| Editorial: Turkey’s Denial is the Failure of the World’s Major Powers |
By Vahagn Avedian
Turkish authorities have raised charges for “insulting the judicial
system” against five Turkish journalists who have criticized the banning
of a conference about the Armenian Genocide. If convicted they risk prison
up to six years. The journalists can, however, consider themselves in good
company: Nobel Prize candidate and author Orhan Pamuk is already on trial
for “insulting the Turkish identity” by mentioning the Armenian Genocide
and the Hrant Dink, editor of a Turkish-Armenian bi-lingual weekly in
Istanbul, has already received his six-month prison sentence for the same
“crime.”
More than 90 years has passed, Armenians have pleaded annually for
recognition, the pile of evidence put forward by researchers and
historians has grown constantly, yet Turkey has managed to evade
confessing to its violent past and present violations.
Almost everyone, even the Turks, know of the Armenian Genocide and that it
has in fact taken place. Some, as Germany and USA, refrain from calling
the massacre of 1.5 million Armenians and the ethnic cleansing of 80
percent of the Armenian Highland from its native inhabitants as
“genocide,” but have, nevertheless, condemned it as “massacres.” But how
can one blame Turkey for its refusal to recognize the Armenian Genocide,
when the world powers have since the very beginning of the massacres in
1894 failed to demand an official recognition and a subsequent
indemnification? Who is to blame: a criminal who has committed murder and
is still free to harass its surroundings or the judicial system and the
authorities in charge who remain indifferent to the perpetrator?
Turkey has managed to buy its innocence in over a century: their
possession of the Bosporus and the Dardanelles played a vital role in
neutralizing the attempts of the major European Powers at the beginning of
the 20th century; Kemal Atatürk’s Turkey used East against West during the
Cold War era; and now it’s the “war against terrorism” in Middle East and
EU candidacy which serves the same purpose. Europe and USA have time after
time pointed their finger at Turkey in regard to the “Armenian Question.”
But the threat has stopped to just that.
Armenians have always held Turkey responsible for the atrocities against
their nation and chastised them for refusing to recognize and apologize
for their actions. In pursuing the support of the leading world powers the
Armenians have silenced their critic towards France, Russia, Germany,
Great Britain and USA for having failed the Armenians time after time with
hollow promises. Armenia became their forgotten ally during the World War
I, who despite the prevailing situation and while other Transcaucasian
peoples were willingly cooperating with Germany and Turkey, stood firm for
fighting against the Central Powers, resulting in many more losses during
that struggle. Armenia was “the Little Ally” who was sacrificed when the
prospect of political and economic profits emerged. The word “Armenia,”
frequently mentioned in the Treaty of Sevrés, was suddenly entirely
dropped in the subsequent Treaty of Lausanne while Soviet Russia chose to
drop its demands concerning Western Armenia and the Armenian genocide in
exchange for good relations with Atatürk’s Turkey. Armenians were the same
people in regard to whom the Allies, for the first time in history, used
the term “crimes against humanity,” when describing the massacres in
Ottoman Turkey.
Now, suddenly the “Armenian Genocide” has once more become the tool in
world politics. US used it to restrain Turkey when Ankara threatened to
accuse USA for the death of many of their Turkmen brothers in northern
parts of Iraq, while Europe has off and on used it during the Turkish EU
negotiation talks as it has served its interests. But again, it has
stopped there. USA still refuses to recognize the “regrettable atrocities
against the Armenians” as genocide and EU failed to include an official
recognition of the genocide as a pre-condition for the Turkish EU
negotiations.
Now five Turkish journalists are facing trial for mentioning the number
one taboo word in present Turkey. This is happening today, in year 2005,
while Turkey is supposed to display its progressive sides. Yet, the
“democratic, freedom loving, and defender of human rights” leaders of the
world content themselves with expressing their “regret” for the Turkish
behavior. Turkey has resembled itself to a bridge which can connect the
Christian Europe with the Moslem Asia. EU should ask itself if this is the
kind of bridge which one wants to use for crossing or whether it is still
in critical need of reparation and restoration before it can be used.
The fact of the Armenian Genocide is indisputable. The question, however,
remains the same as it was in 1920: Is the Armenian Genocide worth
recognizing? Will the world redress the Armenian Genocide or will
Armenians once more be sacrificed as an expendable pawn on the world chess
board?
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