NOBEL LAUREATE’S TRAVEL FEARS: ARE TURKISH-NATIONALIST ATTITUDES TO BLAME?
San Francisco Chronicle, CA
Feb 8 2007
Late last week, the Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk (winner of the 2006
Nobel Prize for literature) canceled a reading tour of major cities in
Germany at the last minute. The apparent reason: the internationally
acclaimed author of such works as Snow and Istanbul: Memories and
the City was reportedly concerned about his safety after the recent
killing of the Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in Istanbul
last month. "Yasin Hayal, the alleged mastermind behind [Dink’s]
murder, declared on his way into court on January 24: ‘Tell Orhan
Pamuk to wise up!’" (Der Spiegel) Germany has a population of some
2.6 million people of Turkish origin.
Like Dink, who was murdered by Turkish nationalists, in his writing
Pamuk has dared to critically examine aspects of Turkish culture,
society, history and religious practices that have long been considered
off-limits subjects for public discussion.
The writer’s biggest boo-boo in the eyes of hardcore Turkish
nationalists: In the past, he has dared to refer to "the deaths of
up to one-and-a-half-million Armenians at the end of World War I"
in what historians and Armenians have referred to as a campaign
of genocide carried out by the era’s Ottoman Turks. As a result,
"Pamuk is despised by militant Turkish nationalists for talking about
the mass murder and for criticizing the Turkish government’s handling
of the conflict with the Kurdish separatists in the southeast of the
country." (Der Spiegel)
Like Dink, Pamuk was taken to court (in 2005) for allegedly violating
Article 301 of Turkey’s national penal code. That provision makes it
illegal to "publicly denigrate Turkishness, the Parliament, the state
as well as the judiciary, the police force and the military…" (New
Anatolian) Pamuk’s case was eventually dropped on a technicality but
it reinforced international perception of Turkey as a country that
suppresses free speech – and, as such, as a nation that still may have
a long way to go before it can meet European Union requirements in its
government’s determined bid for coveted membership in the Euro-club.
Germany’s Der Spiegel noted that Pamuk’s "decision to cancel [his]
tour will be another blow to Turkey’s reputation when it comes to
the issue of freedom of expression."
Instead of traveling to Germany, Pamuk headed to the United States late
last week. He told reporters at Istanbul’s airport, upon his departure:
"I will give talks at Columbia University and other universities." (AP
in International Herald Tribune)
An editorial in Spain’s El País this week hinted that Pamuk’s latest
overseas travels might be seen as the writer’s first steps toward
a permanent move away from his homeland. The Spanish daily pointed
out that the ultra-nationalist pressure that is oppressing or even
silencing a growing number of Turkish artists and intellectuals
directly implicates the government of Turkish Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip Erdogan. Although Erdogan reportedly ordered any government
officials who may have acted with favor toward Dink’s alleged
murder-conspirators to be disciplined, El País noted that it has
been hard to miss, in watching Pamuk in TV news clips, that "the
Nobel laureate has lost confidence in the [Turkish] law-enforcement
forces that should be protecting him and, as a result, has opted for
a voluntary exile. As for his life, Istanbul, the scene of and the
source of his work, and all of Turkey, have become dangerous places."
–Boundary_(ID_eOIgaFNGkY5dy4CN1aiS jA)–
From: Baghdasarian