ARMINFO News Agency
October 8, 2005
TURKISH SCIENTIST DOES NOT DOUBT THAT THERE WAS ARMENIAN GENOCIDE IN
OTTOMAN TURKEY IN EARLY XX
YEREVAN, OCTOBER 8. ARMINFO. There is no doubt that there was
thoroughly organized Armenian Genocide in Ottoman Turkey in 1915,
professor of Saban University (Turkey) Halil Bargtay said during the
Yerevan NATO Rose Roth seminar.
Armenians were massacred just because they were Armenians and
Turkey’s claims that it was a result of Armenian revolt are a lie.
There was no word “genocide” in the international legal terminology
in early XX but today this cannot be called otherwise. The only
difference between the Jewish Holocaust and Armenian Genocide is that
the Jews of Western Europe had no revolutionary organizations while
the Armenians of Ottoman Turkey had several revolutionary groups. But
this is not an excuse, says Bargtay.
In response Vice Speaker of the Armenian Parliament Vahan
Hovhanissyan said at the Jews of Western Europe were immigrants while
present day Turkish Anatolia is a historical territory of Eastern
Armenia as the early XX revolutionary moods by Armenians were quite
understandable – they struggled for the liberation of their
historical homeland.
Bargtay said that there is certain progress in the Turkish public
opinion but the political authorities cannot just get up one morning
and recognize one thing they have been denying for decades. This
requires time. Bargtay said that it is not right to pressure Turkey
in the issue. International pressure may only lead to escalating nazi
and fascist moods.
Turkey should come to this on its own. At the same time both Armenia
and Turkey should overcome antagonism and the ghost of the past.
There already are some signs of tolerance. Many Turkish scientists
have already begun to publicly acknowledge the fact of massacres and
some of them even call this genocide, says Bargtay noting that he is
one example of this.