EAFJD President Addresses World Kurdish Congress
October 11, 2013
EAFJD President, Kaspar Karampetian addresses the 3rd World Kurdish
Scientific Congress
Kurdistan Regional Government’s financial, scientific and cultural
issues were touched at the 3rd World Kurdish Scientific Congress which
was convened on October 11-13, 2013, in Stockholm, Sweden. During the
three-day event experts in the aforementioned fields delivered
presentations and reports and laid the foundations for future plans.
The main objectives of the Congress were the strengthening of the
existence and role of Kurdistan within the framework of the
continuously developing, progressive and contemporary global society
and at the meantime providing peace and prosperity for the Middle East
region.
Welcoming speeches were given by the Head of the Department of Foreign
Relations of the Kurdistan Regional Government, Falah Mustafa Bakir,
Swedish MP, Fredrik Malm, WKC President, Alan Dilani and other
prominent figures such as Canadian MP Jim Karygiannis.
The European Armenian Federation for Justice and Democracy (EAFJD) was
invited to take part in the panel of the first session called `Lessons
Learned from a Successful Diaspora’ and address the Congress with a
keynote speech. EAFJD President, Kaspar Karampetian referred to the
causes that formed the Armenian Diaspora as well as to its present
state of affairs. Karampetian emphasized on the respect of the
political rights of the Kurdish minority during the 1st Republic of
Armenia (1918-1920) such as the election of a Kurdish member of
Parliament as well as during the Soviet times when the Kurdish
minority could enjoy the benefits of having a radio and a newspaper
using their native language.
Following is the speech of EAFJD President, Kaspar Karampetian.
The Experience of the Armenian Diaspora
KASPAR KARAMPETIAN
President of European Armenian Federation, Brussels-Armenia
Session 1: Lessons Learned from a Successful Diaspora
Honorable ministers,
Dear friends, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,
On behalf of the European Armenian Federation for Justice and
Democracy I bring warm greetings to the 3rd Scientific World Kurdish
Congress. We thank the organizers of this Congress for the invitation
and the opportunity to address the honorable participants.
Just as the not so distant past of the Armenian and Kurdish peoples is
closely related, so are the present and the future of our two peoples.
Destined to share a common geography, dialogue and discussions between
Armenians and Kurds, even when at times characterized more as
disagreements than agreements, are surely preferable than the conflict
and carnage which have at times marred our common history.
The European Armenian Federation for Justice and Democracy, of which I
am the President, was founded in 2000 in Brussels, as the interlocutor
within the institutions of the European Union, as well as the Council
of Europe, representing the European citizens of Armenian origin and
coordinating the activities of the Armenian National Committees (ANCs)
in Europe.
The European Armenian Federation advocates for the rights of the
Armenian population (in the Nagorno Karabakh Republic, the
Samtskhe-Javakheti region in Georgia, and in Turkey including the
historically Armenian territories), and denounces the hostile attitude
towards these populations (blockade against Armenia, Genocide denial,
threat of war, violation of the rights of the Armenians, etc.). Also,
the EAFJD assists the citizens of the Republic of Armenia in their
democratization process of the country.
The Armenian Diaspora is a historical phenomenon almost as old as the
history of Armenians in their cradle of civilization in Asia Minor. In
the fourth century, Armenian communities already existed outside of
Greater Armenia. Armenian communities emerged in the Sassanid and
Persian empires, and also to defend eastern and northern borders of
the Byzantine Empire. In order to populate depopulated regions of
Byzantium, Armenians were relocated to those regions. Although an
Armenian Diaspora existed during Antiquity and the Middle Ages, it
grew in size due to emigration from the Ottoman Empire and the
Transcaucasia in the Russia Empire. In short, throughout history
Armenians have established communities in many regions throughout the
world, from imperial Rome to Christian Jerusalem, from India to
Bavaria to England. Hence it should not surprise anyone to know that
the Armenian cultural centres during several centuries preceding the
19th century were cities like Venice, Amsterdam, Constantinople,
Tiflis, Isfahan, Madras, Kolkata, Saint Petersburg.
It is due to this global reach and influence that the Armenian
National Awakening in the 19th century, which actually began in the
Diaspora, reached the Armenian towns and villages in the Ottoman and
Romanov empires. Indeed, the Armenians were awakening to a new
national consciousness that brought forth a fighting spirit. This
change was produced by political, social and economic forces that were
at work both in foreign lands and in the Armenian divided homeland.
The more active and enlightened Armenians began organized action for
self-protection, for human rights and eventually for political
independence.
With this background, the modern Armenian Diaspora was formed largely
after the World War I as a result of the Armenian Genocide of
1915-1923 committed by the Ottoman Empire and Turkey. It is in this
period of state planned and organized extermination attempt, that the
darkest pages of Armenian and Kurdish common history were written. As
a result of the genocide, Armenians were forced to flee to different
parts of the world and created new Armenian communities far from their
native land. Today around 3 million Armenians live in Armenia and
around 7 million Armenians in the Diaspora.
However, while the Genocide was still going on, another historical
event had a tremendous effect on the course of Armenian history. In
May of 1918, when the disintegration of the Russian empire was
followed by the fragmentation of the Trans Caucasus, and following
decisive battles near Yerevan and to further north-east, the Armenian
National Council, announced the creation of the Republic of Armenia.
The creation of the Republic proved to be the single most effective
way to save the remnants of the Armenian people and preserve the few
historically Armenian districts still free of Turkish occupation. In
the Republic of Armenia of 1918-1920 the Kurds received political
rights: a Kurdish representative was elected to the Armenian
parliament, some Kurds became officers of Armenian army and organized
Kurdish volunteer units.
Although the independence of the Republic was short lived, less than
three years, and the fact that an Armenian state structure continued
to exist – albeit as part of the Soviet Union – , the Armenian existence
was transformed. With a significant portion of the surviving Armenians
living abroad, the quasi-state of Armenia became both a rallying point
for those who believed and strived for an independent Armenia and an
apparatus which helped the revival of Armenians both physically and
culturally.
Following the years after the Genocide when the Armenians who
survived, found shelters in other countries, the first preoccupation
of the leaders was to take all the necessary steps to insure that
Armenians be able to safeguard their national identity. They founded
schools, churches and cultural centers. The main objective was for the
first decades, that the Armenians of Diaspora, could establish
themselves in the countries they were living, assuring decent living
standards, thus allowing them to provide to the younger generation,
the possibility to get educated, understand the complexity of the
problems that we were facing and be able in the future to take
initiatives, in pursuing the struggle for the rights of our nation.
And indeed, after the Second World War, during the decades of the 50s
and 60s, we already had a generation which was not facing any more, in
general, problems of survival, was somehow educated and was ready to
take over the responsibility of the pursuance of the legitimate
national claims. It was in 1965, on the 50th anniversary of the
Genocide, that for the first time the Armenians of all over the world,
declared their decision to pursue by all political means the
recognition of the Genocide by the International Community and most of
all from Turkey. That period the biggest political party of the
Armenian Diaspora ARF Dashnaktsutyun, formed the Armenian National
Committees (known as ANCs), in all the countries where Armenian
communities existed.
The ANCs with planned and persistent work, in the next decades, broke
the wall of silence imposed to Armenians regarding the Genocide. Many
countries, among them almost half of the countries of EU, recognized
the Genocide, as well as the European Parliament, the Mercosur and
other international bodies. Today, Turkey still denies a crime against
the humanity, that no one in the world has any doubts about it. We
will continue our struggle to oblige Turkey to recognize the genocide
and bear the responsibility of the reparations to the Armenian nation.
The Armenian Diaspora is playing a crucial rolein in the political and
economic evolution of today’s independent Armenia. From the early 90’s
the Armenian Diaspora has organized many times special events to
gather amounts and help to the amelioration of the infrastructure of
Armenia.
Armenian Republic is today under blockade by Turkey and Azerbaijan,
because of the conflict of Nagorno Karabakh5 where the people living
there decided by a referendum the basic value of self determination,
to create an independent country, the Nagorno Karabakh Republic. Thus,
the role of the Armenian Diaspora grows every day, and from 2008 the
Armenian Republic has the Ministry of Diaspora, which handles directly
in every way the relations with the Armenian Diaspora, promoting and
solving all the problems. It is proven so for that it was a successful
initiative and of course when it will accumulate more experience and
means it will play even greater role between the motherland and the
Diaspora.
It was in the Soviet Armenian quasi-state that the Kurds enjoyed
substantial state-sponsored cultural support. It is here that the
Kurds of the Soviet Union first began writing Kurdish in the Armenian
alphabet in the 1920s, followed by Latin in 1927, then Cyrillic in
1945, and now in both Cyrillic and Latin. The Kurds in Armenia
established a Kurdish radio broadcast from Yerevan and the first
Kurdish newspaper Riya Teze. The Kurds of Armenia were the first to
have access to media such as radio, education and press in their
native tongue. Armenian radio station Denge Erivan (The Voice of
Yerevan) broadcast in Kurdish for one hour a day, drawing an audience
of ethnic Kurds from across the border in Turkish occupied Western
Armenia.
It is also worth reminding ourselves that in the 1920s and early
1930s, the most active and positive page in the history of
Armenian-Kurdish relations, was written prior to and during the actual
Kurdish rebellions of Dersim and especially Mt. Ararat. The Armenian
Revolutionary Federation-Dashnaktsutyun was instrumental in providing
much needed aid to the Kurdish national movement. It provided the
moral support that Kurdish warriors needed in their battles against
the Turkish armies. It was within the confines of this moral support
that the ARF-Dashnaktsutyun provided critical help to the Kurdish
Revolution and its leading organization, Hoyboun. This was achieved
through the channels of the Second Socialist International.
The ARF-Dashnaktsutyun did all this with only one goal in mind: to
make the world understand that in the far away mountain of Ararat a
people was fighting for freedom. It was besieged by regular army
battalions that were shelling not only freedom fighters but even
families, children, and elderly people. The ARF-Dashnaktsutyun
delivered a historical background of the Kurdish people to the General
Assembly of the Socialist International concentrating particularly on
the events of 1920-1930. It emphasized the deportation and relocation
policies deployed by the Kemalist government that aimed at the
Turkification of the Kurds and their uprooting from their ancestral,
national, and historical homeland.
Today, the Middle East is at a crossroads; the artificially set
borders are under pressure to give in to the realities on the ground.
The Kurdish people and the Kurdistan Region are at the core of these
prospective changes. The Republic of Armenia and Armenians in the
region and around the world have a vested interest in these changes
and are able to influence them. A new Armenian-Kurdish global alliance
– based on mutual respect and consideration of the interests of both
peoples – would surely be not only mutually beneficial, but would also
help the development of a more tolerant, progressive, inclusive Middle
East. We should avoid our past mistakes; we should not allow others to
sow enmity between us.
Once again, I thank you for this invitation and wish the 3rd
Scientific World Kurdish Congress success in its deliberations.
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