Turkish Forum

Category: Armenian Question

“The great Turk is governing in peace twenty nations from different religions. Turks have taught to Christians how to be moderate in peace and gentle in victory.”Voltaire’s Philosophical Dictionary

  • Oskanian in NY: Armenian Side Has Lost the Battle

    Oskanian in NY: Armenian Side Has Lost the Battle

    NEW YORK (A.W.)— Armenia’s former Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian spoke on Thursday, June 18 at Fordham University Law School on the ongoing developments in Armenia’s talks with the Turkish government.

    After a brief introduction by Fordham University professor Anny Kaladjian and organizing committee chair Antranig Kassbarian, Oskanian gave his analysis of the possible directions and pitfalls of the administration’s current approach to negotiations.

    He talked about the power play politics that the Turkish government uses towards Armenia, noting how his administration’s policy did not allow official talks with Turkey as it would be used by Turkey to force Armenia’s consent on national issues.

    Referring to Turkey-Armenia relations during his tenure as Foreign Minister, he said the Armenian side insisted that negotiations remain secret, because there was the concern that “Turkey was more interested in the process and not the outcome,” and hence it would try to use the fact that negotiations are being held to advance its own agenda of derailing genocide recognition.

    Talking about the announcement of the roadmap between Turkey and Armenia on the eve of April 24, Oskanian said that “the Armenian side has lost the battle.” He noted, “They [Turkey] have the Armenian side’s agreement in their pocket, and now Turkey can decide when and how to open border. We haven’t received anything in return.”

    Oskanian said that for Armenia, national issues must remain a priority and the government’s greatest challenge is standing strong against immense pressures from other countries to do what is best for them, not necessarily what would be in Armenia’s best interest.

    After a brief but concise presentation, Oskanian opened the floor to questions from the audience and responded to inquiries ranging from his ideas on the post election protests, Armenia’s approach on the Karabagh issue, as well as genocide reparations and his thoughts on the roadmap.

    The event was organized by the Armenian Revolutionary Federation and co-sponsored by the Armenian Catholic Exarcate, the Armenian Club of Fordham University, AMAA, ANCA, ASA, AYF, knights and Daughters of Vartan, and the Prelacy of the Armenian Apostolic Church.

    Related Posts

    1. Oskanian Says Armenia-Turkey Relations May Get Worse
    2. Oskanian, Hovannisian Urge Caution in Turkey-Armenia Deal
    3. Oskanian Meets with OSCE Co-Chairs
    4. Oskanian Meets with Iranian and Turkish Foreign Ministers in New York
    5. We Need to Achieve De Jure Independence of Karabakh, Says Oskanian
  • Israel’s New Ambassador to the U.S.

    Israel’s New Ambassador to the U.S.

    Calls Armenian Killings “Genocide”

    By Harut Sassounian

    Israel’s new Ambassador to the United States, Michael B. Oren, is a firm believer in the veracity of the Armenian Genocide, despite his government’s denialist position on this issue.

    Prior to his ambassadorial appointment, Oren repeatedly confirmed the facts of the Armenian Genocide in his writings. In the May 10, 2007 issue of the New York Review of Books, he wrote a highly positive review of Taner Akcam’s book: “A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility.” The review was titled: “The Mass Murder They Still Deny.”

    In his most recent book, “Power, Faith and Fantasy,” Oren made dozens of references to Armenia and Armenians, including lengthy heart-wrenching descriptions of the mass killings before and during the Armenian Genocide. Here are some of the most striking quotations from his book:

    “The buildup of Ottoman oppression and Armenian anger erupted finally in the spring of 1894, when Turkish troops set out to crush a local rebellion, but then went on to raze entire villages and slaughter all of their inhabitants…. Some 200,000 Armenians died — 20 percent of the population — and a million homes were ransacked. ‘Armenian holocaust,’ cried a New York Times headline in September 1895, employing the word that would later become synonymous with genocide.”

    Oren then went on to establish that more than a century ago, similar to today’s acrimonious political tug-of-war over the genocide recognition issue, the Armenian atrocities seriously affected U.S.-Turkish relations. He wrote: “Maintaining amicability with Turkey would prove complicated, however, because ties between the United States and the Porte [Sultan] had long been frayed. The perennial source of friction was the oppression of Armenian Christians. Though a band of modernizing Young Turks, many of them graduates of Roberts College, had achieved power in Istanbul in 1908 and promised equal rights for all of the empire’s citizens, barely a year passed before the slaughter of Armenians resumed. Some thirty thousand of them were butchered by Turkish troops in south-central Anatolia.”

    In a section titled, “The most horrible crime in human history,” Oren wrote: “The first reports, from December 1914, told of anti-Christian pogroms in Bitlis, in eastern Turkey, and the hanging of hundreds of Armenians in the streets of Erzerum. Armenian men between the ages of twenty and sixty were being conscripted into forced-labor battalions, building roads, and hauling supplies for the Turkish army. The following month, after their defeat by Russian forces in the Caucasus, Turkish troops salved their humiliation by pillaging Armenian towns and executing their Armenian laborers. In the early spring, Turkish soldiers laid siege to the Armenian city of Van in eastern Anatolia and began the first of innumerable mass deportations. The slaughter then raged westward to Istanbul, where, on April 24, security forces arrested and hanged some 250 Armenian leaders and torched Armenian neighborhoods. Interior Minister Talaat Pasha informed the Armenian Patriarch that ‘there was no room for Christians in Turkey’ and advised him and his parishioners ‘to clear out of the country.’”

    Oren then exposed Turkey’s attempts to falsify history by pointing out that: “Most contemporary observers agree that the massacres were scarcely connected to the war, but rather represented a systematically planned and executed program to eliminate an entire people. Indeed, foreshadowing the Nazi genocide of the Jews twenty-five years later, Turkish soldiers herded entire Armenian villages into freezing rivers, incinerated them in burning churches, or simply marched them into the deserts and abandoned them to die of thirst…. By the end of summer, an estimated 800,000 Armenians had been killed and countless others forcibly converted to Islam.”

    After citing numerous eyewitness accounts of the mass killings, Oren concluded: “In all, as many as 1.5 million Armenians were killed in a genocide that the Turkish government would never acknowledge, much less regret.”

    While it is true that Michael Oren published this book before his assignment as Ambassador to Washington, his compelling position on the Armenian Genocide would hopefully make him refrain from following the footsteps of his predecessors who shamefully lobbied against the congressional resolution on this issue.

    The appointment of a staunch supporter of the truth of the Armenian Genocide as Israel’s Ambassador to Washington comes on the heels of a serious rift between Turkey and Israel following the Gaza war earlier this year. On that occasion, there were major manifestations of anti-Semitic statements and acts throughout Turkey, including anti-Israeli remarks by Turkish Prime Minister Rejeb Erdogan. His insulting words to Israel’s President Shimon Peres in Davos, Switzerland, antagonized Israelis and Jews worldwide. Even though Israel downplayed Erdogan’s offensive words, they did a lasting damage to Israeli-Turkish relations.

    The combination of an Israeli government that is less sympathetic of Turkey and the presence of Israel’s Ambassador in Washington who is a firm believer in the facts of the Armenian Genocide may facilitate the passage of the pending congressional resolution on the Armenian Genocide.

  • INTERVIEW-Turkey talks on Armenia “paused” – EU mediator

    INTERVIEW-Turkey talks on Armenia “paused” – EU mediator

    * Envoy does not see new Turkey policy on Armenia changing
    * Pause should not last so long as to lose momentum-envoy

    By Michael Stott

    MOSCOW, June 17 (Reuters) – Turkey has taken a “tactical step backwards” on normalising relations with Armenia because of hostile domestic reaction to the move, the EU’s envoy to the region said in an interview.

    “A step back was taken by the Turkish side … but this is not a U-turn,” said EU South Caucasus envoy Peter Semneby. “We expect the conversations will continue.”

    After decades of hostility, Muslim Turkey and Christian Armenia announced in April a “roadmap” for re-establishing diplomatic relations and opening their shared border.

    But Ankara’s Muslim ally Azerbaijan said Armenia should first leave Nagorno-Karabakh, a mostly ethnic Armenian enclave which broke away after fighting a bloody war with Azerbaijan in the 1990s and claims independence.

    Turkey then offered support for the Azeri position, complicating further progress in talks with Armenia.

    Semneby said in the interview, conducted at the end of a visit to Moscow last week, that it was important the “pause” in the peace process between Turkey and Armenia did not last too long because of the risk that impetus would be lost.

    “The normalisation (with Armenia) became the subject of quite widespread and heated discussion in Turkey,” he added in earlier remarks to a small group of reporters. “It seems to me, this discussion became more heated than was expected.” Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan promised Azerbaijan during a visit to Baku last month that Ankara would not open its border with Armenia — closed since 1993 — until Armenia ended what he termed its occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh.

    “I see this as a Turkish tactical step backwards,” Semneby told Reuters. “But fundamentally, the new foreign policy that has been pursued by the Erdogan government, I don’t see that this policy is changing.”

    PROGRESS

    Talks on the future of Nagorno-Karabakh have been dragging on for more than a decade under the auspices of the Minsk Group linking Russia, France and the United States.

    But Armenia, whose president, Serzh Sarksyan, is from Nagorno-Karabakh, is reluctant to budge and Azerbaijan periodically threatens military intervention.

    Nonetheless Semneby believes real progress is being made.

    “It is clear that if you look at the negotiating process, it is intensifying,” he told Reuters. “We had in a month two meetings and there will be another relatively soon between the presidents.”

    The Nagorno-Karabakh war, in which up to 30,000 died, was the bloodiest of a spate of conflicts which followed the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. Armed clashes still occur regularly along the lines separating Azeri and Armenian troops.

    Asked about the risk of conflict, Semneby said it would be foolish to neglect it but he felt both sides understood the enormous costs which would be involved in any large-scale military engagement.

    “Even with this very dangerous posturing that we see sometimes and the fact that the forces are not separated and there are incidents all the time, the two sides are by now used to managing incidents,” he said.

    “If anything, the Georgia war (last year with Russia), demonstrated the risks of military engagement … it was also a wake-up call to both countries how vulnerable they are.” (Editing by Alison Williams)

    Source:  www.reuters.com, Jun 17, 2009

  • PROVOCATION AGAINST TURKEY

    PROVOCATION AGAINST TURKEY

    ARMENIAN COMMUNITY IN US MAKES ANOTHER PROVOCATION AGAINST TURKEY
    Saturday, 13 June 2009
    APA’s US bureau reports that the US-based law office of Geragos & Geragos owned by famous lawyer of Armenian descent Mark Geragosian addressed heirs of Ethnic Greek New York Life Policy Holders who “were murdered” in the Genocide perpetrated by the Ottoman Turks between 1915 and 1921.

    “Prior to 1915, New York Life sold life insurance policies to thousands of Greeks living in the Ottoman Empire. Countless Greek policyholders were among the hundreds of thousands of Greeks who perished in the first Genocide of the twentieth century. In the ensuing chaos, many of the rightful heirs were unable to produce the documentation required to claim the insurance proceeds while others were unaware that they were entitled to any insurance benefits. In 2004, a class action settlement of $20 million which involved 2,300 Armenian New York Life policyholders with unpaid claims was awarded to the descendents of the victims massacred in the Armenian Genocide of 1915,” Geragos & Geragos noted in the special webpage launched for this purpose.

    This is not the first campaign launched by the US Armenian community to damage Turkey”s image. Earlier, California State Assembly member of Armenian descent Paul Krekorian presented a bill “Justice for Genocide Victims” and wanted prohibition of investments in Turkey and other states that committed “genocide.”
  • Court dismisses Armenian Genocide denial

    Court dismisses Armenian Genocide denial

    Massachusetts District Court dismisses Armenian Genocide denial case

    In a major blow to Turkey’s global campaign to suppress the truth about the Armenian Genocide, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Mark Wolf today ruled in favor of the Massachusetts Department of Education, allowing it to continue teaching the facts of the Armenian Genocide, and other crimes against humanity, in public schools across the Commonwealth as constitutionally protected government speech, reported the Armenian Assembly of America (Assembly).
    “The Armenian Assembly appreciates the court’s ruling in this matter. It sends a clear message to Turkey and its revisionist allies that history cannot be rewritten to further Ankara’s state-sponsored denial campaign,” said Assembly Board of Trustees Chairman Hirair Hovnanian. Carolyn Mugar, the Board’s President, added, “Given the overwhelming historical and legal evidence documenting the incontestable fact of the Armenian Genocide, this ruling is a victory for all those concerned about genocide education and prevention.”
    Assembly Executive Director Bryan Ardouny noted that “today’s decision is in keeping with a growing trend toward teaching genocide prevention with nearly every state, including Massachusetts, formally recognizing the Armenian Genocide. We want to thank the office of the Attorney General of Massachusetts for not backing down in this case.”
    The court’s ruling preserves the teaching of accurate history, which is part of the official “Massachusetts Guide to Choosing and Using Curricular Materials on Genocide and Human Rights,” prepared in 1999. In 2005, the Assembly of Turkish American Associations (ATAA), along with others, filed the suit against the Department of Education arguing that the Commonwealth violated the plaintiffs’ First Amendment rights by removing materials from the curriculum that deny the events of 1915.
    In an unprecedented move, the plaintiffs attempted to use the federal courts to argue a tired and discredited practice that the “other side” of the story should be taught.
    “In light of the fact that Turkey criminalizes honest discussion of the Armenian Genocide, it is especially ironic that Turkish denialists turned to U.S. courts in an attempt to twist freedom of speech in America,” stated Assembly Board of Trustees Counselor Van Krikorian. “Even though the court viewed this case ‘in the light most favorable to plaintiffs,’ it still ruled in favor of truth, history and the U.S. Constitution. The sooner Turkey comes to terms with its past, the better it will be for everyone.”
    The Armenian Assembly immediately responded when the suit was filed, hiring Duke University Law Professor Irwin Chemerinsky, one of the nation’s leading First Amendment experts, and co-counsel Arnold Rosenfeld of the firm K&L Gates LLP. Over the past four years, the Assembly, and others, challenged the ATAA at every turn by filing a series of pleadings including an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief. The brief was intended to assist the Court in bringing the case to a conclusion in favor of the Commonwealth.
    Attorneys Rosenfeld and Krikorian presented the amicus brief before Judge Wolf. Rosenfeld and Krikorian warned that if the court accepted the plaintiffs’ First Amendment claims, it would open the door for any extremist group, such as Holocaust deniers, to challenge curriculum matters in court.
    Attorney Gabrielle R. Wolohojian, then of Wilmer, Cutler, Hale and Dorr LLP, also represented an Amicus Class, which included the Armenian Bar Association, the Armenian National Committee of America, the Irish Immigration Center, the Jewish Alliance for Law and Justice and the NAACP.


    11.06.2009 11:28
  • High-Ranking Obama Official Refuses to Acknowledge the Genocide

    High-Ranking Obama Official Refuses to Acknowledge the Genocide

    By Harut Sassounian
    Publisher, The California Courier
    sassun-21
    Pres. Obama continues to disappoint the Armenian-American community. After breaking two promises in a row on key Armenian issues — not acknowledging the Armenian Genocide and proposing reduced U.S. aid levels to Armenia — he appoints Philip Gordon Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs.
    Dr. Gordon, a former Director of the Brookings Institution — a think thank partially funded by Turkish sources — has written several pro-Turkish books and articles. He has been an opponent of congressional acknowledgment of the Armenian Genocide and a critic of Greek Cypriot leaders rather than the occupying Turkish forces. Gordon served in the Clinton administration as Director for European Affairs at the National Security Council. During the last presidential campaign, he served as head of the Europe team in Obama’s group of foreign policy advisers.
    During his confirmation hearing by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at the end of March, Gordon was grilled by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) on his views on Armenian and Cypriot issues. Several Senators pointed out that Gordon’s answers contradicted Pres. Obama’s campaign promises. Little did the Senators know that a few weeks later the President himself would not keep his word on these issues! Sen. Menendez submitted over two dozen questions which were to be answered by the nominee in writing after the hearing.
    Sen. John Ensign (R-Nevada) wrote a scathing letter to Gordon on April 7, expressing his dismay that the nominee, during his confirmation hearing, had used the word “tragedy” to refer to the Armenian Genocide. Sen. Ensign demanded to know if Gordon’s position on the Armenian Genocide was consistent with those of Pres. Obama, Vice President Biden, and Secretary of State Clinton all of whom, as Senators and presidential candidates, had strongly acknowledged the Armenian Genocide. Furthermore, referring to the early termination of the career of U.S. Ambassador to Armenia John Evans for saying Armenian Genocide, Sen. Ensign asked if Gordon would “discourage Ambassadors or other Foreign Service personnel from using the term ‘Armenian Genocide.’”
    Sen. Ensign, not satisfied with Gordon’s answers, surprised everyone by placing a hold on his nomination, temporarily blocking his approval by the full Senate. However, just as surprisingly, Sen. Ensign lifted his hold, paving the way for Gordon’s Senate confirmation.
    In the meantime, Gordon answered in writing all 28 questions sent to him by Sen. Menendez, even though his responses were evasive and non-responsive. Regardless of the nature of the question, he mindlessly repeated the same answer over and over again, using just about every word in the dictionary, except “Armenian Genocide,” to describe the mass killings of Armenians.
    Only one of Gordon’s answers was particularly revealing, as he put the blame for the Armenian Genocide on the “officials and soldiers of the Ottoman Empire,” thus inadvertently acknowledging that it was a state sponsored genocide. Here is the verbatim text of that particular exchange:
    Sen. Menendez: “Who was responsible for the death of over 1.5 million Armenians during WWI?”
    Philip Gordon: “This administration, like those before it, does not deny the facts — 1.5 million Armenians were murdered, starved, or deported by civilian officials and soldiers of the Ottoman Empire, some of whom were sentenced to death for committing these crimes. The United States mourns this terrible chapter of history and recognizes that it remains a source of pain for the people of Armenia and of Armenian descent, and all those who believe in the dignity and value of every human life.”
    Gordon also disclosed to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the Brookings had received a total of $700,000 from the following Turkish sources 2006-2008:
    — $200,000 from the Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen’s Association;
    — $190,000 from Sabanci University;
    — $150,000 from the Eksiogullari Group (construction company);
    — $100,000 from the Dogan Yayin Holding Company (media-entertainment conglomerate);
    — $30,000 from Nurol Construction and Trading Company;
    — $30,000 from Hedef-Alliance Holding (Pharmaceutical Company).
    A large number of pro-Turkish officials, such as Philip Gordon, can be found throughout the American government. Some of these Turkophiles are leftovers from the cold war era. Others, motivated by personal gain, serve in the government for a while, and then go to work at Washington Think Tanks, some partially funded from Turkish sources, or end up as lobbyists for Turkey.
    Armenian-Americans will continue to face great resistance in their lobbying efforts from pro-Turkish elements in Washington — regardless of which party is in power and who is president — unless they can expand their political influence beyond Congress into the Executive Branch, Think Tanks and the media.