Turkish Forum

Category: Harut Sassounian

Harut Sassounian is the Publisher of The California Courier, founded in 1958. His weekly editorials, translated into several languages, are reprinted in scores of U.S. and overseas publications and posted on countless websites.<p>

He is the author of “The Armenian Genocide: The World Speaks Out, 1915-2005, Documents and Declarations.”

As President of the Armenia Artsakh Fund, he has administered the procurement and delivery of $970 million of humanitarian assistance to Armenia and Artsakh during the past 34 years. As Senior Vice President of Kirk Kerkorian’s Lincy Foundation, he oversaw $240 million of infrastructure projects in Armenia.

From 1978 to 1982, Mr. Sassounian worked as an international marketing executive for Procter & Gamble in Geneva, Switzerland. He was a human rights delegate at the United Nations for 10 years. He played a leading role in the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by the U.N. Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities in 1985.

Mr. Sassounian has a Master’s Degree in International Affairs from Columbia University, and a Master’s in Business Administration from Pepperdine University.

  • Hanging Armenia’s Dirty Laundry in Public

    Hanging Armenia’s Dirty Laundry in Public

     

     

    By Harut Sassounian

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    President Serzh Sargsyan made an important appearance at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in Strasbourg last week. In a whirlwind 30-minute speech, he covered Armenia’s internal and foreign affairs, presenting his country in the best possible light before a distinguished foreign audience.

     

    On the domestic front, Pres. Sargsyan spoke about fighting corruption, holding “fair and transparent elections,” and overcoming “the consequences of the tragic events of March 2008.”

     

    The President then reminded the European Parliamentarians about Armenia’s “shared historical and cultural legacy” with Europe and discussed the ongoing negotiations to resolve the Artsakh (Karabagh) conflict. He condemned “the extreme level of Armenophobia and racism” in Azerbaijan, and spoke of the difficulty of making “a concession to the side that is looking for a convenient excuse to shoot at us.”

     

    Pres. Sargsyan went on to accuse the Turkish government of undermining the “normalizaton” of Armenia-Turkey relations “by setting preconditions and failing to honor its commitments, which rendered the ratification of the signed Protocols impossible.” He called on Turkey and Azerbaijan to end the “unlawful blockade imposed on Armenia” and accused Turkey of “not only failing to recognize, but also engaging in a policy of blunt denial of the Genocide of Armenians committed in the Ottoman Empire in 1915.” He pledged that Armenians and all those concerned with crimes against humanity “will henceforth remain focused on the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide.”

     

    After his speech, Pres. Sargsyan spent another 30 minutes answering questions from PACE delegates representing Lithuania, France, Switzerland, Russia, Moldova, Holland, Armenia, and Ireland. Five Azerbaijanis had placed their names on the list of Parliamentarians to ask questions, but none of them did so. The delegates from Turkey had also made a unanimous decision not to question the Armenian President, as reported by Hurriyet Turkish newspaper.

     

    The question that attracted most attention was the one asked by Parliamentarian Zaruhi Postanjyan from Armenia, a member of the opposition Heritage Party. She told Pres. Sargsyan: “Since an authoritarian regime has been established in Armenia and all elections from 1995 on have been rigged,” wouldn’t it be preferable if he organized special and fair elections and then “resigned”?

     

    As the Turkish President of PACE, Mevlut Cavusoglu snickered at the question, Pres. Sargsyan calmly responded that he was well aware of Ms. Postanjyan’s views which she had freely expressed in the Armenian Parliament, on the street and in the media. He added that he was not prepared to hold special elections because it is neither necessary nor constitutionally feasible to organize such elections. He urged Ms. Postanjyan to participate in the next regularly-scheduled parliamentary elections.

     

    Not surprisingly, Pres. Sargsyan’s PACE speech was welcomed by his supporters and criticized by his opponents at home. The most important issue for all concerned should have been whether the President’s impressive words would translate into action in the near future. However, the immediate controversy revolved around the appropriateness of Ms. Postanjyan’s criticism of the President, while on foreign soil.

     

    Some Armenian politicians were of the opinion that it was improper for Ms. Postanjyan “to attack” Pres. Sargsyan in the chambers of the European Council. Others felt that her “harsh words” inadvertently made the President look good, because in a truly “authoritarian regime,” she would have been excluded from Armenia’s delegation, stripped of her parliamentary immunity and prosecuted. In fact, some European Parliamentarians wondered whether Turkish or Azeri delegates would dare to criticize their President at PACE?

     

    American politicians use the expression “politics stops at the water’s edge” to indicate their willingness to set aside internal disputes for the sake of presenting a united front to outsiders. Applying that adage to Armenia, one could question the wisdom of making such disparaging comments before the Council of Europe, regardless of whether one agrees with the President or his policies. Since Armenia is routinely attacked by Turkish and Azerbaijani delegates in international forums, it is unwise to add one’s voice to those tarnishing Armenia’s reputation.

     

    This issue also comes up when some Armenians try to pressure their authorities by taking their internal disputes to foreign governments and international courts. While their frustration is understandable, dragging a foreign entity into an internal dispute detracts from Armenia’s image overseas. In such cases, however, the blame must be shared by the Armenian government for failing to ensure the integrity of domestic courts, thereby forcing citizens to turn elsewhere for justice.

     

    Before making critical comments about Armenia’s leadership outside the country, especially by Parliament members who have ample opportunity to express their views at home, one must weigh the benefits of pressuring the authorities to respect the people’s rights with the damage caused to the country’s international reputation.

     

  • From Genocide Recognition To Reclaiming Church Properties

    From Genocide Recognition To Reclaiming Church Properties

     

     

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    The Armenian-American community took a major step last week to reverse the consequences of the Armenian Genocide and end the Turkish government’s long-standing policy of erasing all traces of Armenian civilization from present-day Turkey.

     

    Going beyond mere acknowledgment of the Armenian Genocide, some members of Congress have introduced a new resolution that urges “the Republic of Turkey to safeguard its Christian heritage and to return confiscated church properties.”

     

    The sweeping House Resolution 306 calls on the Government of Turkey to:

    “1) end all forms of religious discrimination;

    2) allow the rightful church and lay owners of Christian church properties, without hindrance or restriction, to organize and administer prayer services, religious education, clerical training, appointments, and succession, religious community gatherings, social services, including ministry to the needs of the poor and infirm, and other religious activities;

    3) return to their rightful owners all Christian churches and other places of worship, monasteries, schools, hospitals, monuments, relics, holy sites, and other religious properties, including movable properties, such as artwork, manuscripts, vestments, vessels, and other artifacts; and

    4) allow the rightful Christian church and lay owners of Christian church properties, without hindrance or restriction, to preserve, reconstruct, and repair, as they see fit, all Christian churches and other places of worship, monasteries, schools, hospitals, monuments, relics, holy sites, and other religious properties within Turkey.”

     

    This bipartisan resolution, sponsored by Cong. Ed Royce (R-CA) and Cong. Howard Berman (D-CA), was immediately endorsed by 30 of their House colleagues, 10 of them Republicans. This is a good start, as Republicans constitute the majority in the House and their support is crucial for the successful passage of the resolution. Significantly, Cong. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and a long-time opponent of the Armenian Genocide resolution, was one of the first supporters of the resolution regarding the return of church properties.

     

    It is not surprising that this resolution has such broad support, as it is hard to imagine that any member of Congress, the State Department or the Obama administration would oppose returning a religious building back to its proper owners. By contemporary societal standards, no one would accept the conversion of a church into a mosque or vice versa. Turkey’s devout leaders, as good Muslims, would be the first to acknowledge and uphold the sanctity of houses of worship.

     

    Beyond building a strong bipartisan coalition in Congress, practically all religious denominations in America, be they Evangelical, Catholic, Orthodox, Jewish or Muslim, would support such a resolution. All ethnic groups, such as Latinos, Greek-Americans, Irish-Americans, Jewish-American, Arab-Americans, Afro-Americans, Asian-Americans, and Assyrian-Americans would also lend their support to this resolution.

     

    The Armenian National Committee of America noted that the resolution intends “to highlight, confront, and eventually reverse decades of official Turkish policy of destroying Christian church properties, desecrating holy sites, discriminating against Christian communities, and denying of the right of Armenians, Greeks, Assyrians, Chaldeans, Pontians, Arameans (Syriacs), and others to practice their faith in freedom.”

     

    The right to religious freedom is not simply an internal Turkish issue. This right is protected by many international agreements, including the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the European Convention on Human Rights, and the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne to which Turkey is a signatory. Turkey continues to violate Articles 41 and 42 of the Lausanne Treaty which obligate it to provide funding and facilities to non-Muslim minorities for educational, religious, and charitable purposes, and to protect their religious establishments. Regrettably, the House resolution makes no mention of these violations and Turkey’s obligations under the Lausanne Treaty.

     

    The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, which issues an annual report documenting violations of religious rights around the world, has placed Turkey on its “Watch List,” for the third year in a row. The Commission has found that “the Turkish government continues to impose serious limitations on freedom of religion or belief, thereby threatening the continued vitality and survival of minority religious communities in Turkey.” The Turkish government also “continues to intervene in the internal governance and education of religious communities and to confiscate places of worship.”

     

    In recent years, the House and Senate passed several resolutions calling on Turkish-occupied Northern Cyprus, Lithuania, Romania, and Vietnam to protect houses of worship and return wrongfully confiscated properties belonging to religious minorities. In line with these resolutions, the House of Representatives should adopt Resolution 306, calling on the Turkish government to respect the right of worship for all Christian minorities and return to them their expropriated churches and other religious properties.

  • Sassounian’s column of June 16, 2011

    Sassounian’s column of June 16, 2011

     

     

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    Why Pass an Armenian Genocide 

    Resolution for the Third Time?

     

    By Harut Sassounian

    Publisher, The California Courier

     

    A new Armenian Genocide resolution is being introduced in the House of Representatives this week.

     

    The first question is why Congress is being asked to pass a genocide resolution for the third time? As is well known, the House of Representatives twice adopted resolutions acknowledging the Armenian Genocide, in 1975 and 1984. What would Armenians gain by adopting the resolution for the third time? And if it passes this year, would another attempt be made to pass it again for the fourth time next year?

     

    Some may be under the mistaken impression that such resolutions would help Armenians obtain restitution from Turkey for their confiscated lands and stolen possessions. This is simply not true. Commemorative resolutions express “the sense” of Congress and do not have the force of law. Furthermore, if these resolutions had any real benefits, Armenians would have taken advantage of them during the decades since their adoption!

     

    On the positive side, the passage of these resolutions have ethical, psychological, and political dimensions. Morality dictates that the mass murder of an entire nation not be forgotten or ignored. Yet, it is the Turkish government’s continued denial of the Armenian Genocide that compels Armenians to present such resolutions to Congress year after year. Regrettably, successive U.S. administrations also share the blame in this sordid affair by aiding and abetting the Turkish denialists, and playing unethical word games with the extermination of 1.5 million innocent men, women and children.

     

    The psychological advantage of passing such a resolution is the satisfaction received by descendants of genocide victims when their loss and pain are acknowledged by the legislature of the world’s greatest democracy.

     

    The political raucous, whenever an Armenian Genocide resolution is introduced in Congress, is due to the Turkish government’s scandalous behavior. Dozens of commemorative resolutions on a variety of issues are adopted by the U.S. Congress each year, yet not a single one makes the news. Because Turkish leaders create such mayhem by making threats against the United States, dispatching high-level delegations to Washington, hiring powerful lobbying firms, and spending valuable political capital, they end up making millions of people aware of the facts of the Armenian Genocide. While the Turkish intent is to cover up the mass murder of Armenians almost a century ago, their berserk reaction inadvertently succeeds in publicizing to the whole world the dastardly crimes committed by their forefathers.

     

    Hopefully, the Turkish government would once again resort to its normal bullying tactics, thereby attracting the attention of the international community to the Armenian Genocide issue. The newly introduced resolution can only benefit from such Turkish-generated publicity, since the Republican-dominated House is not likely to act on it anytime soon, not that the more sympathetic Democrats had a greater degree of enthusiasm to bring it to a vote late last year, when they were in power!

     

    Certainly, Turkish officials could be even more helpful should they create unexpected crises with the United States, thus forcing the hand of both the Democratic administration and Republican House leadership to support the genocide resolution. Meanwhile, the Armenian-American community would keep the issue alive and ready to be triggered at the opportune moment, causing the Turkish side to spend millions of dollars in on-going lobbying efforts!

     

    Such an opportunity may come later this month with a possible bloody confrontation between the second Turkish “humanitarian” flotilla and Israel’s Navy, which could trigger the ire of U.S. and Israeli leaders, compelling them to put the pending Genocide resolutions to a vote in their respective legislatures. While Armenians would resent seeing the genocide issue used as a political football, they may not have much of a choice, since they have been just as offended when the resolution was not being adopted for all the wrong reasons!

     

    Going beyond the genocide issue, Armenian-Americans may introduce several other resolutions in Congress this year involving Armenian-Turkish relations:

    — Urging Turkey to return the expropriated Armenian churches to the Armenian Patriarchate of Istanbul, allowing them to function as churches, not museums, mosques, or touristic sites;

    — Honoring the distinguished jurist Raphael Lemkin who coined the term genocide, influenced by the mass murder of Armenians in 1915;

    — Advocating the lifting of the blockade of Armenia imposed by Turkey and Azerbaijan; and

    — Supporting the protection of human rights of all minorities in Turkey (Alevis, Armenians, Assyrians, Greeks, Jews, and Kurds).

     

    With the upcoming congressional and presidential elections, and unexpected developments in the Eastern Mediterranean, we may be facing a hectic and chaotic political season. It is critical for Armenian-Americans and their supporters to remain well informed, active, and committed to the pursuit of Armenian interests.

     

  • A Glimmer of Hope, Amid the Discord On the Armenian Genocide Museum

    A Glimmer of Hope, Amid the Discord On the Armenian Genocide Museum

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    In a recent column titled, “There is a Time to Sue and a Time to Settle,” I urged the Armenian-American community to come together and launch the long-awaited Armenian Genocide Museum and Memorial in Washington, located two blocks from the White House.

    I made that suggestion after a federal judge ruled that the Cafesjian Family Foundation is the rightful owner of the Museum buildings. Many Armenian-Americans were hopeful that the court’s verdict would put an end to several years of legal wrangling that delayed the development of the Genocide Museum and cost millions of dollars in attorney fees.

    Although many in the Armenian community welcomed my call for a united effort to make the Museum a reality on the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, Armenian Assembly’s leadership disagreed, and proceeded to appeal the court’s verdict. Of course, the Assembly has the right to appeal, but doing so may not be the right course of action. Continuing the litigation would further delay the creation of an Armenian Genocide Museum in the nation’s capital, and undermine not only the interests of the Armenian-American community, but also the interests of the Assembly itself!

    Members and supporters of the Assembly must be concerned about the insistence of some of their leaders to prolong this legal dispute. It would have been far more preferable to devote their limited resources to expand the organization’s social and political activities that have been considerably curtailed in recent years because of the economic downturn and the departure of key staff members from its offices in Washington, Los Angeles, and Yerevan. The organization’s finances were also impacted due to the loss of several Assembly donors after some of its leaders got involved in the highly controversial Turkish-Armenian Reconciliation Commission (TARC). The Assembly acknowledged that shortage of funds was the reason for its decision to withdraw from the United Armenian Fund, a coalition of seven largest Armenian-American philanthropic and religious organizations that has provided over $600 million of humanitarian aid to Armenia and Artsakh since the 1988 earthquake.

    Under these circumstances, it may be counterproductive for the Assembly’s leaders to spend millions of more dollars to appeal the verdict, particularly since the Judge ruled that in addition to paying their own legal expenses, they have to reimburse Mr. Gerard Cafesjian for a portion of his attorney fees, which could be a substantial sum! Those funds could be better utilized to re-energize the Assembly’s lobbying work in Washington or to fund other worthy projects, such as the Genocide Museum.

    The Assembly leaders also do not need to waste their efforts by re-trying their legal case in the media. The California Courier received last week a letter to the editor signed by a gracious and generous couple who are major supporters of the Armenian Assembly. They were expressing disagreement with my column titled, “There is a Time to Sue and a Time to Settle.” Interestingly, parts of this letter bore some similarity to a press release issued by the Assembly a week earlier. In fact, the text reads more like a court brief drafted by an attorney than a letter expressing a reader’s opinion. The letter was sent to 10 Armenian newspapers and websites in the U.S. and Canada, asking them to publish it as a response to my column which did not appear in some of these news outlets.

    I sincerely hope that the Assembly leaders are not engaged in wasteful efforts to conduct letter-writing campaigns in a vain attempt to win a war of words with the media, because there is no point in re-trying a lawsuit in the pages of a newspaper! That issue has already been settled in a court of law by an independent federal judge.

    Nevertheless, a hopeful sign emerged last week, buried deep amid the disputes and recriminations. In an “Open Letter,” Mr. Hirair Hovnanian, Chairman of the Armenian Assembly, suggested that he “may be able to convince all interested parties to agree not to file an appeal,” if Mr. Cafesjian would guarantee the development of the Genocide Museum.

    Since Mr. Cafesjian has already made such a commitment in court, the time has come to bury the hatchet, end all lawsuits and appeals, and go on with the important task of forming a pan-Armenian entity that would establish an Armenian Genocide Museum in Washington by April 24, 2015, the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.

  • California to Extend until 2016 Deadline to Sue Insurance Companies

    California to Extend until 2016 Deadline to Sue Insurance Companies

     

     

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    By Harut Sassounian

     

    Eleven years ago, the California Legislature extended until the end of 2010, the deadline for filing lawsuits against insurance companies that had failed to pay benefits to heirs of Armenian Genocide victims.

     

    Until the year 2000, these heirs could not sue insurance companies, as the deadline for filing such lawsuits had expired long ago. Under California law, the time limit for such lawsuits is 4 years.

     

    During the past decade, after the statute of limitation was extended, Armenian-Americans successfully filed lawsuits in U.S. Federal Courts against New York Life insurance company and French AXA insurance company.

     

    Additional lawsuits against German insurance companies and banks are still pending. With the support of the Turkish government which is not a party to these lawsuits, these German firms have unsuccessfully challenged in court the legislature’s action by claiming that the reference to the Armenian Genocide in the California bill is an encroachment on the foreign policy prerogative of the federal government.

     

    After the expiration of the December 31, 2010 deadline, the Armenian-American community asked the California Legislature to extend the statute of limitation once again, since several new insurance companies have been identified that had not paid the benefits owed to their genocide-era clients.

     

    To avoid further court challenges by the Turkish government and insurance companies, some have argued that there may not be a need to include a reference to the Armenian Genocide in the new California bill, as the companies were contractually obligated to pay the beneficiaries regardless of the cause of death. The legislators decided, however, not to give in to Turkish pressures and retain the reference to the Armenian Genocide, particularly since the justification for extending the filing deadline for genocide victims was that they lacked the necessary documents — death certificates and insurance policies — to file their claims in a timely manner.

     

    It is noteworthy that the State of California defines the Armenian Genocide in the insurance bill as follows: “The Legislature recognizes that during the period from 1915 to 1923, many persons of Armenian ancestry residing in the historic Armenian homeland then situated in the Ottoman Empire were victims of massacre, torture, starvation, death marches, and exile. This period is known as the Armenian Genocide.”

     

    The California State Assembly adopted the new bill (AB 173) on April 14, 2011, extending to December 31, 2016 the deadline for lawsuits against insurance companies by heirs of Armenian Genocide victims. Despite objections by the self-proclaimed “Turkish Peace and Justice Commission of California,” the bill was approved 10-0 by the Judiciary Committee of the California Assembly, and 61-0 by the full State Assembly. AB 173, formally supported by the Consumer Attorneys of California and American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, was introduced by Assemblyman Mike Gatto on January 20, 2011. Assemblyman Katcho Achadjian was its principal co-author.

     

    The Assembly’s Legislative Counsel provided the following digest of the bill: “Existing law authorizes any Armenian Genocide victim, as defined, or the heir or beneficiary of that victim, who resides in this state and has a claim arising out of an insurance policy or policies purchased or in effect in Europe or Asia between 1875 and 1923 from a defined insurer, to bring a legal action to recover on that claim in a court in this state. Existing law also provides that any action, including any pending action brought by an Armenian Genocide victim, or the heir or beneficiary of that victim, whether a resident or nonresident of this state, seeking benefits under the insurance policies issued or in effect between 1875 and 1923, shall not be dismissed for failure to comply with the applicable statute of limitation, provided the action is filed on or before December 31, 2010. This bill would extend the deadline for filing that action to December 31, 2016. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.”

     

    After the State Assembly’s approval in April, the bill was referred to the California Senate Judiciary Committee on May 12, 2011. It will then be sent to the full Senate, and submitted to Governor Brown for his signature. This bill would amend Section 354.4 of the California Code of Civil Procedure that was initially signed into law on September 18, 2000. The new bill would extend the deadline to file lawsuits by heirs of Armenian Genocide victims against insurance companies from 2010 to end of 2016 — a year beyond the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, allowing many more lawsuits to be filed against delinquent insurance companies.

     

     

  • Council of Europe not Deceived By Erdogan’s Double-Talk

    Council of Europe not Deceived By Erdogan’s Double-Talk


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    Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan made an embarrassing appearance before the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) last month.
    Erdogan was invited to the podium after lavish praise by Mevlut Cavusoglu, who was acting more like a Turkish lobbyist than President of PACE. Cavusoglu is a founding member of the ruling AKP party and member of the Turkish Parliament.
    In his lengthy speech, the Prime Minister shamelessly lectured European Parliamentarians about democracy and freedom. Given his country’s dismal human rights record, Erdogan should have not raised such issues! Claiming that Turkey’s accession was “vital to the European Union,” he described as “foolish” those who opposed Turkey’s EU membership “for populist or artificial reasons.”
    Making a series of dubious and inflated claims about his government’s accomplishments, Erdogan asserted that: “Turkey has achieved historic reforms, especially in the area of democratization…. The government has also worked to lift restrictions on freedom. Freedoms have been strengthened in the last decade, and many issues are now discussed freely that could not have been discussed a decade ago. There is zero tolerance of torture, and barriers to freedom of expression have been removed. Some have alleged that there are restrictions on freedom of expression, but this is wrong…. The press is free, and freely criticizes anyone and everyone…. In Turkey, 26 journalists have been detained or arrested, because they are criminals, not because they are journalists.” These incredible words are uttered by a Prime Minister who does not hesitate to sue newspapers simply for publishing a cartoon likeness of him!
    When Erdogan finished his speech, Cavusoglu shielded him from further embarrassment by allowing only a handful of Parliamentarians to ask 30-second questions.
    Erdogan was displeased when Swiss Parliamentarian Andreas Gross reminded him about “the dark side of Turkish history,” asking him why Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk was being persecuted for exercising his right to free speech.
    In response to Parliamentarian Anne Brasseur’s (Luxembourg) question about censorship in Turkey, Erdogan claimed that the Turkish “judiciary is independent and is entitled to conduct its investigations as it saw fit.”
    Armen Rustamyan, Chairman of the Armenian Parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee, asked Erdogan what was the point of signing the Armenia-Turkey Protocols, if Turkey is not going to open its border with Armenia until the Karabagh (Artsakh) conflict is resolved?
    The Prime Minister responded that Turkey could not let Armenia “usurp the rights of Azerbaijan” and would indeed keep the border closed until the Karabagh issue is resolved. Erdogan then made a series of outlandish statements. He inadvertently reminded his European audience of the Turkish deportations of Armenians during the 1915 genocide by stating that even though Turkey could, it would not deport the 40,000 undocumented Armenian workers! He also complained that Armenia is not sufficiently pressuring its Diaspora. The Prime Minister seems to have forgotten that millions of Turks living illegally in Europe could also be deported! Erdogan carefully avoided responding to Rustamyan’s question about his personal order to dismantle the “Armenian-Turkish Friendship Statue” in Kars!
    The most embarrassing part of the PACE meeting was Erdogan’s rude answer to French Parliamentarian Muriel Marland-Militello who asked about the protection of religious minorities in Turkey. Erdogan insulted the lady by point out that in the Turkish language an ignorant person is described as someone from France, which she clearly happens to be! He invited her to Turkey, so she could learn about his country. To Erdogan’s chagrin, Marland-Militello turned out to know much more about Turkey’s minorities than the Prime Minister himself. As she disclosed during a subsequent press conference, Marland-Militello is a descendant of an Armenian family that had escaped from Turkey during the genocide! Erdogan also falsely claimed that the Armenian Holy Cross Church on Akhtamar Island is “now open for worship.” The fact is that the Turkish government converted the church into a state museum, allowing Divine Liturgy to be performed there only once.
    Another member of PACE, Naira Zohrabyan, having been blocked by Cavusoglu from asking a question, chased Erdogan down the corridor after the session and pushed her way past his bodyguards to hand him a photo album of murdered Armenian children during the genocide.

    While the Prime Minister may easily impress his devout followers at home, he completely embarrassed himself during his appearance at PACE in Strasbourg. In view of his blatantly deceptive statements, one would hope that Erdogan would appear more frequently in front of European audiences so he could help convince them that Turkey does not belong in Europe!