Keeping Faith in Istanbul: Armenian community strong says Dink successor

By GAYANE MKRTCHYAN

ArmeniaNow reporter

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Istanbul-based Armenian Bagrat Estukian visits the shore of Bosphorus straits each last Sunday of a month to participate in a holy mass, served in Surp Yerits Mangants Church in the Armenian ‘Boyaji Gyugh’ district in Istanbul.

“More than 30 Armenian churches operate in Istanbul,” says Estukian, editor of the Armenian edition of Istanbul-based ‘Agos’ daily. “After the massacres, our ancestors came to Istanbul, hoping to find freedom here. Istanbul used to differ from other Turkish towns then, but the fact was that it was again Turkey.”

The generations of genocide survivors lived under Turkish Armenophobic policy, and many, not being able to stand it anymore, left Turkey. If at the end of 1915, more than 300,000 Genocide survivors lived in Istanbul, now the population of the Armenian community in Istanbul is only 60,000-70,000.

The Armenian national hospital Surb Prkich (Church of the Redeemer), and Surb Hakob (St. Jacob) Katoghike hospital belong to the Armenian community in Istanbul. Three dailies are released – ‘Agos’, published since 2000, with 24 pages (four pages are in Armenian, and 20 pages – in Turkish; 5,000-6,000 print run); 102-year-old ‘Zhamanak’ (Time) (2,000 print run); and ‘Marmara’, published since 1940 (1,500 print run).

The only Armenian ‘Aras’ printing and publishing house in Turkey is also in Istanbul.

Artashes Markosian, editor of the printing and publishing house says that the objective of ‘Aras’ is to preserve the cultural heritage of Armenians living in Turkey for future generations. It has published 120 titles so far, one third of which are in Armenian. There are also books about the Armenian Genocide among them, which are not sold at bookstores in Istanbul. As for Yerevan, books published by ‘Aras’ are sold at ArtBridge Bookstore Cafe.

The Armenian community in Istanbul has five high and 14 elementary schools, where 3,000 children study, however, their number in the community reaches 12,000. The rest of the children attend Turkish schools, which unlike Armenian schools, are free of charge.

Getronagan High School, founded in 1886, is one of the Istanbul-based Armenians high schools. The high school, which has about 230 students studying in the 9-12 grades, has 50-60 alumni each year; only baptized Armenians study here.

“At the entrance of the preparatory [of the school], you must prove that you are an Armenian, and the only proof here is being baptized,” says Sirvard Kuyumjian, head of Getronagan High School.

The deputy head of the school is a Turk, which is compulsory for an Armenian school and other schools belonging to national minorities. It is forbidden to speak about the Armenian genocide at history classes.

Teachers of the Armenian literature try to fill that gap, briefly touching upon what happened in 1915.

The high school needs specialists and textbooks. They use 50-60-year-old textbooks.

Teacher of the Armenian language Natalie Baghdad says that all those who have graduated from an Armenian school in Turkey do not have the right to hold high posts. But they become good linguists, lawyers, doctors or teachers.

The life of Istanbul-based Armenians was essentially changed after death of Hrant Dink, editor-in-chief of ‘Agos’ daily, who was murdered on January 19, 2007, by Turk nationalist Ogun Samast just in front of ‘Agos’ office.

“The appearance of hidden Armenians incredibly ran up. They came and said that Hrant had been killed for being an Armenian. “We are also Armenians; let them kill us, too,” they said,” Estukian recalls.

Employees of ‘Agos’ editorial house say that they have no forbidden theme in their daily. Yet when Dink was alive they used the word “genocide” and paid an extremely high price for it. Now all the more, they have no reason not to use it.

“Our daily always tried to speak about genocide through telling about it, through presenting the historical fact, because today’s Turkish people do not know what the Genocide is, it’s a closed topic here,” Estukian says.

Since the 1990s Dink had tried to break through the limitations of the closed topic.

“It was important to us to make sure that Turkish people know about it. The position of the government [of Turkey] would hardly change, if people do not change. If people change, the government would also change after a few generations. This is a great struggle,” Estukian says.

Istanbul-based Kurd lawmaker Ufuk Uras has entered the Turkish parliament with the help of the vote of national minorities. Last year he visited Armenia with President of Turkey Abdullah Gul.

The Kurd lawmaker joined the signature collection campaign of Turk members of intelligentsia, where they apologize to Armenians for the genocide.

“Turkey has not been cleansed of massacres’ blood yet. We and Armenians have many things in common. There is no need to look for historical events in the diplomatic labyrinth. I appreciate this signature collection even more than whether or not U.S. President Barack Obama will pronounce the word genocide on April 24,” Uras says.