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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

  • Turkey seeks fence-mending meeting with Armenia, Azerbaijan

    Turkey seeks fence-mending meeting with Armenia, Azerbaijan

     

     

     

     

     

    ANKARA, (AFP) – Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan Wednesday said he was trying to organize a meeting with counterparts from Armenia and Azerbaijan to discuss decades-old disputes plaguing ties between them.

    The idea, Babacan said, emerged during a historic visit to Yereven by President Abdullah Gul on Saturday, which raised hopes that Turkey and Armenia could overcome traditional enmity and establish diplomatic relations.

    “We have many reasons to be hopeful, the most important of which is the presence of a strong political will to improve ties,” the minister said in an interview with NTV television.

    Babacan and Armenian Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian are already scheduled to meet on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York later this month.

    Babacan said he suggested that their Azeri counterpart also join the meeting and Nalbandian agreed.

    “We will now seek Azerbaijan’s consent… The problems between Turkey and Armenia and not independent from the problems between Azerbaijan and Armenia,” he said.

    The issue would be discussed when Gul visits Baku later Wednesday, he said.

    Turkey has refused to establish diplomatic ties with eastern neighbor Armenia because of Yerevan’s campaign for the recognition of the mass killings of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire during World War I as genocide.

    In 1993, Turkey dealt a heavy economic blow to its impoverished neighbor by shutting the border in a show of solidarity with its close ally Azerbaijan, then at war with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh — an Armenian-majority region in Azerbaijan which declared independence.

    Babacan said Gul’s visit to Armenia, the first by a Turkish head of state, had raised hopes that the two sides could mend fences.

    “In our talks in Yereven we decided to speed up the process (of reconciliation)… We are entering a period in which we will have frequent contacts,” he told NTV.

    Gul traveled to Yereven for several hours to watch a World Cup qualifying football match between Turkey and Armenia following an invitation by his counterpart Serzh Sarkisian.

  • ERMENI GOZU ILE : Georgia’s Adventurous President Saakashvili

    ERMENI GOZU ILE : Georgia’s Adventurous President Saakashvili

     

    By Appo Jabarian
    Executive Publisher/Managing Editor
    USA ARMENIAN LIFE Magazine
     
    appojabarian@gmail.com

     

    Much controversy was created with former Soviet Republic of Georgia’s surprise military attacks on Russian peacekeeping forces in South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

     

    The ill-devised attack, authorized by Georgia‘s adventurous President Saakashvili, has effectively triggered an irreversible process that may cost him his career and Georgia‘s territorial integrity.

     

    The 8.8.08 attack broke centuries-old tradition of friendship and alliance with the Russian Uncle to the north, instigating a strong popular backlash in Russian public and governmental circles. Except for Pres. Saakashvili, no Georgian official has ever actively worked to weaken his country’s ties with Russia and actively sought to “integrate” it with the oil interests of the West.

     

    In turn, he earned the status of being a strong U.S. ally in the Caucasus. But the inexperienced Georgian grossly miscalculated the extent of the Russian response, on the one hand, and the lame-duck posture adopted by his neo-con masters in the West, on the other.

     

    On Aug 29, F. William Engdahl, the author of A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order (Pluto Press), and Seeds of Destruction: The Hidden Agenda of Genetic Manipulation (www.globalresearch.ca), and a contributing writer of Online Journal wrote: “An examination shows 41-year-old Mikheil Saakashvili to be a ruthless and corrupt totalitarian who is tied to not only the US NATO establishment, but also to the Israeli military and intelligence establishment. The famous ‘Rose Revolution of November 2003 that forced the aging Edouard Shevardnadze from power and swept the then 36-year-old US university graduate into power was run and financed by the US State Department, the Soros Foundations, and agencies tied to the Pentagon and US intelligence community.”

     

    On September 1, in an article titled “The ‘Stupidest Guy on the Planet’ Has Lots of Company,” John Taylor of www.antiwar.com, wrote: “Saakashvili acted with such remarkable stupidity and miscalculation that a 38-inch yardstick is needed to measure his foolishness against other famously bad decisions … Did Saakashvili really think the Russians would stand idly by and let him pound their forces in South Ossetia? That the U.S., Israel, or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization would come to his aid? Or that Georgia‘s army could hold off the Russians?”

     

    Unmasking the real face of certain NGO’s, Engdahl added: “But there is more. The NGOs were coordinated by the US Ambassador to Georgia, Richard Miles, who had just arrived in Tbilisi fresh from success in orchestrating the CIA-backed toppling of Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrade, using the same NGOs. Miles, who is believed to be an undercover intelligence specialist, supervised the Saakashvili coup. It involved US billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Georgia Foundation, the Washington-based Freedom House whose chairman was former CIA chief James Woolsey, and generous financing from the US Congress-financed National Endowment for Democracy, an agency created by Ronald Reagan in the 1980s to °do privately what the CIA used to do,° namely coups against regimes the US government finds unfriendly.”

     

    Further bringing Saakashvili’s real persona to light, Engdahl reported: “Since coming to power in 2004 with US aid, Saakashvili has led a policy of large-scale arrests, imprisonment, torture and deepened corruption. Saakashvili has presided over the creation of a de facto one-party state, with a dummy opposition occupying a tiny portion of seats in the parliament, and this public servant is building a Ceaucescu-style palace for himself on the outskirts of Tbilisi. According to the magazine, Civil Georgia (Mar. 22, 2004), until 2005, the salaries of Saakashvili and many of his ministers were reportedly paid by the NGO network of New York-based currency speculator Soros — along with the United Nations Development Program.”

     

    Taylor added: “On an official visit to Israel, Saakashvili proclaimed that the Georgians were ‘the Jews of our time’ and compared Russian President Putin’s anti-Georgian policies to the anti-Semitic decrees of the 18th-century Russian Empress Catherine the Great. He also asserted that his model when refounding the Georgian state was Israel‘s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion. And Saakashvili did not hesitate to take his case directly to Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in New York: ‘We need to establish relations with the U.S. Jewish community because you understand better than many in this country the international repercussions with the rest of the world.… I want your help in having better relations with the United States….’”

     

    One wonders if the world Jewry can fathom Saakashvili’s adventurous politics as a “Jew of our time.” By masquerading as a “Jew” of the Caucasus, Saakashvili has certainly brought liabilities to the Jewish quest for healthy relations with Russia and other countries. That’s why the Israeli military specialists and advisers in Georgia “were reluctant to upset the Russians. They need President Putin’s support at the UN to get stronger anti-nuclear sanctions on Iran.”

     

    Engdahl ominously noted that “With Russia openly backing and training the indigenous military in South Ossetia and Abkhazia to maintain Russian presence in the region, especially since the US-backed pro-NATO Saakashvili regime took power in 2004, the Caucasus is rapidly coming to resemble Spain in the Civil War from 1936-1939, where the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany and others poured money and weapons and volunteers into Spain in a devastating war that was a precursor to the Second World War.”

     

    By his misguided military move against Russia, Saakashvili has de facto triggered a counter-“Rose Revolution” process. The process which already yielded Russia‘s trashing of Georgia‘s army may soon bring reversal of fortunes both for him and his masters in Washington and elsewhere.

     

    As for Saakashvili’s Azeri counter-part Pres. Ilham Aliev of Azerbaijan, it is yet to be seen if the junior Aliev has learned from his colleague’s experience to tone down his belligerent rhetoric against Armenia.

     

    One hopes that Aliev’s advisors in Baku are hard at work to convince their boss not to join the club of the “Stupidest Guys” of the Caucasus. After all, like Georgia, Azerbaijan has much to worry about its shaky and unstable ethnic makeup. Nearly 60% of its inhabitants come from restive non-Azeri ethnic groups such Daghestanis, Alans, Lezgis and many others.
     
  • ERMENI LOBISI GOZU ILE : Armenia Lost the Soccer Match, But Gained International Prestige

    ERMENI LOBISI GOZU ILE : Armenia Lost the Soccer Match, But Gained International Prestige

    Armenia Lost the Soccer Match, But Gained International Prestige

    Kaynak: The California Courier
    Yer: USA
    Tarih: 9.9.2008

    Armenia Lost the Soccer Match, But Gained International Prestige

    I witnessed history in the making last week when the Turkish President, at the invitation of the Armenian President, paid his first ever visit to Armenia to watch the soccer match between the national teams of their respective countries – a qualifying game for the 2010 World Cup finals.

    Before the match, some Armenians had been predicting with great nationalistic fervor an outright victory for Armenia , while others were certain that the game would end in a draw, in keeping with the atmosphere of political reconciliation. Armenians frowned upon this writer when he suggested that the powerful Turkish team would most probably win and that the practice of state mandated outcomes for soccer games had ceased with the demise of the Soviet Union . As I had anticipated, the Armenian team lost 2-0 in a lackluster game against the more powerful, but overly cautious Turkish team.

    When the Turkish President’s jet arrived at Yerevan ‘s Zvartnots Airport last Saturday, he was greeted with proper state protocol and hundreds of protesters. Later on, as he arrived at the Presidential Palace for a meeting with the Armenian President, there were more protests, not against him or his visit, but the Turkish state’s denial of the Armenian Genocide. There were lengthy debates in both the Turkish and the Armenian press about the appropriateness of such protests.

    I believe it would have been highly surprising if the head of the Turkish state that continues to deny the Armenian Genocide had visited Armenia without a single Armenian reminding him that there is an on-going injustice and unresolved issues between the two countries. In the absence of such protests, the Turkish President would have drawn the wrong conclusion that Armenians in Armenia had no problems with Turkey and that the Genocide issue is only raised by the Diaspora, particularly since it was reported that the Genocide was not discussed at all between the two presidents. To draw Pres. Gul’s attention to this important issue, ARF members unfurled a giant unsanctioned banner during the soccer match that called for: “Recognition and Reparations.”

    Many Armenians were unhappy that the Football Federation of Armenia (FFA) had just decided to remove the sketch of Mount Ararat from the FFA logo on the Armenian soccer players’ uniforms. They viewed this removal as an undesirable attempt to appease Turkey . Some members of the Armenian Parliament were so irate that they pledged to raise their objection in Parliament and possibly take legal action against the FFA.

    Nevertheless, the soccer match provided a unique opportunity for Pres. Sargsyan and Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian to meet with their Turkish counterparts in Yerevan to discuss the Artsakh (Karabagh) conflict, possible diplomatic relations between the two countries, the blockade of Armenia by Turkey , and the Caucasus Stability and Cooperation Platform – a new Turkish initiative. The two foreign ministers, after huddling long past midnight, decided to continue their discussions later this month while attending the United Nations General Assembly in New York City . Meanwhile, Pres. Gul invited his Armenian counterpart to come to Istanbul on Oct. 14, 2009 to watch with him the return match between the two national soccer teams.

    It is not known how much progress was registered in last Saturday’s discussions. Both sides made optimistic statements at the conclusion of their meetings. Several observations could be made, however, regarding recent developments in the region:

    — Both Armenia and Turkey have come under intense diplomatic pressure from the United States , Europe and Russia to resolve their long-standing problems which would enable these foreign powers to secure their energy supplies from the Caspian Sea region and engage in the transfer of goods by rail across now closed borders.

    — The Georgian-Ossetian-Russian conflict has raised Armenia ‘s geopolitical significance in the region at the expense of Georgia and Azerbaijan .

    — Turkish officials no longer seem to be setting the resolution of the Artsakh conflict as a pre-condition to establishing relations with Armenia .

    — Since Pres. Gul was strongly urged by his domestic opponents, hardliners within his own administration as well as Azerbaijani officials not to go to Armenia, imagine how much more pressure he would have to endure should he decide to establish diplomatic relations with Yerevan and open the closed border with Armenia in the near future!

    Finally, one concrete attempt at historical reconciliation between a very special Turk and a very special Armenian already succeeded. Milliyet’s journalist Hasan Cemal, the grandson of one of the three masterminds of the Armenian Genocide, Jemal Pasha, had a very touching meeting earlier this week in Yerevan with the grandson of his grandfather’s Armenian assassin in Tbilisi in 1922. A few days ago, Hasan Cemal visited the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan and placed a wreath in memory of the Armenian victims!

  • President of Republic of Turkey Should go to Erivan with a Message from the Turkish People to the Armenian People.

    President of Republic of Turkey Should go to Erivan with a Message from the Turkish People to the Armenian People.

    Turkiye Cumhuriyeti Cumhurbaskaninin Ermenistan’a yaptigi seyahatten once, asagidaki yaziyi yine bir cok kurum ve sahsa gonderdim (isimle ilgili bir toplanti aninda hazirlamaya baslayip bir otel odasinda tamamladigim acele bir yazi), hatta gurup uyelerinin bazilarina dagitmadan once yorum icin dagittim ama tek yanit veren olmadi. Halbuki boyle bir yazi, Cumhurbaskani tarafindan olmasa bile, dernekler tarafindan gazetelere ilan olarak verilebilinirdi.. Futbol maci cok buyuk bir firsatti ve lehimize propaganda olarak kullanilabilinirdi ama maalesef bunu kavrayan pek kimse olmadi ve cogunluk (%85 diye yazdi gazeteler) seyahate karsi cikdi.. Only in Turkey…

     

    Yuksel Oktay

    Eski FTAA Baskani, 1973

     

     

    President of Republic of Turkey Should go to Erivan with a Message from the Turkish People to the Armenian People.

     

    The President of the Republic of Turkey should go to Erivan as invited by the President of Armenia but with a message from the Turkish people that should be pubished in Turkish and Armenian newspapers and perhaps in the American, European and the World media as well.

     

    The invitation to attend the first match of the World Cup was first made in an article by the President of Armenia published in the Wall Street Journal on 9 July 2008. Armenians have used this method of communication with Turkey before, as manifected in a letter that was published in the Times of London back in1919, as will be referenced below. The official letter of invitation was delivered to the Turkish Embassy in Tiblis, Georgia, since there is no diplomatic relations between the two countries.

     

    First, the presence of the Turkish President at the Stadium will be comforting to the Turkish national soccer team. The whole world will watch the game that will hopefully pave the way to Turkish team’s winning the World Cup that they missed in 2002 when they were the third best. No one should expect otherwise since the population of Turkey is over 70 million and Armenia 3 million. Almost every Turkish Armenian interviewed on TV comfortably stated that Turkish team would win, many sith 2-1 score. Turkey will be playing the finals in 2010 in South Africa as Istanbul celebrates its selection as the Culture Capital of Europe the same year.

     

    Second, hundreds of thousands of articles and books have been written on the Turkish-Armenian relations and the April 24 1915 issue to date which has not brought a solution to the issue, to some for obvious reasons. People are busy wiriting, reading, protesting one another in thousands of web sites, endlessly, without achieving the ultimate goal. For the sake of our children and grandchildren, the Armenians and the world have to come to their senses and solve this issue by  listening to the Turkish side through the United Nations. The President of the Republic of Turkey could issue a letter to the to the Armenians in the Republic of Armenia and Armenians around the World, perhaps mentioning some of the facts suggested below:

     

    The President of the Republic of Turkey can state that he is happy to be in Erivan on September 6 at the invitation of the President of Armenia to watch the soccer game between the two national teams, bringing them the greetings and the love of Turkish people from all over the world, Turkey and Anatolia that some of them also call as their ancestral home. The Turkish people have no hatred against the Armenian people which is falsely and purposely advocated in the western media and many Armenians in the diaspora. This visit may eventuallyl pave the way to normalizing relations between the two states which can only happen if the following situation are corrected

     

    1.  Armenian state and the diaspora should cease their efforts on the recognition of the alleged Armenian Genocide which is being carried out through distorted facts, fabrications and untruthful presentations. The events that led to the tradegy of 1915 where both sides suffered, were started by Armenian separatists and terrorists which as early as 1887 and continued through the First World War and the Turkish War of Independence. This is documented in a letter to the Times of London (January 27, 1919) by Boghos Nubar who was the representative of the Armenian committee at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, revealing for the record that the Armenians were “belligerents in a war”, not victims of a genocide:

     

     “…ever since the beginning of the(First World) war, the Armenians fought by the side of the Allies on all fronts. … the Armenians have been belligerents de facto, since they indignantly refused to side with Turkey….Our volunteers fought in the French “Legion Etrangere” …. In the Legion d’Orient, they numbered over 5,000, and made up more than half the French contingent in Syria and Palestine…In the Caucasus, without mentioning the 150,000 Armenians in the Russian armies, about 50,000 Armenian volunteers under Andranik, Nazarbekoff, and others not only fought for four years for the cause of the Entente…At the moment when the fate of Armenia is being decided at the (Paris) Peace Conference, it is my duty, as the head of the National Delegation which has no tribute from which its voice can resound, to state once again, in the columns of The Times, the important part played by the Armenians in this frightful war. ”

     

    2.  Armenian state should declare to the world that she has no territorial claims from the Turkish Republic and that they will amend their constitution removing the reference to Eastern Anatolia as ‘’Western Armenia.’’ Armenians should also give up their demands of compensation.

     

    3. Armenian state should sign the declaration on the recognition of the existing borders that was requested by Turkey following the recognition of the Republic of Armenia established in 1991.

     

    4.  Armenia has been illegally occupying Nagorno-Karabakh since 1993, despite a United Nations Resoltion that demands their withdrawal, which they should abide.

     

    Let the best team win but above all, the friendship between the peoples flourish again fully which was the desire of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk also,  who stated back on 7 March1920 :

     

    ‘’Civilisation and the humanity should once more be enlightened regarding the alleged Armenian massacres and the purpose of the propaganda created to mislead the world. These are the results of resentment and anger from detestable and vicious accusations.’’

     

    The President of the Republic of Turkey has an opportunity to tell his counterpart that Turks are ready and willing to solve to issue and that the Armenians should face the facts.

     

    Yuksel Oktay

    3 December 2008

    Ankara

  • Amerikan Senatorleri NASIL SATIN ALINIR : Buying Policies of Armenian American nationalists

    Amerikan Senatorleri NASIL SATIN ALINIR : Buying Policies of Armenian American nationalists

    PoliGazette takes a closer look into the financial records of US Senator Menendez (D NJ). His vote can and has been bought.

    One of the main things Americans frequently complain about is the influence of special interest groups over politicians and, thus, over how the United States is ran. Too many laws, these Americans say, are designed not with the best interest of the American people in mind, but with the interest of said groups in mind. This is, Americans rightfully complain, now how the US government was meant to function.

    In recent months and years some Democratic politicians have constantly functioned as mouthpieces for one of those special interest groups; Armenian American nationalists. For some, for most Americans, unknown reason, these Democratic Senators and Representatives bring the events of 1915 which they call the Armenian Genocide up whenever they can. This obsession with something that happened almost 100 years ago resulted in an international controversy when one of the first acts of the Democratically controlled US Congress after the elections of 2006 was to adopt a resolution that labels said events officially as ‘genocide.’

    Turkey denies that what happened constitutes genocide and argues, instead, that historians, not politicians, should cast judgment on this affair. In response to the resolution Turkey threatened to withdraw its support for the War in Iraq and, more importantly, would no longer allow the US to use Turkey (to move troops, material, etc.) in order to fight and thus win in that Middle Eastern country.

    Americans wondered what happened to their government; why was the war put at risk? Why were American lives put at risk? Why this sudden obsession with something that has no relation whatsoever with America?

    PoliGazette has the answers to those questions. As usual it is about one thing only: money.

    One of the most fervent supporters of the Armenian cause in the United States is Senator Robert Menendez. He is one of the Senators who blocked George W. Bush’s nomination for ambassador to Armenia; when Bush wanted to send that person, Menendez blocked the nomination because the nominee refused to call what happened to the Armenian as ‘genocide.’ Later Bush nominated another diplomat, and once again Menendez objected, etc. In the end, though, Marie Yovanovitch was finally confirmed.

    And once again Americans wondered what the hell just happened. Why was Menendez so passionate about this subject? Why is history politicized?

    As said, it is about one thing, and one thing only; money. PoliGazette’s Kemal (who did most of the work) and me, Michael, took a closer look at the financial records of Senator Menendez and found that he has been paid and bought by Armenian activists. All in all, this Senator received some $136,000 from Armenian action committees and individuals; quite a gigantic sum.

    Below follows the complete record of Armenian donations to Senator Menendez. I’ll summarize the findings here, for details, scroll down to the records.

    One of the first things one notices about the Armenians who donated to Senator Menendez is that many of the Armenian donaters do not live in New Jersey. This means that he is not representing them, since American Senators represent a specific part of the population who are able to vote him or her in and out of office. In other words, a sizable part of Menendez’s donaters are not his constituents.

    Since he does not represent them nor their regional interests, common sense dictates that he works for them in other areas. This is, obviously, the Armenian Genocide issue. Menendez has become one of the most vocal US Senators on this subject.

    Another interesting aspect of Menendez’s financial records is that he receives a lot of money from Armenian organizations, or PACS. These PACS are special interest groups, who often only deal with one subject. The Armenian PACS that donate to Menendez are the Armenian American PAC and the Armenian Americans Legislative Issues Committee. Together these PACS have donated $25,746 to Menendez.

    Menendez’s own financial records taken from the Federal Election Commission’s website show that this one, individual Senator alone has received $136,481 from Armenian organizations and individuals, many of whom not constituents of this Democratic Senator for New Jersey. This amount, a significant amount, has caused Menendez to focus a lot of time and attention to the Armenian ‘Genocide’ issue and has, directly, resulted in international controversies and worsening relations with America’s allies.

    Here follow the details. Names of individuals are published because those records are available and open to the public already at other places.

    DETAYLI LISTE ICIN / FULL INFORMATION OF AMERICAN SENATOR BUYING DETAILS  OF ARMENIANS ARE BELOW

    AND SOME COMMENTS FROM THE NEWSPAPER ARE POSTED BELOW

  • ANCA OUTLINES CONCERNS ABOUT GUL VISIT TO ARMENIA

    ANCA OUTLINES CONCERNS ABOUT GUL VISIT TO ARMENIA

    TURKISH FORUMDAN ONSOZ VE YORUM

    Bu uzun yaziyi okumak istemeyenler icin ozetliyelim:

    Ermenistan Gul’e futbol seyretmesi icin comertce bedava bilet verecek.

    Bu alicenaplik ve bedava bilete karsilik Turkiye’den istenen ise SADECE, Gul’den sozde soykirim anitini ziyaret ve sozde soykirimi tanimak, sinirlari acmak, ve Azerbeycan’i desteklemekten vazgecmek.

    Sakin ola bu firsati (!) kacirmayalim, bu kucucuk fedakarligi da yapalim azizim.

    Toprak taleplerini karsilamak da artik bir sonraki futbol macina kalsin 🙂

     

    Dr.Timur Sumer [mailto:timursumer@yahoo.com]

    , TURKISH FORUM DANISMA KURULU

     

     

     

    Below text is from ANCA web site; as expected…

     

    “…To that end, Hachikian outlined some immediate and

    long-term steps President Gul could take to demonstrate his sincerity in

    accepting President Sarkisyan’s invitation, including showing the

    “willingness to walk the mile from Armenia’s national soccer stadium to the

    “Dzidzernagapert” Armenian Genocide Memorial, a tradition long honored by foreign

    dignitaries visiting Yerevan.” In the days and weeks following President

    Gul’s departure froM Armenia, Hachikian urged: ” Hakan

     

    rest of letter:

    Armenian National Committee of America
    1711 N Street, NW, Washington, DC 20036
    Tel. (202) 775-1918 * Fax. (202) 775-5648 * Email.anca@anca.org

    PRESS RELEASE

    For Immediate Release ~ 2008-09-04
    Contact: Elizabeth S. Chouldjian ~ Tel: (202) 775-1918

     

    ANCA OUTLINES CONCERNS ABOUT GUL VISIT TO ARMENIA

     
    “For this initiative to succeed, Turkey’s leaders need to view this as a true opportunity for enduring peace, not simply as a photo opportunity to help alleviate the growing international pressure it is under to recognize the Armenian Genocide.” – ANCA Chairman Ken Hachikian

    WASHINGTON, DC – The Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA), today, expressed hopes and reservations regarding Turkey’s President Abdullah Gul’s impending visit to Armenia, at the invitation by Armenian President Serzh Sarkisyan, to watch the September 6th Turkey vs. Armenia soccer match in Armenia’s capital, Yerevan.

    “We are, as you can imagine, watching this matter with vigilance, mindful of the risks that Armenia is taking for peace, hopeful that Yerevan’s diplomatic initiative will bear fruit, yet cautious regarding the realistic prospects for progress given Ankara’s longstanding and deeply troubling track record of antagonism toward Armenia,” explained ANCA Chairman Ken Hachikian, in a September 4th letter to House and Senate Members.

    Recognizing that this visit cannot, by itself, substitute for real progress in improved Armenia-Turkey relations, Hachikian remained hopeful “that Armenia’s pro-active diplomacy, if matched with real movement by Turkey, can serve as a first, cautious step toward a true reconciliation based on truth and justice.”

    To that end, Hachikian outlined some immediate and long-term steps President Gul could take to demonstrate his sincerity in accepting President Sarkisyan’s invitation, including showing the “willingness to walk the mile from Armenia’s national soccer stadium to the “Dzidzernagapert” Armenian Genocide Memorial, a tradition long honored by foreign dignitaries visiting Yerevan.” In the days and weeks following President Gul’s departure from Armenia, Hachikian urged:

    “* Lifting domestic restrictions on the study, discussion, and recognition of the Armenian Genocide, and abandoning opposition to international recognition and commemoration of this crime against humanity – including by the White House and the U.S. Congress.

    * Lifting its blockade of Armenia, allowing free Armenian access to its traditional transportation routes, ending its opposition to the incorporation of Armenia in regional and international initiatives impacting the Southern Caucasus, and removing restrictions on Armenian stewardship of cultural and religious heritage sites within Turkey.

    * Publicly and in practice adopting a truly neutral position as a member of the OSCE Minsk Group charged with mediating a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno Karabagh conflict, ending military support for Azerbaijan’s armed forces, and openly calling on all parties to reject any non-peaceful resolution to this conflict.

    * Lifting all restrictions on the collective rights of the Armenian community in Turkey.

    * Accepting Armenia’s offer to negotiate the establishment of normal diplomatic relations without any preconditions, and agreeing to resolve all outstanding bilateral issues in a peaceful, non-violent manner.”

    The complete text of the ANCA letter to Congress is provided below.

    #####

    TEXT OF ANCA CHAIRMAN KEN HACHIKIAN’S LETTER TO SENATE AND HOUSE MEMBERS REGARDING TURKISH PRESIDENT ABDULLAH GUL’ IMPENDING VISIT TO ARMENIA

    Dear Senator/Representative _________________:

    In light of the announcement this week by Turkish President Abdullah Gul that he will accept Armenian President Serj Sarkisyan’s invitation to watch the September 6th Armenia-Turkey World Cup qualifying match in Yerevan, we wanted to share with you the Armenian American community’s perspective on this new and potentially significant development, and to reaffirm our community’s fundamental commitment to universal recognition and a just resolution of the Armenian Genocide.

    We are, as you can imagine, watching this matter with vigilance, mindful of the risks that Armenia is taking for peace, hopeful that Yerevan’s diplomatic initiative will bear fruit, yet cautious regarding the realistic prospects for progress given Ankara’s longstanding and deeply troubling track record of antagonism toward Armenia.

    As you know, since Armenia’s independence in 1991, successive Armenian governments and the worldwide Armenian Diaspora have – despite the unresolved legacy of the Armenian Genocide and Ankara’s ongoing and deeply painful denial of this crime – consistently sought sincere and sustainable progress toward improved Armenia-Turkey relations. President Sarkisyan’s invitation represents only the most recent such outreach on Armenia’s part, although by no means the only one. Both of his predecessors visited Turkey in their official capacities as president, although, sadly, neither of their visits resulted in any moderation of Turkey’s policies toward Armenia.

    Armenia’s invitation represents a pro-active gesture by Armenia – a small country populated in large part by the descendents of Armenian Genocide survivors – to reach out to a large and heavily armed neighbor that, as heir to the Ottoman Empire, denies this horrific crime, blockades Armenia, and pursues a broad array of anti-Armenian policies – both at home and abroad. President Gul has accepted the Armenian President’s invitation even as his government has made it clear that they do not plan any changes in these policies, which, it is worthwhile noting, include:

    * Turkey’s continued denial of the Armenian Genocide, continued threats against other nations that consider recognizing this crime against humanity, and continued allocations of tens of millions of dollars annually for lobbyists, academic mercenaries, and outright fabricators to attempt to rewrite this profoundly important chapter in world history.

    * Turkey’s continued efforts to silence any recognition of the Armenian Genocide within its own borders through Article 301 and other provisions of its criminal code (e.g. Nobel Prize-winner Orhan Pamuk), continued intimidation and unofficial acts of violence (e.g. Hrant Dink), and the perpetuation of a deeply flawed educational system that indoctrinates successive new generations of Turkish students to believe that the Armenian Genocide is a lie and that all Armenians are inherently enemies of Turkey.

    * Turkey’s continued attempts to economically weaken and isolate Armenia through its illegal 14-year blockade; its attempts to exclude Armenia from regional and international initiatives that provide economic benefit to the Southern Caucasus; its continued attacks on Armenia within the United Nations, the OSCE, and other international venues; and, its ongoing military, economic, and political support for Azerbaijan over the Nagorno Karabagh conflict.

    * Turkey’s continued mistreatment of its remaining Armenian population as second-class citizens, continued enforcement of unfair and burdensome restrictions on the Armenian Church, and the continuation of policies intended to drive out the remaining Christian minorities within its borders.

    We are, given this record and Turkey’s past efforts to manipulate public opinion, profoundly concerned that President Gul’s visit will be used by Ankara to advance its short-term “public relations” interest in creating the image of movement, at the expense of the broader and far more meaningful interest of the United States and the international community in actual progress toward a durable improvement in Armenia-Turkey ties. For this initiative to succeed, Turkey’s leaders need to view this as a true opportunity for enduring peace, not simply as a photo opportunity to help alleviate the growing international pressure it is under to recognize the Armenian Genocide.

    Recognizing that this visit cannot, by itself, substitute for real progress in improved Armenia-Turkey relations, we do, however, remain hopeful that Armenia’s pro-active diplomacy, if matched with real movement by Turkey, can serve as a first, cautious step toward a true reconciliation based on truth and justice. At the same time, we remain deeply concerned that if, as may very well be the case, Turkey treats this visit as a superficial undertaking – yet still garners undeserved credit internationally for an essentially empty gesture – we may in fact witness a tragic setback to the worthwhile cause of a real and enduring peace between Armenia and Turkey.

    In this spirit, we respectfully ask that you look beyond Ankara’s rhetoric concerning this visit, and focus instead on the substance of the Turkish government’s real-world policies toward Armenia. The best – and most immediate – test of President Gul’s sincerity will be his willingness to walk the mile from Armenia’s national soccer stadium to the “Dzidzernagapert” Armenian Genocide Memorial, a tradition long honored by foreign dignitaries visiting Yerevan. In the days and weeks following his departure, we urge you to track Turkey’s movement toward:

    * Lifting domestic restrictions on the study, discussion, and recognition of the Armenian Genocide, and abandoning opposition to international recognition and commemoration of this crime against humanity including by the White House and the U.S. Congress.

    * Lifting its blockade of Armenia, allowing free Armenian access to its traditional transportation routes, ending its opposition to the incorporation of Armenia in regional and international initiatives impacting the Southern Caucasus, and removing restrictions on Armenian stewardship of cultural and religious heritage sites within Turkey.

    * Publicly and in practice adopting a truly neutral position as a member of the OSCE Minsk Group charged with mediating a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno Karabagh conflict, ending military support for Azerbaijan’s armed forces, and openly calling on all parties to reject any non-peaceful resolution to this conflict.

    * Lifting all restrictions on the collective rights of the Armenian community in Turkey.

    * Accepting Armenia’s offer to negotiate the establishment of normal diplomatic relations without any preconditions, and agreeing to resolve all outstanding bilateral issues in a peaceful, non-violent manner.

    Progress in each of these vitally important areas – not the level of skill of Turkey’s public relations firms in spinning this visit – will represent the true benchmarks of progress toward improved Armenia-Turkey relations.

    Thank you for your consideration of the points we have raised in this letter. We would, of course, welcome the opportunity to meet with you to discuss this matter in greater detail.

    Sincerely,

    Kenneth V. Hachikian
    Chairman