- Journalist Ben Brown’s security chief said corpse left on BBC HQ doorstep posed same danger as a ‘blocked toilet’
- TV executives accused of cover-up after trying to halt publication of book that exposed incineration
A BBC bodyguard has confessed to burning the body of a baby on a funeral pyre made of rubbish after the 2004 tsunami – because he considered it a threat to the health of his reporting team.
Craig Summers, 52, discovered the body outside the house in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, where he was staying with journalist Ben Brown and his production team as they covered the aftermath of the disaster.
But instead of reporting it to the local authorities, he burned the body of the boy and swore two other witnesses, including BBC producer Peter Leng, to secrecy. There is no suggestion that Mr Brown knew about the incident.
Writing in his new book Bodyguard: My Life On The Frontline, Summers compared the body to an obstacle such as a ‘blocked toilet’.
‘I pride myself in my work,’ writes Summers, now head of security at Sky TV. ‘Nobody got sick on that trip. Nobody even came close to diarrhoea and I knew that I had done my job keeping everyone else healthy. I ran a tight ship ensuring everyone always washed their hands with wet wipes.
‘The baby was an obstacle to their health; the next day it would be a blocked toilet. I hadn’t known it was coming but I had to deal with it and I would do the same again.’
The revelation comes four months after the BBC’s Head of Newsgathering, Fran Unsworth, and Head of Safety, ex-Army officer Paul Greeves, tried to persuade Summers not to publish the biography.
According to the bodyguard, they summoned him to a meeting in January after he sent them a draft copy of the manuscript, and asked him to abandon the project.
It is not known what they objected to within the book – although the confession does not paint the Corporation in a good light.
Summers, a former commando, served with British Forces in the Falklands and Balkans before being appointed the Corporation’s safety and security adviser in 2001, working with the High Risk Team – which ‘provides advice to programme-makers deploying to hostile or dangerous environments’.He spent ten years accompanying journalists to war zones and scenes of natural disaster, working with reporters including John Simpson and Nicholas Witchell. He was with Simpson, in Iraq in 2003, when their vehicle was blown up and their translator killed.
It was also his brief to look after celebrities – including, on occasion, Sir Ranulph Fiennes, Gary Lineker and Matthew Pinsent. Summers, who also carried out undercover operations for the BBC, left the Corporation last July, after accepting redundancy, and now works as Sky’s Broadcast Security Operations Manager.
It was on January 7, 2005, 12 days after the tsunami, when he woke at dawn to find the body of the baby boy, aged between one and two, with matted black hair and closed eyes, lying on the doorstep.
‘There had to be a reason for this,’ he writes in his book. ‘This wasn’t random or down to chance – someone had specifically left this baby at what they knew to be the BBC house.’
Yet instead of informing anybody in the house, or contacting the local authorities, Summers took matters into his own hands. ‘I picked it up with my bare hands and looked around,’ he added.‘Nobody was watching. I walked over to the rubbish, which night after night would pile high in the streets waiting for the authorities to burn the next day by the side of the roads to stave off the threat of rats. Removing some cardboard from the tip, I covered the baby with it.
‘I heard a voice say, “What’s that Craig?” It was Bob, the Australian paramedic who was staying next door to us. I walked towards him. He didn’t need me to answer. “What are you going to do?” he asked.
‘My response was instant and came from the mouth of a soldier in the zone and on autopilot. My sole priority was to protect the BBC crew from infection.
‘ “I’m going to burn it,” I answered. “That’s the best thing to do.” ’
Bob went to get some petrol from a jerrycan as Summers laid the baby on a box in the centre of the rubbish. The BBC bodyguard then soaked the body in petrol and set fire to it. When the flames burned down ten minutes later, the two men bagged up the smouldering rubbish.‘I didn’t look to see the remains of the baby,’ Summers writes, ‘both our heads were looking down while shovelling.
‘Nothing was said. We just got on with it. We may have left a skull on the floor – I can’t recall. I just wanted it done.’
The incident was witnessed by BBC producer Peter Leng, who was standing in the doorway of the house used by the Corporation’s staff.
‘I had no choice but to come clean,’ Summers continued. ‘I told him we had to keep this to ourselves – I didn’t want anyone else to find out. “I wondered what all the flies were,” he replied. “How do you feel about it?”
‘ “It’s a sad situation but I am surprised someone has dumped it on our doorstep,” I answered bluntly. Only years later did Peter confess that he had told a couple of people – he also said he was grateful and couldn’t have done the same thing.’
Summers remains convinced that he did the right thing that day.
Justifying his behaviour, he writes: ‘I was working and this was the job I had to do. If they were still alive, I couldn’t give the parents that closure because there were no clues on the baby. I didn’t know how it got here but I felt sure it was orphaned and deliberately dumped. I couldn’t change its fate. I did what I had to do. There were no alternatives but to cremate the baby.‘It was the most humane thing to do before it became riddled with maggots and was left to rot in the street. I couldn’t put a sign up outside the house saying: “One ex-baby here – please knock.’’
‘If the parents hadn’t died, why would it be dumped?’
Last night Summers told The Mail on Sunday: ‘At the time we felt it was the easiest and most humane thing to do. There were a quarter of a million dead people there and the majority were being dumped in open pits.
‘The baby was completely unidentifiable – it was infested with maggots and there were no features on it at all.’
A BBC spokeswoman said last night: ‘It’s his account, which he has put into context.
‘From our point of view, we don’t have anything to say. We don’t discuss private conversations but managers sometimes talk to staff, or former staff, who have written books about the BBC – particularly if there are legal or safety issues.’
Last night Peter Leng did not wish to comment and Ben Brown did not respond to calls.Daily Mail
Category: Non-EU Countries
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BBC bodyguard admits to burning body of tsunami baby…likening it to a ‘blocked toilet’
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Three Ethnic Racist Terrorist Kurdish women who firebombed Turkish club in Stoke Newington jailed
Dilek Dag, 25 
- Dilek Dag, 25
- Altin Yadirgi, 28
Three Kurdish women were jailed last week for a potentially “catastrophic” petrol bomb attack on a Turkish club in Stoke Newington, deemed to be politically and racially motivated by the judge.
Four home-made petrol bombs were thrown into the Coffee House of the People of Gumushane in 94 Green Lanes last year, because of its Turkish association.
Dilek Dag, 25, Altin Yadirgi, 28, and Dilan Eroglu, 20, all pleaded guilty to arson with intent and being reckless as to whether life was endangered.
The court heard the three women supported the aims of the Kurdish-linked group Partiya Karkeren Kurdistan (PKK).
A Turkish Airforce Strike in Turkey on December 28, which killed Kurdish civilians suspected of being PKK fighters, prompted them to carry out the attack.
The next day the women made four petrol bombs out of empty beer bottles and drove over to the club, which was filled with 10 people aged 40 to 50 playing cards and drinking coffee at 1.15am on December 30.
Two of them threw the lit petrol-filled bottles, setting alight a table cloth, carpet and chairs, before they all ran off.
One customer tried to chase them before he realised his arm and leg were alight.
The fire was put out by a neighbouring businessman using his own fire extinguisher before fire crews arrived.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Osborne, the senior national coordinator counter terrorism, said: “It is only by luck that none of these petrol bombs smashed during the course of this attack.
“Had any of them done so the likely consequences would have been a catastrophic fireball that would have caused serious and life threatening injuries in the confined space of the social club.”
The women were arrested three days later after detectives from the Met’s Counter Terrorism Command identified them using CCTV footage of them buying the petrol and mobile phone evidence.
Eroglu’s fingerprint was found on one of the bottles and further forensic examination revealed DNA traces to Eroglu and Yadirgi.
CCTV footage also shows their Ford Focus car making loops around the block, conducting hostile reconnaissance before the attack.
All three women pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing on 27 April 2012 and appeared before Woolwich Crown Court for sentencing.
Dag and Yadirgi were jailed for six years and eight months each, and Eroglu for six years.
London 24
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It Will Not Happen to Me! Guess What? It Wll! Chapter 9
Chapter 9
WHY SOCIALISM WILL FAIL OVER THE LONG TERM
“Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy. Its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.” Winston Churchill
Socialism is a noble cause for those pure in heart. Franklin D Roosevelt (FDR) President of the United States from 1932- 1945 used it to try to pull the United States out of a depression.
His programs had universal appeal and once the economy started to recover he raised taxes to pay for the programs. The recovery would have been working at a slower speed until WWII changed the course of history.
Once a government starts giving entitlements to the public it becomes accustomed to them. The problem is how does one pay for these services?
One can raise taxes on the wealthiest, but they soon start looking to “tax shelters”. Raising taxes of any kind creates other avenues of avoidance.
The underground economy is where one provides a service or product for a credit. Then one uses those credits with another member. This will ultimately create more government debt as tax receipts fail. These deficits weaken an economy and encourage politicians to accumulate vast sums of “compensation” for running the country.
It also demoralizes the public in their desire to improve ones lot through hard work and effort. It is the individual that provides growth to an economy by wanting to earn more through an extra effort to succeed.
Countries with limited surplus or assets use a peaceful solution by hiring foreigners as cheap labor. Eventually these labor pools increase in size and start demanding more equal pay and benefits. They can appease them for a time, but the cinders will start burning the fires of resentment and hatred.
As time starts to diminish funds, the wealthy are the first to feel the pinch as their taxes are raised. “It is their civic duty and pride” to partake in this noble effort.
After that the sales taxes are imitated or increased. Now everyone feels poorer. The sales tax hurts the poor most. A 6% sales tax on dollar leaves only $.94. If a dollar is all one has – ouch. 6% of a hundred dollars amounts to $6.00, but one still has $94.00 left.
During this time the country has been borrowing, and at first their costs were low, but as the debt builds up the costs rise and suddenly the borrowing is to mainly pay the interest charges.
The next to get hit is foreign companies who have local plants that will have a tax on them. They will find all kinds of ways. If it is hard assets, then they will find a way to nationalize them.
Then as the situation becomes dire, the governments become bolder and greedy in ways to find moneys. Mind you, in the 13th century the French monarchs had the habit of inviting domestic creditors to dinner and for desert they were beheaded. This was called “bloodletting”.
A better example of heavy debt load is when the credit-card companies start adding interest penalties to ones debit balance and there comes a point of no return. Socialism will self-destruct if you have assets because the government will want them to pay for various entitlement programs. The “poor” will now be in force to protect their entitlements so they can remain on the gravy train. The wealthy will soon become poor and the nouveau rich will be “our representatives” in Washington and various state capitols across our nation.
When the flow of funds ceases is when the riots would expand from the inner cities out to the suburbs.
If it is not too late, governments can slowly wean thy public off the welfare rolls by delisting people who are not legal citizens of the community and cannot speak the common language of the area. This makes the employers honest and also assures they are not using public funds for their corrupted earnings.
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Turkish court hearing in Duchess of York secret filming case
Turkish court hearing in Duchess of York secret filming case
Duchess of York Sarah Ferguson The Duchess of York wore a wig and headscarf as a disguise during filming A hearing has taken place in Turkey in a court case in which the Duchess of York has been accused over the secret filming of orphans for a documentary.
Sarah Ferguson is being defended by a Turkish legal team but has declined to go to Ankara for the trial.
She is accused of violating the privacy of children during the filming for ITV.
The duchess has previously apologised for any offence, but says she stands by the 2008 documentary’s conclusion that ill-treatment was taking place.
If found guilty, she could be sentenced to more than 20 years in prison.
BBC correspondent Jonathan Head says the duchess has made it clear she will not return to Turkey and British officials have insisted there is no possibility of her being extradited.
Tied to beds
Posing as an aid worker, the duchess accompanied a television crew into a state orphanage in Ankara.
Scenes were recorded of alleged ill-treatment, including emaciated children tied to their beds and left in cots all day.
Princess Eugenie and the Duchess of York The Duchess said she ‘went as a mum’ to the orphanage
She visited a second institution in Istanbul with her daughter Princess Eugenie, who said conditions endured by the children there had “opened her eyes.”
The documentary – which also included footage of children filmed in Romania – was broadcast on ITV1’s Tonight programme in Britain in November 2008.
It provoked an angry reaction from Turkish politicians, who accused the duchess of being involved in a campaign to tarnish their country’s reputation.
Human rights record
BBC presenter Chris Rogers, who was part of the ITV programme team in 2008, said they knew it was against Turkish law to film in secret, but that the public “needed to know.”
Speaking earlier this year, Mr Rogers, who is also charged with invasion of privacy, said there was “a strong public interest argument for us to do this” because Turkey might join the EU soon.
Mr Rogers said Turkey has been told it must improve its human rights record, before it can become a full member of the European Union.
When charges were first laid in January, the duchess said she had gone purely as a mother, and was “happy with courage to stand by the film.”
The trial could last for several months.
via BBC News – Turkish court hearing in Duchess of York secret filming case.
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Britain Supports Istanbul’s Candidacy for Olympic Games in 2020
Britain supported on Thursday Istanbul’s candidacy to host olympic games to take place in 2020.
British Minister of Sport and the Olympics Hugh Robertson said Istanbul was an extremely attractive place for olympic games.
Robertson defined Istanbul as a more historical city when compared with many British cities, and an excellent international city where Europe and Asia intersected.
The International Olympic Committee should be convinced that Turkey could host olympic games, Robertson told AA correspondent in an exclusive interview.
Moreover, Paul Deighton, an executive of London Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG), said he would like to watch olympic games in Istanbul one day.
Deighton defined Istanbul as a perfect venue to host olympic games as a city where the West and East intersected.
Besides Istanbul, Tokyo, Madrid, Doha and Baku have run candidacy to host 2020 Olympic Games. The venue of the event will be announced on September 7, 2013.
Thursday, 26 April 2012
A.A.
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PLEASE SUPPORT TURKISH FORUM CAMPAIGN AGAINST RACIST ARMENIANS
Armenian issue is alive please send the following Letter as prepared by Honorable Pulat Tacar, and sign your name to it
PARLEMENTERIANS e-mail adresses also given in two blocks, cop paste either block to your address section
DO NOT FORGET TO WRITE YOUR NAME IN SIGNATURE SECTION
E-MAIL BLOCK 1:
arj@althingi.is,ossur@althingi.is,atlig@althingi.is, thback@althingi.is,
thrainnb@althingi.is, thkg@althingi.is, thorsaari@althingi.is,
vigdish@althingi.is, ubk@althingi.is, vbj@althingi.is, tryggvih@althingi.is,
sjs@althingi.is, svandiss@althingi.is, skulih@althingi.is, siv@althingi.is,
sij@althingi.is, sii@althingi.is, ser@althingi.is, sdg@althingi.is,
marshall@althingi.is, ragnheidurr@althingi.is, rea@althingi.is,
petur@althingi.is, olofn@althingi.is, olinath@althingi.is,
oddnyh@althingi.is, ludvikge@althingi.is, agnusorri@althingi.is,
mordur@althingi.is, klm@althingi.is, kristjanj@althingi.is,
kristjanj@althingi.is, lrm@althingi.is, jong@althingi.is, jrg@althingi.is,
katrinja@althingi.is, katrinj@althingi.is, johanna@althingi.is,
jb@althingi.is, illugig@althingi.is, helgih@althingi.is,
hoskuldurth@althingi.is, gunnarbragi@althingi.is, glg@althingi.is,
einarg@althingi.is, gudlaugurthor@althingi.is, eygloha@althingi.is,
gudbjarturh@althingi.is, bjorngi@althingi.is, bjarniben@althingi.is,
bgs@althingi.is, birkir@althingi.is, asbjorno@althingi.is,
birgir@althingi.is, arj@althingi.is, asmundurd@althingi.is,
alfheiduri@althingi.is, arnij@althingi.is, arnipall@althingi.is,
arnithor@althingi.is,ALTERNATE E-MAIL BLOCK 2 : (ONLY ONE FORM OF E-MAILS CAN BE USED BY YOUR COMPUTER)
arj@althingi.is;ossur@althingi.is;atlig@althingi.is; thback@althingi.is;
thrainnb@althingi.is; thkg@althingi.is; thorsaari@althingi.is;
vigdish@althingi.is; ubk@althingi.is; vbj@althingi.is; tryggvih@althingi.is;
sjs@althingi.is; svandiss@althingi.is; skulih@althingi.is; siv@althingi.is;
sij@althingi.is; sii@althingi.is; ser@althingi.is; sdg@althingi.is;
marshall@althingi.is; ragnheidurr@althingi.is; rea@althingi.is;
petur@althingi.is; olofn@althingi.is; olinath@althingi.is;
oddnyh@althingi.is; ludvikge@althingi.is; agnusorri@althingi.is;
mordur@althingi.is; klm@althingi.is; kristjanj@althingi.is;
kristjanj@althingi.is; lrm@althingi.is; jong@althingi.is; jrg@althingi.is;
katrinja@althingi.is; katrinj@althingi.is; johanna@althingi.is;
jb@althingi.is; illugig@althingi.is; helgih@althingi.is;
hoskuldurth@althingi.is; gunnarbragi@althingi.is; glg@althingi.is;
einarg@althingi.is; gudlaugurthor@althingi.is; eygloha@althingi.is;
gudbjarturh@althingi.is; bjorngi@althingi.is; bjarniben@althingi.is;
bgs@althingi.is; birkir@althingi.is; asbjorno@althingi.is;
birgir@althingi.is; arj@althingi.is; asmundurd@althingi.is;
alfheiduri@althingi.is; arnij@althingi.is; arnipall@althingi.is;
arnithor@althingi.is;SAMPLE LETTER FOR PARLEMENTARIANS
I. Why Turkey does not qualify the tragic events of 1915-1916 as genocide?
1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
The main incrimination of the author is that Turkey denies recognizing the 1915-1916 Armenian genocide. Let us scrutinize if such an accusation is legally sustainable.
“The concept of the “Armenian genocide” is being used in a historical and political rather than in a legal perspective. It has become a catchword which reveals deep scars in the Armenian collective memory. Learned legal discussions on the issue of genocidal intent are of little or no relevance to the perception by the Armenians of one of the most defining moments of their history [1]”.
The term “genocide” is a legal term; it describes a crime specifically defined by the 1948 Genocide Convention and must be addressed accordingly. The existence of the crime of genocide can be legally determined only by the judges of a competent tribunal on the basis of the prescribed legal criteria and after a fair and impartial trial. The Genocide Convention does not allow for convictions on genocide by legislatures, scholars, pamphleteers, politicians or others. Some historians, sociologists, politicians and even political scientists who dealt with these issues tend to describe almost any incident which involves a significant number of dead[2] as genocide; they sometimes purposely mislead those who are not familiar with the law; they created an “Armenian taboo” and now they are prisoners of it.[3] Indeed,
“To term the events of 1915 as genocide is to detach genocide from its legal definition and to use it for political or moral purposes. Whether it is sound to keep hammering on a legal term based on non-legal considerations is doubtful… it adds to a wrong conceptualization of the legal system and eventually could lead to a devaluation of the norm itself…” [4]
But, Armenians and some of their supporters have deliberately set aside the legal aspects of the issue, because –they thought- it would weaken their genocide claims. They have chosen to adopt a dogmatic political approach to underline the tragic nature of the incidents so that they can make genocide claims more easily acceptable by the public.[5]
Dolus specialis – special intent
The most important characteristic of the Genocide Convention is that for the crime of genocide to exist, acts must have been committed with the intent to destroy the protected groups as such. The mental or subjective element (mens rea) is a constituent of that crime. The concept of “general intent,” which is valid for ordinary crimes, is inadequate in the identification of acts of genocide.
Sociologically and psychologically, the intent “to destroy a group as such” emerges in the most intensive stage of racism. Racial hatred is quite different from the ordinary animosity laced with anger, which parties engaged in a substantial dispute may feel toward one another. Racial hatred is a deeply pathological feeling or complicated fanaticism. Anti-Semitism is an example in this context.[6]
According to the Genocide Convention, the intent to destroy a group must be in the form of “special intent,” dolus specialis, beyond any doubt. This crucial aspect of the crime of genocide has been underlined by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in paragraph 187 of its verdict on Bosnia Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro[7]: The International Court of Justice (ICJ) examined the allegations by Bosnia and Herzegovina and conducted long and detailed investigations regarding the alleged atrocities, the findings of which are grouped according to the categories of prohibited acts described in Article II of the Genocide Convention. With regard to killing members of the protected group, the Court found that massive killings throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina were perpetrated during the conflict. However, with the exception of Srebrenica, the Court was not convinced that those killings were accompanied by the specific intent on the part of the perpetrators to destroy in whole or in part the group of Bosnian Muslims. So, if the “special intent” is not proven beyond any doubt, judicially an act cannot be qualified as genocide. The cases of civil war, rebellion, and mutual killings should not be confused with the crime of genocide.
A competent tribunal to judge the genocidal acts
Moreover, the existence of the crime of genocide must be decided by a competent tribunal. Article VI of the 1948 Genocide Convention on the subject reads as follows:
Persons charged with genocide or any of the other acts enumerated in article III shall be tried by a competent tribunal of the State in the territory of which the act was committed or by such international penal tribunal as may have jurisdiction with respect to those Contracting Parties which shall have accepted its jurisdiction.
The issue of a competent tribunal had been debated extensively by the International Preparatory Conference of the 1948 Genocide Convention. The question of determining a competent tribunal was resolved[8] after lengthy discussion and the above-mentioned text was approved. During the discussions, a proposal of “universal repression” was rejected[9]. Universal repression foresees the judging of the suspects by any tribunal of any state. Without a valid decision from a competent court, an act cannot legally be qualified as genocide.
The Turkish government and the overwhelming majority of Turks, as well as other governments [10] and many scholars or experts reject qualifying the tragic events of 1915 as genocide, because the sine qua non legal conditions incorporated in the 1948 Genocide Convention have not been fulfilled. These torts may be legally qualified criminal acts foreseen by the Ottoman Penal Code and / or mutual killings.[11]
On this occasion we would like to underline that, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkey Mr. Ahmet Davutoğlu very clearly stated he was not insensitive to the sufferings of the Ottoman Armenians, but was expecting the same understanding from the Armenian side with regard to the plight of the Muslim Ottomans which equally suffered during the same tragic events.[12] The Turkish government has more than once declared that it was ready to consider and eventually accept the conclusion of historians and legal experts who will meet to study the tragic events of 1915-1916; but Yerevan refused.[13] Regardless, Ankara has supported the Vienna platform since 2004, which in 2009 published a large compilation of documents.[14] Turkey fully opened its archives—unlike the Armenian Revolutionary Federation and the Armenian Patriarchate at Jerusalem—, and, according to Dr. Hilmar Kaiser, a supporter of the “Armenian genocide” label, there is no evidence for deliberate destruction of Ottoman documents.[15]
Other general principles of international criminal law on internationally wrongful acts
Thos who refer to internationally wrongful acts in the context of 1915 events, should also take into consideration the following principles of international law:
“Nulla crimen sine lege”[16] and “Nulla poena sine lege”[17]
The governing principles of criminal law are also valid for the crime of genocide: “Nulla crimen sine lege,” which means no crime shall exist without law, and “Nulla poena sine lege,” which means no person shall be punished without a law foreseeing such punishment.
Ne bis in idem
The principle “Ne bis in idem”[18] means that no person shall be tried with respect to conduct which formed the basis of crimes for which the person has been convicted or acquitted by the competent court.
The Turkish government and the great majority of Turks do not deny that Ottoman Armenians, together with Muslim and other Ottoman citizens, were the subject of a great tragedy[19] during the 1915-1916 events, that they lost their lives, properties, families as well as their homes. During the relocation or the transfer of a population within the borders of Ottoman territory, a number of military personnel or civil servants and other members of the population committed crimes in spite of orders given by the Ottoman government to protect the lives and properties of the displaced Armenians.
The 1915-1916 trials by the Ottoman government for crimes against Ottoman Armenians
In this respect it should be underlined that the criminality associated with the tragic events and the relocation of the Ottoman Armenians during the years 1915-1916 was addressed by the Ottoman judiciary. Individuals or members of the groups who attacked the Armenian convoys and officials who exploited the Armenian plight, neglected their duties or abused their powers were court-martialed and punished.
In 1915, more than 20 Muslims were sentenced to death and executed for such charges.[20] Following a report of Talat Pasha, the Ottoman government created three commissions[21] to investigate the complaints of Armenians and the denunciations of civil servants. As a result, in March-April 1916, 1673 Muslims—including captains, lieutenants, first and second lieutenants, commanders of gendarme squads, police superintendents, and mayors—were sent to martial courts. 67 were sentenced to death, 524 were sentenced to jail, 68 received other punishments such as forced labor, imprisonment in forts, and exile. Since the author of the manuscript stresses the alleged “confiscation” of Armenian properties by the Ottoman State, it is not unimportant to notice that several people were sentenced to death for plunder, and that other death sentences were justified not only by murders, but also by robberies.[22]
[1] Hans Wilhelm Longva, “The concept of genocide in international law , A wound not healed,”Conference on Turkish-Armenian relationship, University of Oslo, February 1st, 2010.
[2] William A. Shabas, Genocide in International Law, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), p. 7.
[3] Ahmet Insel-Michel Marian “Dialogue sur le tabou arménien” Paris Liana Levi, 2009
[4] Der Jan van der Linde, “The Armenian Genocide Question and Legal Responsibility,” Review of Armenian Studies, n° 24, 2011, pp. 123-151
[5] Gündüz Aktan “The Armenian problem and International Law,” www.mfa.gov.tr//data/dispolitika/Ermeni iddialari/Document.pdf
[6] Aktan ibid p. 270
[7] Para 187 “Article II (of the Convention) requires a further mental element. It requires the establishment of the intent to destroy in whole or in part the protected group as such. It is not enough to establish, for instance in terms of paragraph. (a) That unlawful killings of members of the group have occurred. The additional intent must also be established and is defined very precisely. It is often referred to as the “specific intent” (dolus specialis). It is not enough that the members of the group are targeted because they belong to that group that is because the perpetrator has a discriminatory intent. Something more is required. The acts listed in Article II, must be done with the intent to destroy the group as such in whole or in part. The words “as such” emphasize that intent to destroy the protected group.
[8] See Travaux préparatoires Doc. E/794 page 294 and 97, the meeting of the Conference page 360 and following pages
[9]With regard to the “Power to Exercise Universal Repression” or “Universal Repression” (see: April 5, 1948. Doc. E/794. pp.29-33) The Committee rejected a proposal in this respect (Ibid, p.32).Those rejecting the principle of universal repression argued as follows: “ … universal repression is against the principles of traditional law; permitting the courts of one State to punish crimes committed in another state by foreigners will be against the sovereignty of the State; as genocide generally implied the responsibility of the State on the territory of which the crime was committed, the principle of universal repression would imply national courts to judge the acts of foreign governments. The result will be dangerous international tensions.”
[10] The British government on many occasions officially declared its position on the matter. On April 14, 1999 the Foreign Office spokesperson Baroness Ramsay of Cartvale said that “the British government has not recognized the events of 1915 as indications of genocide”; On February 7, 2001, acting on behalf of the British Government, Baroness Scotland of Asthal declared: “The government, in line with the previous British governments, have judged the evidence not to be sufficiently unequivocal to persuade us that these events should be categorized as genocide as defined by the 1948 United Nations on genocide….The interpretation of events in Eastern Anatolia in 1915-1916 is still the subject of genuine debate among historians.” The UK government did not accept qualifying as genocide the 1915 events. The Israeli government refused to accept the parallelism between the Holocaust and the tragic events of 1915. The Ambassador of Israel Rivka Kohen in Yerevan declared on February 7, 2002, during a press conference that “the 1915 events couldn’t be considered genocide because the main killings in these events were not planned and the Ottoman government had no intention to destroy a nation or a group of people as such. As a well-known fact many people from the Armenian and Muslim groups had lost their lives in these events. The Holocaust is unique. At this stage nothing should be compared with the Holocaust.” On April 10, 2001 the Nobel Prize-awarded Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Perez said that “the fate of Armenians in Anatolia was a tragedy, not genocide.” He added: “Armenian allegations are meaningless. We reject attempts to create a similarity between the Holocaust and the Armenian allegation. If we have to determine a position on the Armenian issue it should be done with great care not to distort the historical realities.”
[11] Justin McCarthy,Esat Arslan,Cemalettin Taşkıran,Ömer Turan, The Armenian Rebellion at Van, Utah Ser ies in Turkish and İslamic Studies, The University of Utah Press,2006 : “The slaughter of Muslims that accompanied the Armenian revolt in Van Province inexorably led first to Kurdish reprisals on the Armenian, then to a general and mutual massaccre of the people of the East. The Armenian revolt began an intercommunal war, in which both sides, fearing their own survival, killed those who, given the chance,would have killed them.The result was unprecended horror. History records few examples of mortality as great as that suffered in Van Province…. pp.265”
[12] “WWI Inflicted Pain to Everyone, Davutoğlu Says,” Hürriyet Daily News, December 30, 2011 ; “Turkey ‘Ready to Share Pain’ With Armenians,” Hürriyet Daily News, March 1, 2012,
[13] For example: Anatolian News Agency, April 11, 2005; “Yerevan Rejects Turkish PM Erdogan’s Dialogue Letter,” The Journal of Turkish Weekly, April 14, 2005, ; Interview of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to Charlie Rose, September 27, 2007; “Turkey’s Proposal Clears Last-Minute Snag in Zurich,” Today’s Zaman, October 12, 2009, ; Michael M. Gunter, Armenian History and…, pp. 125-129.
[14] İnanç Atılgan and Garabet Moumdjian (ed.), Archival Documents of the Viennese Armenian-Turkish Platform, Klagenfurt-Vienna-Ljubjana-Sarajevo: Wieser Verlag, 2009.
[15] “We should be really careful about not mixing information. Anything about the CUP archives is sheer speculation. We don’t have any indication that they have been destroyed.” Hilmar Kaiser, interview to Aztag, September 22, 2005. See also “Historian Challenges Politically Motivated 1915 Arguments,” Today’s Zaman, ; Yücel Güçlü, “Will Untapped Ottoman Archives Reshape the Armenian Debate?”, The Middle East Quarterly, XVI-2, Spring 2009, pp. 25-42, https://www.meforum.org/2114/ottoman-archives-reshape-armenian-debate
[16] Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Article 22.
[17] Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Article 23.
[18] Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Article 20.
[19] Shimon Perez: Statement in April 2001: “What happened to the Armenians was a tragedy, but not genocide.”
[20] Guenter Lewy, The Armenian Massacres…, p. 111.
[21] Yusuf Halaçoğlu, Facts on the Relocation of Armenians. 1914-1918, (Ankara: TTK, 2002), pp. 84-86; Hikmet Özdemir and Yusuf Sarınay (ed.), Turkish-Armenian Conflict Documents, (Ankara: TBMM, 2007), p. 294.
[22] Yusuf Halaçoğlu, The Story of 1915. What Happened to the Ottoman Armenians?, (Ankara: TTK, 2008), pp. 82-87; Guenter Lewy, The Armenian Massacres…, p. 112; Yusuf Sarınay, “The Relocation (Tehcir) of Armenians and the Trials of 1915-1916,” Middle East Critique, XX-3, Fall 2011, pp. 308-314.