks died in a partisan conflict
raging at that time.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon opened the exhibit in commemoration
of the 13th anniversary of the Rwanda genocide, in which 800,000
people, mainly Tutsis and moderate Hutus, were massacred by militant
Hutus in April 1994.

Ban recalled how he visited Rwanda last year and talk to "those
who had endured one of humankind's darkest chapters."

But Ban, in a gesture to Turkey, said the exhibit did not "attempt
to make historical judgments on other issues."

He said the United Nations "has taken no position on events"
that took place before World War Two "that led to the birth of the
organization."

Ban also said the post of special advisor on genocide, now held by
Juan Mendez of Argentina, would be elevated to a full-time rather
than a part-time position.

He said governments had agreed in principle of the "responsibility
to protect" civilians when their governments could or would not do so.

"Our challenge now is to give real meaning to the concept by taking
steps to make it operational," Ban said. "Only then will it truly give
hope to those facing genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity
and ethnic cleansing."

The exhibit was installed in the U.N. visitors lobby by the
British-based Aegis Trust. The trust campaigns for the prevention
of genocide and runs a center in Kigali, the Rwandan capital,
memorializing the victims of the massacres.

While Ban did not mention the deaths in Sudan's western region of
Darfur, Aegis made clear that Darfur was on its agenda and that
learning from the Holocaust or from Rwanda meant "had practical
implications for the world today."

"Genocide never happens by chance. It takes time to plan and
organize. The warning signs are always there," one of the panels in
the exhibit said.

Secularism v Democracy

A military coup was avoided, but an early election looms. Turkey's problems are postponed, not solved

ITS prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said it was “a shot fired at democracy.” Others labelled it an “e-coup”. Whatever you call it, a threat to intervene against Turkey's mildly Islamist government posted on the general staff's website on April 27th has hurt democracy and deepened the chasm between the secular and the pious. A defiant Mr Erdogan has called for an early general election. It may take place in July, instead of the scheduled date, November 4th. Opinion polls suggest that his AK Party will again beat its secular rivals.

How would the army respond to that? Seasoned Turkey-watchers who once scoffed at the notion of another coup say that it now can't be ruled out. Many admit that the European Union is partly to blame. EU dithering over Turkish membership has dented enthusiasm: when Olli Rehn, the enlargement commissioner, scolded the army for its meddling, few paid attention.

The row began when Mr Erdogan nominated his foreign minister, Abdullah Gul, to replace President Ahmet Necdet Sezer, who steps down on May 16th. Mr Gul once flirted with political Islam; his wife wears a headscarf (as do 55% of Turkish women). That was deemed to pose an existential threat to the secular republic. Deniz Baykal, the leader of the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), succeeded in blocking Mr Gul's election in a first parliamentary vote on April 27th, claiming, dubiously, to the constitutional court that parliament lacked a quorum.

It was up to the court to decide if Mr Baykal was right. But the generals were taking no chances. In their ultimatum, delivered before the 11 judges gave their verdict on May 1st, the army listed examples of how the government was supposedly allowing the country to drift towards an Islamic theocracy. When the court then ruled in favour of the opposition, nobody was surprised.

Nearly a million secularist Turks gathered in Istanbul on April 29th, to stage their second mass protest against the government in a fortnight. That makes it hard for Mr Erdogan and his AK Party to dismiss the crisis as a brazen attempt by the army to reassert its influence. Chanting “no to coups” and “no to sharia” the demonstrators said their free-wheeling lifestyles were under threat. Many were women who say they are the most vulnerable of all. Some cited attempts by the AK to create “alcohol-free zones”, others a bid to outlaw adultery. Many declared that an AK president, prime minister and parliamentary speaker was more than they could bear.

Yet none was able to name a single law promoted by the party that directly challenged the secular tenets of the constitution—because there is none.

The deeper malaise felt by these urban secular “white Turks” is really rooted in the millions-strong migration from rural Anatolia to the big cities in past decades. Assertively pious and aggressively entrepreneurial, this new class, championed by Mr Erdogan, has been steadily chipping away at the economic and political power of the secular elite. “The white Turks see women with headscarves walking dogs [and] jogging in their neighbourhoods and it drives them mad,” says Baskin Oran, a liberal academic in Ankara. That shock may fade; in time it will become more difficult for the generals to turn secular hostility to Anatolian carpetbaggers into paranoia about creeping Islam, he reckons.

The secularists have weaknesses too. The CHP, founded by Turkey's republican hero, Kemal Ataturk, has been out of power for more than a decade. Kemalism once transformed Turkey, but has now failed to transform itself, says Mr Oran.

While the cocky Mr Baykal shows no signs of self-reproach, an unprecedented bout of soul-searching prompted by the cyber-coup is beginning to grip the AK. During four and a half years it has failed to assuage secular suspicions and to reach out to the opposition. The party should have realised that the country was not ready to have an AK president, a party chief concedes. The present rumpus could have been averted had Mr Erdogan picked a presidential candidate outside his party. Now the prime minister suggests changing the constitution to let the people choose the head of state themselves.

That might be a step forward, but sceptical liberals say Mr Erdogan's views on democracy are selective. “Where was he when Kurdish politicians were being arrested and beaten and Nokta [a dissident magazine] raided by police?” asks one.

The government's response to the army's ultimatum was unusually crisp. Cemil Cicek, the justice minister, called it “unacceptable” and reminded the generals that they were constitutionally bound to take their orders from the prime minister, not vice versa.

It is not just the army's taste for politics that is worrying. The top general recently said a military attack on Kurdish rebels based in northern Iraq was “necessary” and “useful”. Though he agreed that the constitution gave parliament authority over the armed forces, many fear that the army may decide to attack all the same. “They are itching to,” whispers a westerner who observes Turkish security. This may explain why America's response to the political crisis has been so lame. “The last thing they want is a quarrel with the Turkish military,” a European official observes. The nightmare for America is Turkish and American soldiers exchanging fire in Iraq. Based on the past week's events, nothing can be ruled out.

The Economist, (continues to be impressed by reforms) The Battle for Turkey's Soul

If Turks have to choose, democracy is more important than secularism

At a time when Muslim fundamentalism seems to be on the rise all around the world, the sight of somewhere between half a million and a million people marching through Istanbul in defence of secularism is a remarkable one. But then Turkey is a remarkable place. As a mainly Muslim country that practises full secular democracy, it is a working refutation of the widespread belief that Islam and democracy are incompatible.

That's not the only reason why Turkey matters. It is a big and strategically important country, has the largest army in NATO after America's, offers a crucial energy route into Europe that avoids Russia and is the source of much of the water in the Middle East. If the negotiations under way for its entry into the European Union succeed, it will be the EU's biggest country by population. But the reason that the world's eyes are fixed on it this week is the possibility that the army might intervene to limit Islam's role in government. For if Turkey cannot reconcile Islam and democracy, who can?

Cyber soldiers

Over the years Turkish democracy has shown itself to be vibrant yet fragile. A string of military coups and interventions stand as testimony to the army's self-appointed role as the guardian of Kemal Ataturk's secular republic. The most recent instance came a mere ten years ago—the so-called post-modern coup that led to the ousting of a previous moderate Islamist government.

On April 27th the army suggested that it might do the same again. Just before midnight, after a day of inconclusive parliamentary voting for a new president, the army's general staff posted a declaration on its website that attacked the nomination of Abdullah Gul, the foreign minister, for the presidency, and hinted none too subtly at a possible coup against the mildly Islamist Justice and Development (AK) government led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the prime minister who nominated Mr Gul. On May 1st the constitutional court annulled the first round of parliamentary voting for the president, saying not enough members were present. Mr Erdogan promptly said he would call a snap parliamentary election. Street protests, first in Ankara and then in Istanbul, have heightened tension. The cities' coffee houses are buzzing with conspiracy theories.

Given the fractious state of the main opposition parties, and his government's record over the past four years, pollsters expect Mr Erdogan to win another thumping majority. He may then choose to stick with Mr Gul for the presidency, or he may look for another candidate. But he is unlikely to pick one who meets the objections of the army and the secularists.

Turkey's secularists have always mistrusted the AK Party, which has Islamist roots and in government has sometimes toyed with moderate Islamist measures. They especially dislike Mr Gul and Mr Erdogan because their wives sport the Muslim headscarf, which in Ataturk's republic is banned in public buildings. They fret at the prospect of such people controlling not only the government and parliament, as now, but the presidency as well. They fear that once the AK Party has got that triple crown, it will show its true colours—and that they will be rather greener. Given that a fundamental reading of Islamic texts sees no distinction between religion and the state, and that fundamentalism is spreading in the Muslim world, it is understandable that people should entertain such fears.

Yet they do not justify a military intervention such as that of April 27th. However desirable it may be to preserve Ataturk's secular legacy, that cannot come at the expense of overriding the normal process of democracy—even if that process produces bad, ineffective, corrupt or mildly Islamist governments. Algeria, where 150,000 people died in a civil war after an election which Islamists won was annulled in 1992, holds a sharp lesson about what can happen when soldiers suppress popular will. Of course, Turkey is not Algeria; but armies everywhere should beware of subverting elections. It is up to voters, not soldiers, to punish governments—and they will now have the opportunity to do so in Turkey.

They may not want to. Mr Erdogan's government has been Turkey's most successful in half a century. After years of macroeconomic instability, growth has been steady and strong, inflation has been controlled and foreign investment has shot up. Even more impressive are the judicial and constitutional reforms that the AK government has pushed through. Corruption remains a blemish, but there is no sign of the government trying to overturn Turkey's secular order. The record amply justifies Mr Erdogan's biggest achievement: to persuade the EU to open membership talks, over 40 years after a much less impressive Turkey first expressed its wish to join.

Who cares what Europe thinks?

Unfortunately, the EU's enthusiasm for Turkish entry, never high, has visibly waned. Were Nicolas Sarkozy to win the French presidency on May 6th, that would be another setback to Turkey's ambitions: he is categorically against the notion of it ever joining the EU.

In practice there is no chance of Turkey actually signing on the dotted line for another decade. But the perception in the country that so many current members are against it matters, for it reduces the EU's influence. Were the prospects of EU membership obviously brighter, the army would not have intervened as brutally. As it is, the EU's mild condemnation was shrugged off in Ankara, especially when the Americans said nothing at all. Their influence in Turkey is also much diminished, mainly because the war in Iraq has inflamed anti-American feeling.

Given the West's declining influence on their country's actions, Turks themselves must resolve their political crisis. The best way to do that would be to reject the army's intervention by re-electing the AK Party. The secularists' fears of the creeping Islamisation are understandable; but the AK Party's record does not justify it, and military intervention is no way to avert it. For the sake of the state they are trying to protect, Turkey's soldiers should stay out of politics.

MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE REPUBLIC OF ARMENIA

----------------------------------------------
PRESS AND INFORMATION DEPARTMENT
Government House # 2, Republic SquareYerevan 0010, Republic of Armenia
Telephone: +37410. 544041 ext 202
Fax: +37410. 562543
Email: press@mfa.am
www.armeniaforeignministry.am


Speech by H. E. Vartan Oskanian
Minister of Foreign Affairs
At a Commemorative Evening
Conservatoire Royal
Brussels, April 25, 2007

Thank you Mr. du Vivier, for sharing this evening with us and conveying
your message from the halls of Brussels. And thank you Sergey and
Lusine. Sergey graciously accepted my invitation to join us this evening,
because I knew well that Sergey's message will resonate in this
hall and stay with us as the context for an evening of commemoration.

This is an evening of commemoration, much like those that are being
held in nearly every major city around the world this week. It is a day
of remembrance much like those that have been held every year for
the last half century.

But over these years, and especially since independence, the nature
and the purpose of our remembering have changed.

I would like to speak with you today not just about our past, but about
our future. I want to set the record straight about what we want for our
people, our country and our neighborhood. And I want to do that here
in this European capital that is the symbol of unity and not divisiveness.

Today, I want to talk about what we remember, how we remember and
how the reasons for remembering have evolved, just as our communities,
our country and the world around us have evolved. We have had a difficult,
painful past that we will continue to remember and honor. But let me be
clear, we don't want to live in the past. We want to reconcile with the
past, as we forge a future.

In Aleppo, Syria, where I grew up, remembering rituals consisted mainly of
gathering to hear the stories of someone who had suffered things we could
not really imagine. Aleppo was the end of the road for those who were
deported and marched thru the deserts. This is where those with no hope
of returning to their homes set up ramshackle, flimsy refugee camps,
trying to cope with enormous loss, with wounds that refused to heal.

I think back now at our nave efforts to lessen the grief of the survivors
by encouraging them to forget and not to speak of their experiences. We
did not understand that their lives and outlooks, memories and
experiences were forever traumatized. That is how they lived, how they
raised their children, how they interacted with the societies and countries
in which they found refuge. This we learned years later, as we read about
Holocaust survivors trying to cope.

Only when solitary memories were transformed into formal, community-
wide tributes, did the survivors begin to feel that their own individual
histories of horror had significance beyond the personal. Remembering
became a shared activity, a commemoration. Decades later, programs
such as Remembering the Cambodian Genocide, and the Remembering
Rwanda Project served the same purpose.

For Armenians, commemorations became the outlet for the disbelief and
outrage at how this historical event deeply affected our way of being in
the world, our sense of personal and collective identity. This was a new
generation, no longer victims, a generation that had come to understand
that what had been done had been done not to 1.5 million individual
Armenians who comprised 2/3 of a nation, but to an entire people who
had been massacred, uprooted, deported and whose way of life, whose
culture and history, had forever been altered. And all this, by
government decree.

For a long time, we memorialized these events by ourselves.
We were left alone because there were two versions of history
the official and the alleged. The acknowledged and the denied.
The Ottoman Empire that fell was succeeded by a Republic
with an immaculate, almost divine, self-image. Such murderous
acts and their tolerance could not fit within this self-definition.
Therefore, a new history was invented in which these acts
never happened. The crimes were never committed. The records
of their own military tribunals were ignored, the eye-witness
reports of missionaries and diplomats were disputed.

Our history became the Oalleged truth. Their history was the official
truth. And since the official truth had the backing of the entire state
apparatus, ours became the forgotten genocide.

Occasionally, some would raise their voices against forgetting, and for
condemnation. In 1987, Mr. du Villier and others introduced a resolution
at the European Parliament, calling the events of 1915, Genocide. Since
then, a host of countries have joined us in recognition and in
commemoration.

These commemorations are very critical in the face of growing threat of
genocide in the world today from Bosnia to Rwanda to Darfur.

Commemoration is a way of countering the distortion of history,
countering the subversion of truth by power.

Commemoration is the victory of truth over expediency.

Commemoration is a condemnation of the violence.

Commemoration is a call to responsibility, and therefore to prevention.

Commemoration is an acknowledgement of the past, and even the
present, but not an obstacle to the future.

And herein lies the irony ,­ I don't want to say impasse in our relations
today, with Turkey.

We cannot build a future alone. But neither can we build a future
together with a neighbor that is disingenuous about the past, our
common past.

This Monday's International Herald Tribune carried an advert that
also ran in many major newspapers around the world. It is a perfect
distillation of Turkey's willful blindness to historical and political
processes surrounding it. Just as it succeeded in creating a new
history for itself, it wants the world and us to dismiss all other
histories not in line with its own.

Turkey calls for Armenians to agree to a historical commission
to study the genocide. Not because none have ever convened,
but because Turkey does not like their conclusions! Reputable
institutions such as the International Association of Genocide
Scholars, the International Center for Transitional Justice have
seriously studied these historic events, independent of political
pressures, and independently arrived at the conclusion that the
events of 1915 constituted Genocide.

Does Turkey want to go shopping for yet another commission,
hoping for different results? It has gagged its writers and
historians with a criminal code that punishes free speech.
What does it expect these historians to study? And with a
closed border between our two countries, how does it expect
these historians will meet to explore this topic? This is why we
wonder about the sincerity and usefulness of the historical
commission idea.

Despite these obvious obstacles to serious scholarly exchange, we have
agreed to an intergovernmental commission that can discuss everything,
so long as there are open borders between our two countries. If Turkey
need discussion, we are ready to cooperate. But we don't want
discussion for discussion's sake; we don't want discussion of the past to
replace today's vital political processes that are essential for us, for
Turkey, for the region. Yes, we want to explore and understand our
common past, together. But we don't want that past to be the sole
link between our peoples and our countries. We don't want that
past to condition the future.

We, the victims of Genocide, have not made Turkey's recognition
of that act conditional for our present or future relations. Turkey,
however, wants Armenians in and out of Armenia to renounce our
past, to understand their denial of our past, as a condition for
moving forward. Who is trapped in the past?

I welcome the words of a Turkish intellectual who has said, I am neither
guilty nor responsible for what was done 90 years ago. But I feel
responsible for what can be done now.

I, too, believe that we must distinguish between the Ottoman
Empire and today's government of Turkey. But I must say that
although that is possible to do when speaking of the events of
1915, it becomes increasingly difficult to do when speaking
about the denial of the Turkish state today.
As Elie Wiesel said, the denial of genocide is the continuation of
genocide So, how do we distinguish between the two states, if the
ideology that is put forth and defended is the same?. This policy of
denial is both intellectually and morally bankrupt. And it is costing us
all time. The later they get around to making a distinction between their
stand and that of their predecessors, the harder it will be to dissociate
the two regimes in people's minds.

It is absurd that 92 years later, Turkey can say, in public, that the
Armenian allegations of genocide have never been historically or
legally substantiated.

Dear Friends,

Armenians were one of the largest minorities of the Ottoman Empire.
Where did they go? Is it possible that all our grandmothers and
grandfathers colluded and created stories? Where are the descendants
of the Armenians who built the hundreds of churches and monasteries
whose ruins still stand today? What kind of open and honest discussion
is possible with a government that loudly and proudly announces its
renovation of the medieval Armenian jewel of a church, Akhtamar in
Lake Van, while it carefully, consistently, removes every reference to its
Armenianness from all literature and signs?
What is Turkey afraid of?

It is a political reality that Armenia is not a security threat to Turkey.
It is a political reality that both Turkey and Armenia exist today in the
international community with their current borders.

Today, as the Foreign Minister of the Republic of Armenia, as the
grandson of genocide survivors, I can only say that Armenia and
Turkey are neighbors who will remain neighbors. We share a border.
We can only move forward together.

There is no national history in a vacuum. It can neither be created nor
transcended in a vacuum. For France and Germany, England and
France, Poland and Germany, in order to transcend their histories of
conflict, they had to transcend the past together to transform their
future. That, too, can only be done together.

Not always does history give mankind a second chance. In this
neighborhood, with our neighbors, we have a second chance.
We can make history, again, by transcending boundaries and
opening the last closed border in Europe and moving forward,
together.

Europe ,­ the premise of Europe and the legacy of Europe is the
distinct promise of our age. Europe is where one takes from the
past whatever is necessary to move forward. Europe is where
former enemies and adversaries can dismiss and condemn
actions, policies and processes, but not peoples. Instead, people
in Europe move from remorse to reconciliation, and embrace
the future. This is precisely what we want to do in our region.
Thank you.

Turkey needs early elections, not the army! Turkish distractions

What we are up against:
In yesterday's House of Lords conference, speakers from Turkey stated that Turks themselves were oppressed by their own state, that reforms were achieved by changes in attitude not just by cosmetic amendments to legislation, and that suppression within Turkey was facilitated by Europe's double standards when it comes to human rights and the treatment of minorities.
Yet look at these articles that expound the official Turkish line without any critical analysis!
The UK Armenian community has so much to do to change mindsets here.


Turkey needs early elections, not the army
Published: April 30 2007 20:11

Turkey has entered a dangerous political crisis. The heavy-handed intervention by the army in the stand-off between the neo-Islamist government and the secular establishment over electing the next president has turned the clock back on Turkey’s emergence as a fully-fledged liberal democracy. It risks coarsening public and political life to the point of open confrontation.

The generals’ declaration – that they are the “absolute” guardians of the secular republic created by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk – is a pronunciamiento from another era. An army that has ousted four elected governments since 1960 – the last one in a “soft” coup against an Islamist administration 10 years ago – is threatening to do so again.

That would be a terrible mistake.

First of all, the thesis that the Justice and Development party (AKP) government led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan is intent on installing theocracy by stealth does not really stand up. Mr Erdogan’s party combines the deeply conservative and religiously observant traditions of Anatolia with a huge constituency in Turkey’s modern but Muslim middle class. It was created from the debris of failed Islamist movements in order to supersede them; a rough analogy would be the way the Christian Democrats emerged as modern parties of the centre right in much of Europe.

Second, the AKP is a successful, reforming government. It overcame a deep financial crisis, and enlarged democratic, human and minority rights through the biggest ever overhaul of Turkey’s laws. It has a good chance of being re-elected. That is partly why Turkey’s fragmented, largely unmodernised secular parties are trying to win back in the streets what they lost in the ballot box – and goading the generals into helping them.

The trigger for this crisis was Mr Erdogan’s decision to nominate his foreign minister, Abdullah Gul, for president, to be elected by parliament, where the AKP has a thumping majority. The minority opposition’s attempt to get the constitutional court to change the rules is spurious and opportunist.

But underlying this clash is an umistakable whiff of class animus. Many in the urban secular elites equate Islam with backwardness and fear that their socially liberal lifestyle will be constrained as observant Muslims from the Anatolian countryside gradually become a majority in Turkey’s cities. Both sides need to address these fears and attitudes openly.

That is not going to happen if the constitutional court finds procedural excuses to invalidate Mr Gul’s candidacy, much less if the army intervenes. The return of the military to centre stage, moreover, would put an end to Turkey’s stalled but still intact candidacy to enter the European Union, exacerbating the already worrying signs of a country turning in on itself.


Turkish distractions
Daily Telegraph
Last Updated: 12:01am BST 30/04/2007

What mighty contests rise from trivial things.

A row over whether the Turkish President's wife should wear a
headscarf has brought millions of demonstrators on to the streets,
agitated the army and reheated the familiar argument about Turkish
secularism. In the eyes of many foreign critics, this is an argument
that Turkey cannot win. If Ankara tolerates the outward symbols of
religious devotion, it is sliding into Islamism; if it bans them, it
is a dictatorship.

Such criticism is inconsistent and unfair. The governing party, AK,
has behaved impeccably, dismantling some of the more oppressive
anti-clerical laws while respecting the laic character of the state.
Its candidate for the largely titular office of president, the
current foreign minister Abdullah Gul, is courteous, cultured,
moderate and touchingly Anglophile. The idea that he should be
barred because his wife's attire violates the ban on Islamic symbols
in state offices would be risible in any other country.

This newspaper is a long-standing friend of Turkey. We backed the
Sublime Porte in its quarrels against Russia during the 19th
Century; we broke with Gladstone over his anti-Ottoman policy; we
called for intervention in Cyprus when the anti-Turkish pogroms
began in the 1960s, and supported the invasion when it came in 1974;
we have consistently backed Turkey's right to join the EU.

Our grounds have altered little over the years: Turkey remains a
vital ally, guarding Europe's flank against the Islamists as it once
did against the Russians. Ankara's Western vocation rests, however,
not on its renunciation of Islamic iconography, but on its respect
for human rights, representative government and individual liberty.
It is worth restating, therefore, what ought to be basic principles.

First, election results should stand.

Second, states ought not to be in the business of telling their
citizens how to dress.

Third, if generals want to get involved in politics, they should
resign their commissions and stand for election.

There is no question that Mr Gul should be president: we wish him
every success.


Blair intervenes in Turkish crisis
By Ben Hall in London

Published: May 1 2007 11:53 | Last updated: May 1 2007 11:53

Tony Blair, British prime minister, on Tuesday intervened in Turkey’s internal political crisis by urging the Turkish armed forces to abide by the country’s democratic constitution.

In an unusual foray into the domestic affairs of a close ally, Downing Street issued a statement in which Mr Blair said he was following closely developments in Turkey following the military’s threat on Friday to block the selection of a new president.

“It is essential that all those engaged in the political process do so in accordance with Turkey’s well established democratic principles and in compliance with the constitution,” Mr Blair said.

He added that he was “confident” that this would happen and that Turkey “will continue to play a role as a key and democratic partner”.

Mr Blair has been a forceful advocate of Turkey’s accession to the European Union and has celebrated Turkey’s status as a democratic Muslim country. The UK regards Turkey, a Nato member, as a pivotal power in the Middle East and is grateful for its constructive approach towards Iraq.

Mr Blair has forged close links with Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister, most recently using Ankara to put pressure on the Iranian government to release 15 UK navy personnel seized by Iranian forces from Iraqi waters.

Mr Blair’s intervention is intended as an expression of confidence in Mr Erdogan after the military issued an ultimatum to the Islamist-based government to drop Abdullah Gul, the foreign minister, as its candidate for the presidency.

The best way to resolve this crisis is to bring forward general elections due by November. That should be the occasion for re-establishing common ground rules and a common definition of secularism. With passions at their current pitch, that will be, of course, risky. But not as risky as the alternatives.

An Important New Book Relating to Ethnic Cleansing by Turkish Nationalists in the Years Following World War 1

British Reports on Ethnic Cleansing in Anatolia, 1919-1922: The Armenian -Greek Section, compiled By Vartkes Yeghiayan, May 2007. Published by CAR, 296 Pages, $20, ISBN #978-0-9777153-2-9

Available from http://www.centerar.org , eBay, or by calling (818) 281-9992

British Reports on Ethnic Cleansing in Anatolia, 1919-1922: The Armenian-Greek Section, is a provocative new book that clearly and vividly demonstrates that from 1919 to 1922, the Turkish Nationalists under Mustafa Kemal perpetrated an organized scheme of wholesale ethnic cleansing upon the indigenous Armenians of Asia Minor and Cilicia, and the Greeks of Pontus.

This important book, compiled by Attorney Vartkes Yeghiayan, chronicles how the Turkish forces, after invoking a "War of Independence," massacred innocent civilians and looted and appropriated Armenian and Greek cathedrals, monasteries, churches, institutions, fields, orchards, stores and factories, while the victorious Allies looked away.

WW I "ended" when the defeated Ottoman Empire signed the Mudros Armistice, which dictated categorically that the Ottomans had to renounce their empire, with the exception of Anatolia, and the Allies would have the right to occupy the Six Armenian Provinces in Asia Minor (Anatolia) in case of disturbances.

Ten days after the signing, the victorious British took charge of Constantinople and formed the Armenian-Greek Section to deal with all urgent and outstanding issues related to the Armenians and Greeks in Turkey. The victorious British also persuaded the Sultan to dissolve the Ottoman Parliament. In a Proclamation on 6 December 1918, Sultan Mohammed VI announced, "My sorrow is profound at the mistreatment of my Armenian subjects by certain political committees acting under my government."

The remnants of the Young Turk Regime, however, especially those who had gotten rich by the wholesale looting of Armenian and Greek assets, rejected such acts of contrition and sabotaged all efforts that would reverse their ill-begotten fortunes.

British Reports on Ethnic Cleansing in Anatolia, 1919-1922: Minutes of the Armenian Greek Section, is the verbatim record of 87 reports the British High Commission compiled for the use of the British Foreign Office. These reports are yet another "smoking gun" that confirm that the genocide of the Armenian people did not end with the end of the Great War. Kemalist forces systematically evaded the Armistice terms, and instead, implemented a scorched earth policy of a massive ethnic cleansing. The reports collected in this book cumulatively confirm without the shadow of any doubt, that the genocidal policy started by the Young Turks was brought to its merciless and bloody climax by the Nationalists.

The first official meeting between the A.G.S. and the American, Greek, and Armenian representatives took place on 5th March 1919, with the participation of Dr. Tavitian, and Mr. Tchakirian, representing the Armenian Patriarchate, and Dr. Theotokas representing the Greek Patriarchate.Here is a sample of the war crimes committed by Turks that are recorded in the minutes of the A.G.S.:

Dr. Tavitian stated that he had received news from Boghazlian, Yozgat and Caesarea to the affect that repatriated Armenians were now being accused of having murdered Turks and so were obliged to leave again."

At Yozgat a secret anti-Christian movement had been started, and as a result of a telegraphic order received from Mustafa Kemal Pasha, many volunteers had been enrolled.

Dr. Tavitian reported that the same state existed everywhere, at Everek (Caesarea) boycottage of Christians was being carried on, and the Mufti was preaching in the Mosque ordering his people not to sell to Christian. From Sivas and Samsoun many reports of outrages, cruelty and brigandage had been received, thus confirming the reports of Relief Officer in those districts.

Information from Sivas showed that a number of the more notorious malefactors of the time of the massacres were re-appearing; for instance, Rassim Bey, an ex-Deputy, has offered himself for election.

The Kemalists have requisitioned the Armenian Cathedral and are using it as a prison. (They have also taken over) the Armenian Church of St.Saviour; the Convent of St. Nishan; the Armenian College; the Archbishop's residence; the Armenian Protestant Church; the Greek Church; the Jesuit School and the School and Residence of the Sisters. The Authorities have also requisitioned about 2500 kilos of brass Church ornaments.

Turkish propagandists have recently intensified their efforts to distort these truths so clearly stated in these damning reports. One of the false narratives the Turks have been pushing is the lie that after the war ended, thousands of Armenians were allowed to return and reclaim their homes and properties. The reports gathered in this book prove otherwise. British Colonel Graves, who ran the Greek-Armenian Section, asserts in these reports that the locality from which these disturbances were reported was precisely that in which returned Armenians had managed to a certain extent to resettle; one would say that since November the Turks were trying to rid themselves of these few Armenians too.

In another report we read: The Kemalists blocked the Armenian quarter on the pretext that the Armenians had helped the Circassians, pillaged their houses and murdered the men. They then collected all the women, young girls and children in the Armenian church to which they set fire and burnt them alive. They finally reduced the Armenian quarter to ruins.

And finally: This report described at length and in detail the terrible sufferings which the Armenian population had undergone through the systematic endavours of the Kemalists to completely annihilate the Armenian race by requisitioning their houses, schools, churches; their land (40%), cattle, merchandise and provisions for the needs of the Kemalist Army. Crushing taxes were being imposed upon these unfortunate people. Young Armenian Orphans were being recruited into the Turkish Labour Battalions and turned on to road mending.

British Reports on Ethnic Cleansing in Anatolia, 1919-1922: Minutes of the Armenian Greek Section forms a continuum with the "Blue Book" by Viscount Bryce that chronicled the massacres and ethnic cleansing of Armenians in 1915.

When it became clear to the British that they couldn't neutralize Ataturk, they shut down the A.G.S., abandoned Constantinople, abandoned the Armenians and Greeks still stuck under the yoke of triumphant Turks, declared victory, and return to England - after having secured rights to Mosul oil.

Soon after, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk became the President of the Republic and ever since, successive Turkish governments have denied that, their "War of Independence" was nothing else but the ethnic cleansing of Greeks and Armenians from their millennia-old natural habitats.

This important book sets the record straight.

The book is part of the Genocide Remembrance series published by CAR, the Center for Armenian Remembrance.

Books may be ordered by mail, phone or online. Books also available at your local Armenian Bookseller.

Center for Armenian Remembrance (CAR)
PO BOX 250322
Glendale, CA 91205-0322

Tel: 818-281-9992 Web: http://www.centerar.org

The retail price is $20 (US) and $24 in Canada, plus $5 for s&h for up to 2 books.