Author: Badalian Vardan

MWC – Media With Conscience
April 19 2015

Armenia: The Genocide Controversy

Of the many current concerns associated with historic wrongs, none is
more salient these days than the long simmering tensions between
modern Turkey and the Armenian diaspora (and the state of Armenia).
And none so convincingly validates the assertion of the great American
novelist, William Faulkner: `The past is never dead. It’s not even
past.’ This year being the centenary of the contested events of 1915
makes it understandable that was simmering through the decades has
come to a boil, with the anniversary day of April 24th likely to be
the climax of this latest phase of the unresolved drama.

The Armenian red line for any move toward reconciliation has been for
many years a formal acknowledgement by the Turkish government that the
killings that occurred in 1915 should be regarded as `genocide,’ and
that an official apology to the descendants of the Armenian victims
should be issued by the top political leaders in Turkey. It is not
clear whether once that red line is crossed, a second exists, this one
involving Armenian expectations of reparations in some form or even
restorations of property and territory. For now the battleground is
over the significance of granting or withholding the G word from these
momentous happenings. The utterance of this word, alone, seems the
only key capable of unlocking the portals leading to conflict
resolution, but it is a key that Turks across the political spectrum
refuse to use.

What has recently raised the temperature on both sides is the clear
alignment of Pope Francis with the Armenian demands. At a solemn mass
in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome on April 12th that was devoted to the
centenary of the Ottoman killings of Armenian Christians Francis
quoted with approval from the 2001 joint declaration of Pope John Paul
II and the Armenian religious leader Karenkin II to the effect that
these massacres in 1915 were `widely considered the first genocide of
the 20th century.’

The pope’s reliance upon an earlier declaration by a predecessor
pontiff was interpreted by some Vatican watchers as a subtle
indication of `restraint,’ showing a continuity of view in the
Catholic Church rather than the enunciation of a provocative new
position. Others equally reliable commentators felt that situating the
label of genocide within a solemn mass gave it more authority than the
earlier declaration with the 1.1 billion Catholics around the world,
with likely more public impact. The unusual stature enjoyed by this
pope who is widely admired the world over as possessing the most
influential voice of moral authority, exerting a powerful impact even
on non-Catholics, lends added significance to his pronouncements on
sensitive policy issues. There are some in the Catholic community, to
be sure, who are critical of this latest foray into this conflict
about the application of the word genocide at a delicate time. For
instance, the respected Vatican expert, Marco Politi, said that Pope
Francis’s comment were typical of this pope who `uses language without
excessive diplomatic care.’

For these very reasons of salience, one supposes, the Turkish response
has been strident, involving some retreat from the more forthcoming
statements made just a year ago by the then Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip ErdoÄ?an. In an apologetic and conciliatory speech addressed
directly to the Armenian community ErdoÄ?an in 2014 said: `May
Armenians who lost their lives in the early twentieth century rest in
peace, we convey our condolences to their grandchildren.’ His language
in 2015 reverts to a much harsher tone, in a pushback to Francis
declaring that religious leaders make a `mistake’ when they try to
resolve historical controversies.

In an effort to constructive, ErdoÄ?an restates the long standing
Turkish proposal to open the Ottoman archives and allow a joint
international commission of historians to settle the issue as to how
the events of 1915 should most accurately be described, and
specifically whether the term genocide is appropriate. Both ErdoÄ?an
and the current prime minister, Ahmet DavutoÄ?lu, continue to regard
the core issue to be a historical matter of establishing the factual
reality. The Turkish position is that there were terrible killings of
the Armenians, but at a level far below the 1.5 million claimed by
Armenian and most international sources, and mainly as an incident of
ongoing warfare and civil strife in which many Turks also lost their
lives, and hence it was an experience of mutual loss, and not
`genocide.’

The almost internationally uncontested historical narrative is that
the essential factual questions have settled: the Ottoman political
leaders embarked on a deliberate policy of mass killings of the
Armenians living in what is now modern Turkey. From this international
consensus, the Armenians claim that it follows that Armenian
victimization in 1915 was `genocide,’ the position endorsed and
supported by Pope Francis, the European Parliament, and about 20
countries, including France and Russia. As might have been expected
the NY Times jumped on the bandwagon by publishing a lead editorial
with the headline, `Turkey’s Willful Amnesia,’ as if was a matter of
Ankara forgetting or a dynamic of denial, rather than is the case of
selective perception, nationalism, and fears about the fragility of
domestic political balance that explain Turkey’s seemingly stubborn
adherence to a discredited narrative.

Yet there are weighty problems here, as well. The conclusion of
`genocide’ is ambiguous. Not only did no such crime, labeled as such,
exist in 1915, but there was not even the concept crystallyzed in this
manner. Indeed the word was not coined until 1944 by Rafael Lemkin in
his book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe, written in reaction to the
crimes of the Nazis. Lemkin’s text does indirectly lend support to the
Armenian insistence that only by acknowledging these events as
genocide is their true reality comprehended. Consider this often
quoted passage from Lemkin’s book: `I became interested in genocide
because it happened so many times in history. It happened to the
Armenians, then after the Armenians, Hitler took action.’

>From a Turkish perspective, it is notable that the Nuremberg Judgment
assessing Nazi criminality avoids characterizing the Holocaust as
genocide, limiting itself to crimes against peace and crimes against
humanity. If in 1945 there was no legal foundation for charging
surviving Nazi leaders with genocide, how can the crime be attributed
to the Ottoman Turks, and how can the Turkish government be reasonably
expected to acknowledge it. Also in the Nuremberg Judgment there is a
clear statement to the effect that criminal law can never be validly
applied retroactively (nulla poena sine lege). This principle is also
embedded in contemporary international criminal law. That is, if
genocide was not a crime in 1915, it cannot be treated as a crime in
2015. Yet from an Armenian perspective, this issue of criminality is
tangential, and is not the ground on which the Turkish narrative
rests. Both sides seem to agree that what is at stake is whether or
not to characterize the events as `genocide,’ regardless of whether
genocide was a distinct crime in 1915. But here ambiguity abounds on
this issue of criminality.

The preamble of the Genocide Convention (1950) includes language
compatible with the wider import of Armenian contentions: `Recognized
in all periods of history that genocide has inflicted great losses on
humanity.’ In effect, that the reality of genocide long preceded the
conclusion of the treaty. And even the premise of prior criminality is
reinforced by Article 1: `The Contracting Parties confirm that
genocide, whether committed in time of peace, or time of war, is a
crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and
punish.’ By using the word `confirm’ it would appear that the crime of
genocide preexisted the use of the word `genocide’ invented to
describe the phenomenon, and thus no persuasive jurisprudential reason
is present to oppose redescribing the events of 1915 as an instance of
genocide.

Such a discussion of the pros and cons of the legalities is far from
the end of the debate. The pressure to call what happened to the
Armenians as genocide is best understood as a pycho-political campaign
to achieve an acknowledgement and apology that is commensurate with
the magnitude of the historical wrong, and possibly to set the stage
for a subsequent demand of reparations. The insistence on the label
`genocide’ seeks to capture total control of the moral high ground in
relation to the events by authoritatively associating the tragic
experience of the Armenians with the most horrendous events
experienced by others, and most particularly by the Jewish victims of
Nazism. In this sense, although Nazis were not indicted at Nuremberg
for genocide, the whole political effort to criminalize genocide as a
crime was in reaction to the Holocaust, lending an initial credibility
to the `never again’ pledge. In other words, only by calling the
events of 1915 genocide can the issues of guilt and responsibility be
resolved in accord with the Armenian narrative with sufficient
gravitas.

The Armenian claim is thus not to be understood as primarily
expressive of a criminal law perspective, but reflects the key
contention that what took place resembled what is prohibited by the
Genocide Convention, and thus in this extra-legal sense is
appropriately called `genocide,’ which functions as a way of
concluding that the Armenians were victimized by the worst possible
type of human behavior. And further, that no other word conveys this
assessment as definitively as does `genocide,’ and hence the Armenian
insistence is non-negotiable. Any step back from this posture would be
interpreted as a further humiliation, thereby dishonoring the memory
of those who suffered and opening the wounds of the past still
further.

At present, both sides are locked into these contradictory positions.
No way forward is apparent at present. Each side is hardening their
positions, partly in retaliation for what they perceive to be the
provocation of their adversary in the controversy. ErdoÄ?an’s
relatively conciliatory tone of 2014 has been replaced on the Turkish
side by a relapse into defensiveness and denial, and the revival of
the largely discredited nationalist version of the events in 2015 as a
mutual ordeal.

The Armenian campaign, in turn, has intensified, taking advantage of
the centenary mood, and now given the strongest possible encouragement
by Pope Francis. In this setting, it is to be expected that Armenians
will mount further pressure on the U.S. Government, considered a key
player by both parties, to abandon its NATO-oriented reluctance to
antagonize Turkey by officially endorsing the view that what happened
in 1915 should be acknowledged by Turkey as genocide. Barack Obama had
assured the Armenian community during his presidential campaign that
he believed that Armenians were victims of genocide in 1915 but has to
date refrained from reiterating this position in his role as
president.

The contextualization of this tension associated with the redress of a
historical grievance is also an element in the unfolding story. There
appears to be an Israeli role in deflecting Turkish harsh criticism of
its behavior in Gaza by a show of strong support for the Armenian
campaign. Then there is the peril in the region faced by Christian
minorities such as the Yazidis, especially at risk from ISIS and other
extremist groups operating in the Middle East. In this picture also is
the rise of Islamophobia in Europe, as well as the moral panic created
by the Charlie Hebdo incident and other post-9/11 signs that
religiously induced violence is continuing to spread Westwards. When
Pope Francis visited Turkey last November there was reported an
agreement reached with ErdoÄ?an that the Vatican would combat
Islamophobia in Europe while Turkey would oppose any persecution of
Christian minorities in the Middle East.

I have known well prominent personalities on both sides of this
Armenian/Turkish divide. More than twenty years ago I endorsed the
Armenian position in talks and some writings. In more recent years,
partly as a result of spending several months in Turkey each year I
have become more sympathetic with Turkish reluctance to apologize and
accept responsibility for `genocide.’ Among other concerns is the
credible anxiety that any acknowledgement of genocide by Turkish
leaders would unleash a furious right-wing backlash in the country
imperiling social order and political stability.

Aside from such prudential inhibitions there are on both sides of the
divide deep and genuine issues of selective perception and identity
politics that help maintain gridlock through the years, with no
breakthrough in sight. Augmenting pressure on Turkey as is presently
occurring is likely to be counter-productive, making the Turkish hard
line both more mainstream and inflexible. Indicative of this is the
stand of the main opposition leader, Kemal KiliçdaroÄ?lu (head of the
CHP) who seldom loses an opportunity to oppose the governing party on
almost every issue, when it comes to the Armenian question is in
lockstep solidarity with ErdoÄ?an.

I see no way out of this debilitating impasse without finding a way to
change the discourse. It serves neither the Armenians nor the Turks to
continue this public encounter on its present path. The Turkish
proposal for a historical joint commission is a bridge to nowhere as
either it would reinforce the existing consensus and be unacceptable
or the gridlock and be unacceptable. What might be more promising
would be a council of `wise persons’ drawn from both ethno/religious
backgrounds, and perhaps including some third parties as well, that
would meet privately in search of shared understanding and common
ground.

A Turkish columnist, writing in this same spirit, proposes renewing
the ErdoÄ?an approach of 2014 by moving beyond sharing the pain to
making an apology, coupled with offers of Turkish citizenship to the
descendants of Armenians who were killed or diplaced in 1915.[See
Verda Ã-zer, `Beyond the Genocide Debate,’ Hürriet Daily News, April
17, 2015] One possible formula that might have some traction is to
agree that if what was done in 1915 were to occur now it would clearly
qualify as `genocide,’ and that was done one hundred years ago was
clearly genocidal in scale and intent. Perhaps, with good will and a
realization that both sides would gain in self-esteem by a win/win
outcome, progress could be made. At least it seems worth trying to use
the resources of the moral imagination to work through with all
possible good will a tangle of issues that has so long seemed
intractable.

Buenos Aires Herald, Argentina
April 19 2015

A most reluctant crusader

By James Neilson
For the Herald

Pope cannot ignore Christian suffering in Muslim countries

Pope Francis would rather spend his days deploring the spiritual
emptiness of consumerism, hedonism and other contemporary ills than
feel called upon to defend Christendom against people who are
determined to annihilate what is left of it. He took the name of
Francis because he wanted to bring the papacy closer to common folk by
making it kinder and more willing to understand their troubles but,
much as he may dislike the idea, circumstances are obliging him to
change his priorities. As head of the biggest and most influential
Christian denomination, he cannot make out that what is happening in
the Middle East, Pakistan, Nigeria and other parts of the world does
not concern him. Once again, Islam is on the march and, to his evident
unease, Francis, a man who would much prefer to talk about the
blessings of peace than don the armour of a crusader, must do whatever
he can to stop it.

Almost nine years have passed since Pope Benedict XVI infuriated many
Muslims and post-Christian progressives by quoting the 14th century
Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologos on Islam. When confronted by a
believer, Manuel asked him to “Show me just what Muhammad brought that
was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as
his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.” To prove
both the Byzantine monarch and the Pope channelling him were wrong
because Islam is a uniquely peaceful creed, Muslims around the world
rioted, trashed dozens of churches, beheaded at least one priest and,
in Somalia, murdered an Italian nun.

Aware that his German predecessor had committed a terrible gaffe by
suggesting in his Regensburg lecture that Islam was less than perfect,
after replacing him Jorge Bergoglio tried a gentler approach, but
events in the Middle East soon forced him to change track. There, the
remaining Christians are the target of a ferocious onslaught much like
the ones that were confronted by the Byzantine Empire before it was
finally snuffed out by the rampaging Turks. Throughout that unhappy
region, Christians are being butchered by jihadists while Western
leaders such as Barack Obama, David Cameron and the rest of them wring
their hands, express their dismay and say mass murder is terrible but,
fortunately, has “nothing to do with Islam.” To ram home that
particular point, Obama said Christians were not entitled to get on
their high horse and complain because the Spanish Inquisition and the
Ku Klux Klan had been just as bad as the holy warriors of the Islamic
State.

But the climate is changing. To the surprise of many, Pope Francis has
begun to speak out. After criticizing the “complicit silence” of
Western politicians whose indifference toward the plight of Christians
in faraway countries about which they know very little struck him as
contemptible, he dared call the systematic and carefully planned
slaughter of Armenians, alongside Greeks, Assyrians and others, by the
Turks a century ago an act of “genocide”, the first in the twentieth
century, that was fully comparable to the later ones carried out by
the Nazis and the Soviet Communists.

As might have been expected, his words greatly angered the Islamists
who are currently ruling Turkey and busily persecuting secularists.
Unlike the Germans, who have come to terms with their own equally
appalling collective past, most Turks – not all by any means – have
refused to do so. As far as they are concerned, one and a half million
Armenians and a large number of Greeks were victims of what these days
is called collateral damage, not of a genocidal pogrom by “Young Turk”
nationalists and religious fanatics determined to exterminate
non-Muslim minorities.

Until fairly recently, most Western politicians and progressive
intellectuals did their best to see in Turkey’s Islamist president
Recep Tayyip Erdogan a Middle-Eastern version of a European Christian
Democrat, a man who, rather than turn his back on his country’s
dominant religious faith, was doing his best to soften it so it could
fit into the modern democratic world just as Catholicism,
Protestantism, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Shintoism and
Confucianism have managed to do. Sceptics who said Erdogan and his
sidekicks were only interested in their own Islamist agenda got short
thrift, but the Turkish regime’s virulent reaction to Pope Francis’s
words has bolstered their case. The following day, the European
Parliament weighed in by calling for a commemoration of “the centenary
of the Armenian genocide”. By so doing, it made it clear that Turkey’s
chances, which were never very great, of joining the European Union
are quickly getting smaller.

According to a large number of opinion polls, most Europeans believe
Islam is incompatible with their way of doing things. That is a major
reason why, in country after country, political parties habitually
denounced as “extreme right-wing” keep sprouting up. The widespread
feeling that governments, along with cultural elites, are bending over
backwards to appease the increasingly aggressive Muslim communities in
Europe, plus the unlovely regimes that rule much of the Muslim world,
has provoked a backlash that could have dire consequences for a large
number of people.

The lessons of history are grim. Time and time again, relations
between large Muslim communities and others have become so strained
that population transfers, like the ones that caused so much suffering
in Greece and Turkey almost a century ago and then in Pakistan and
India after the departure of the British, seemed the least bad option.
Will we see more such disasters in the years to come? Perhaps not, but
to many the prospect no longer seems unimaginable.

Dutch MEP: Current Turkish government bears great responsibility for
wounds of history

15:39, 19.04.2015
Region:World News, Armenia, Turkey
Theme: Politics

The Turkish government bears a great responsibility for wounds of
history, the Dutch MEP from European People’s party Esther de Lange
told Armenian News – NEWS.am, referring to the European Parliament
resolution on Armenian Genocide and Turkey’s continuing denial policy.

“We believe that in a democracy it is necessary to deal with one’s
past and come to terms with it. It was not the current Turkish state
but the Ottoman Empire that was responsible for what happened to the
Armenians 100 years ago, but the Turkish government should realize
that it bears a great responsibility to help heal the wounds of
history,” Esther de Lange said.

On April 15, the European Parliament adopted a resolution by a
majority vote, urging Turkey to recognize the Armenian Genocide in
order to contribute to the “reconciliation of the Armenian and Turkish
people.” The document calls on Turkey to restore its diplomatic ties
with Armenia, open the border and strive for economic integration.

The Providence Journal
April 18 2015

Musical tribute to victims of Armenian genocide at RIC

It was about three years ago that Rhode Island College pianist Judith
Lynn Stillman started thinking about staging a musical tribute for the
centenary of the massacre of more than a million Armenians at the
hands of the Turks.

By Channing Gray
©Journal Arts Writer
Posted Apr. 19, 2015 at 12:01 AM

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — It was about three years ago that Rhode Island
College pianist Judith Lynn Stillman started thinking about staging a
musical tribute for the centenary of the massacre of more than a
million Armenians at the hands of the Turks. She felt she needed to
turn what for most of us is an abstract moment in history into
something “visceral.”

So she set out to immerse herself in Armenian culture, attending
church services, learning the unique style of the nation’s music, even
patronizing an Armenian butcher shop. She also turned to volumes of
Armenian poems spanning more than 1,000 years that were translated and
in some cases written by the grande dame of Armenian poetry, Diana
Der-Hovanessian.

And from her research came a 30-minute score composed by Stillman
called “When the Music Stopped.” Her “tapestry of songs and texts,” as
she calls the piece, was written in just a couple of weeks last
summer.

“The Armenian genocide is a story that needs to be told,” said
Stillman. “It has been described by some historians as the forgotten
Holocaust that inspired Hitler.”

For her concert Wednesday, Stillman is bringing in Armenian-American
TV actor Armen Garo, from “The Departed” and “American Hustle,” to
narrate, along with a couple of opera singers, and an expert on the
duduk, a recorder-like instrument with a reed that makes a plaintive,
wailing sound.

Trinity Rep’s Curt Columbus will direct and “straighten out the
logistics,” said Stillman.

Stillman’s piece follows something of an arc. The poems and texts she
has chosen begin with the miracle of childhood, then segue into the
horrors of the 1915 massacre, then emerge on a note of hope,
celebrating the resilience and creativeness of the Armenian people.

“I thought about writing a little encore,” said Stillman, “but the
words were so glorious and captivating I couldn’t stop.”

Two free performances of “When the Music Stopped” are slated for
Wednesday in Rhode Island College’s Sapinsley Hall, one at 1 p.m. and
the other at 7:30 p.m. The event will also contain some prayers and
opening remarks from Family Court Chief Judge Haiganush Bedrosian.

Mher Khachatryan’s massacre-inspired paintings, which echo much of
Stillman’s text, will be on view. Stillman said Khachatryan, who lives
in the New York area, will also be on hand painting along with the
music. His images will then be projected on large screens.

But the event is mostly a concert, she said. With a Khachaturian Trio
and Stillman’s own piece, written in 13 parts interspersed with text.
The final three triumphant sections employ choirs.

The 1915 massacre, which lasted for two years and led to the deaths of
1.5 million Ottoman Armenians, over half the population, erupted after
the ethnic group was blamed for the defeat of the Ottomon Empire at
the hands of the Russians in an area that sided with the Russians.
They were considered traitors.

Intellectuals, artists, doctors and businessmen were rounded up and
killed, while women and children were driven into the Syrian desert
with little chance of survival.

The spirit of this sad chapter in history has been captured by
Stillman, longtime artist-in-residence at RIC who seems to have found
her voice as a composer in recent years.

Stillman joined the RIC faculty in 1980 after becoming the
then-youngest pianist to earn a doctorate from Juilliard. She has
played at festivals all over the country and toured Europe and the Far
East.

“From the age of 3,” she said, “I was groomed to be a concert pianist.”

But more and more she has turned to composing, lush tuneful scores
laced with hints of Rachmaninoff and Chopin. In 2012, she produced a
set of songs about the Holocaust based on poems written by children
imprisoned in the Terezin concentration camp that were performed on
public television. And she has just been asked to write the music for
a Canadian documentary.

The title of Stillman’s piece, “When the Music Stopped,” was, by the
way, inspired by a Der-Hovanessian poem by the same name. It’s about
the beloved Armenian composer-priest Komitas, who was so emotionally
scarred by witnessing the genocide of his students that he never again
sang and later died in an institution.

Remembering the Armenian massacre is a powerful reminder not to let
such a tragedy happen again, said Stillman. But she said she wasn’t
interested in getting into politics in her “Armenia 100” event. She
just wanted to honor those who died and celebrate the richness of
Armenian culture.

Wednesday’s concerts, at 1 and 7:30 p.m. in Sapinsley Hall, are free
on a first-come-first-served basis, although a $10 donation is
suggested.

ALALAM, Iran
April 16, 2015 Thursday

Mass Killing Between 1915-1917 is Genocide

A picture released by the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute dated
1915 shows soldiers standing over skulls of victims from the Armenian
village of Sheyxalan in the Mush valley, on the Caucasus front during
the First World War(Getty)

The European Parliament has ruled that 1915 mass killings of some 1.5
million Armenians by the Istanbul-ruled Ottoman Empire amount to
genocide.

The decision was made one week before the 100th anniversary of the
killings, which falls on 24 April.

The lawmakers stated that the “tragic events that took place in
1915-1917 against the Armenians in the territory of the Ottoman Empire
represent a genocide”, Reuters reported.

Armenia’s Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian said the resolution is a
move towards defending human rights.

“The resolution contains an important message to Turkey to use the
commemoration of the centenary of the Armenian genocide to come to
terms with its past, to recognise the Armenian genocide and thus pave
the way for a genuine reconciliation between Turkish and Armenian
peoples,” he said in a statement.

However, Turkey did not agree with the resolution and accused the
Parliament of attempting to “rewrite history”.

Turkey’s foreign ministry said lawmakers who backed the decision were
partners of “those who have nothing to do with European values and are
feeding on hatred, revenge and the culture of conflict”.

One day before the ruling, Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan warned
that his country would ignore any view by the Parliament regarding the
mass killing. “Whatever decision they may take, it would go in one
ear and out the other,” Erdogan was quoted by Reuters as saying.

The resolution comes as tensions rose between Turkey and the Vatican,
after Pope Francis referred to the killings as “the first genocide of
the 20th Century” during a Mass at St Peter’s Basilica.

The pontiff spoke about three tragedies in the last century. “The
first, which is widely considered the first genocide of the 20th
century, struck your own Armenian people,” he said, and added that the
other two mass killings were perpetrated by “Nazism and Stalinism.

More recently there have been other mass killings, like those in
Cambodia, Rwanda, Burundi and Bosnia. It seems that humanity is
incapable of putting a halt to the shedding of innocent blood”,IB
Times reports.

Turkey denies that the mass killings amount to genocide and argues
that the figures have been inflated.

Following Francis’ remarks, the Middle Eastern country recalled its
envoy to the Vatican and warned the pontiff not to “repeat the same
mistake”.

A top Turkish Islamic cleric has also warned the Vatican that it has
more to lose by digging up the past.

“If societies start to interrogate each other over past sorrows, the
Vatican will suffer more than anyone else,” Mehmet Gormez, Turkey’s
head of religious affairs, said.

KVUE , TX
April 19 2015

Hundreds march down SoCo Saturday for Armenian Genocide

AUSTIN — Hundreds marched down South Congress Avenue Saturday to
remember the Armenian Genocide.

Organizers said their main goal is to raise awareness and prevent
further genocides from occurring.

100 years ago, the Ottoman Turkish Empire killed approximately 1.5
million Armenian Christians.

Saudis will face crushing response: Iranian commander

Sun Apr 19, 2015 9:45PM

Commander of the Iranian Army’s Ground Forces Brigadier General Ahmad
Reza Pourdastan

The commander of Iranian Army’s Ground Forces has warned Saudi Arabia
of facing a crushing response from inside Yemen if the ongoing
aggression against the Arab country continues.

“The Saudi Arabian army has no war experience and is very fragile and
if it is confronted with a war of attrition, it should await crushing
blows and it will suffer heavy defeat,” Brigadier General Ahmad Reza
Pourdastan said Sunday in an interview with Arabic-language news
channel al-Alam.

The Iranian commander further recommended the Saudi government to stop
what he called “fratricide,” adding that Saudis’ past experiences in
Yemen have proven that they will have no easy job winning the war on
the impoverished country.

Commander of the Iranian Army’s Ground Forces Brigadier General Ahmad
Reza Pourdastan (L) speaks in al-Alam’s “From Tehran” show on April
19, 2015.

Saudi Arabia’s air campaign against Yemen started on March 26 –
without a UN mandate – in a bid to restore power to the country’s
fugitive former president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, and to undermine
the popular Ansarullah Houthi revolutionaries.

Pourdastan highlighted the boosted morale of the Yemeni people in the
face of the ongoing aggression against their country, saying Saudi
airstrikes against Yemen have created more “unity and solidarity”
among the Yemeni people.

“Such solidarity paves the ground for huge blows to Saudi Arabia and
through such solidarity they managed to defeat most of forces loyal to
Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and took control of Yemen,” he said, adding
that if Saudi cities are targeted by the Yemenis, Riyadh will have
serious difficulty dealing with it.

A picture taken on April 17, 2015 shows people walking past buildings
that were damaged the day before in an air strike by Saudi Arabia at a
market in the port city of Aden. (AFP)

Pourdastan rejected some claims that Iran is part of the crisis in
Yemen or accusations that Tehran is sending weapons to the Yemenis,
saying, those making such claims themselves know the unreal nature of
such accusations as they are monitoring the roads and the seas
constantly.

He said Iran’s sole concern for Yemen is to send humanitarian aid to
the people in order to “reduce part of their suffering.”

According to reports, over 2,500 people, including women and children,
have so far lost their lives in the attacks.

Iran not willing to confront Saudis

He also touched upon an ongoing mission by an Iranian fleet near
Yemen’s southern coasts, saying that the fleet’s presence in the area
was planned before the Saudi aggression on Yemen started. He said the
fleet is on a mission to protect Iranian ships against the potential
terrorist threats in the Gulf of Aden and the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait.

The high-profile Iranian commander further said that Iran is not
interested in getting involved in a confrontation with Riyadh,
describing Saudi Arabia as a friend of Iran and an ally.

“Saudi Arabia’s military attaché is currently in our country and we
invited him to attend a (ceremony) on the Army Day. We want to have
ties with Saudi Arabia,” he said.

Commander of the Iranian Army’s Ground Forces Brigadier General Ahmad
Reza Pourdastan (R) attends a speech by Leader of the Islamic
Revolution Ayatollah Khamenei (unseen) on April 19, 2015 on the
occasion of Iran’s Army Day.

Elsewhere in his comments, Pourdastan highlighted the role of the
United States in supporting terrorist groups like the ISIL, saying
that the war waged by ISIL, the al-Nusra Front, and Boko Haram in
Iraq, Syria, and Nigeria are all proxy battles waged in favor of the
US and Israel.

Since the very beginning of ISIL’s advances in western and northern
Iraq, Iranian army defined a 40-kilometer red zone into the Iraqi
territory to warn the terrorists of any potential move towards the
Iranian borders, he said.

Meanwhile, the Iranian commander also referred to a recent decision by
Russian President Vladimir Putin to lift a long-existing ban on
delivering the advanced S-300 air defense system to Tehran, saying
that the development should be viewed as a “step forward” in promoting
the defense capabilities of Islamic Republic.

Pourdastan also said that five major military drills are planned for
the Iranian army in the current Iranian calendar year which started on
March 21.

MS/NT/AS

TURKISH PM’S ARMENIAN ADVISER STEPS DOWN AFTER GENOCIDE REMARK

i24 News, Israel
April 17 2015

Turkey accused of belittling the centenary of the Armenian genocide
by advancing its Gallipoli commemorations

The first ever member of Turkey’s Armenian community to hold the
post of senior adviser to the Turkish prime minister has retired,
an official said on Thursday, after he described the mass killings
of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire as a “genocide.”

The official, who asked not to be named, denied any link between
the departure of Etyen Mahcupyan and the looming 100th anniversary
on April 24 of the start of the 1915 killings of Armenians, which
Yerevan regards as genocide.

Mahcupyan, 65, “has retired on the grounds of age,” the official said,
noting this was the age limit for all Turkish civil servants.

Mahcupyan, who was appointed last year as senior adviser to Ahmet
Davutoglu, infuriated some within the ruling Justice and Development
Party (AKP) this week when he qualified the mass killings of Armenians
as a “genocide.”

“If accepting that what happened in Bosnia and Africa were genocides,
it is impossible not to call what happened to Armenians in 1915
genocide too,” Mahcupyan said in an interview published this week.

Turkey, which has always rejected the term genocide, has taken a
defiant line amid growing tensions over the characterization of the
tragedy ahead of the 100th anniversary.

The European Parliament on Wednesday urged Turkey to use the centenary
of Ottoman-era massacres to “recognize the Armenian genocide” and
help promote reconciliation between the two peoples.

The use of the word “genocide” by Pope Francis on Sunday infuriated
Ankara and prompted Davutoglu to accuse the pontiff of “blackmail”
against Turkey.

In an interview with AFP in December, Mahcupyan said 2015 would be a
“tough year” because of the anniversary.

He said the priority for the future should be establishing relations
with Armenia as well as the millions-strong diaspora, many of whom
harbor a deep hatred of Turkey.

Gallipoli commemorations

Meanwhile Turkey has been accused of belittling the upcoming centenary
of the Armenian genocide by advancing its Gallipoli commemorations
to the same day.

The ceremonies, to be marked on April 24, coincide exactly with the
100th anniversary of the mass killings of Armenians at the hands of
the Ottoman Empire.

“This is a very indecent political manoeuvre,” Ohannes Kılıcdagı, a
researcher and writer for Agos, an Armenian weekly, told the Guardian.

“It’s cheap politics to try to dissolve the pressure on Turkey in
the year of the centennial by organizing this event.

“Everybody knows that the two memorials around Gallipoli have been
held on 18 March and 25 April every year.”

Nazar Buyum, an Armenian columnist and writer, said: “It’s not just
Gallipoli…Someone also had the audacity to suggest the organization
of a Gallipoli memorial concert in an Armenian church in Istanbul for
24 April. The government does everything to overshadow the centennial
of the genocide this year.”

Erdogan has invited his Armenian counterpart, Serzh Sarkisian, to
attend commemoration ceremonies in Turkey.

The Gallipoli campaign was one of the most famous battles of World
War I when Ottoman troops resisted an invading Allied Forceseeking
control of the Gallipoli peninsula on the Dardanelles strait.

The war was also where the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal
Ataturk, made his name as a heroic military leader.

“We fought as a kind together. That’s why we have invited Sarkisian,”
a government official was quoted as saying by local media, referring
to the presence of Armenian minorities alongside Turks and other
peoples in the Ottoman army.

Britain, Australia and New Zealand reportedly want a flamboyant
ceremony to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the landings at
Gallipoli.

Local media said the prime ministers of Australia and New Zealand,
as well as Britain’s Prince Charles, with his sons, are expected to
attend the ceremonies.

An invitation has also been sent to German President Joachim Gauck.

Some 10,500 people from Australia and New Zealand who were selected
after a ballot are due to take part in a dawn service a day later on
April 25, an Australian embassy official told AFP.

War of words as Armenians fight for genocide recognition a century on

Mass killings? Mutual bloodletting? Genocide? The hundreds of thousands
of dead have been silent for a century, but generations on, Armenians
are still battling to get the World War I slaying of their ancestors
recognized as a genocide.As Armenians around the world gear up to
mark 100 years since the start of the slaughter on April 24, the
struggle to get the world — and above all Turkey — to use the term
“genocide” remains deeply divisive.

To Armenians the word represents definitive proof of their ancestors’
horrific suffering at the hands of the Ottoman empire during World
War I, but for Ankara the violence was perpetrated by all sides and
describing the events as “genocide” is a red line it cannot cross.

Trapped somewhere in the middle is an international community, notably
the United States, under pressure from Armenia’s large diaspora but
worried about upsetting a rising Turkey.

“For Armenians the word ‘genocide’ encapsulates what happened to their
forefathers in 1915 and also elevates the Armenian experience to the
level of that of the Holocaust,” said Thomas De Waal, an expert on the
region at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.

“Precisely for the same reason, official Turkey has always rejected
the term, on the grounds that it equates the behaviour of their
grandparents with the Nazis and also out of paranoia that the
application of the word could lead to legal claims against Turkey.”

Armenians say up to 1.5 million of their kin were systematically
killed between 1915 and 1917 by Ottoman authorities as their empire —
the precursor to modern Turkey — crumbled.

Turkey rejects the claims, arguing that 300,000 to 500,000 Armenians
and as many Turks died in civil strife when Armenians rose up against
their Ottoman rulers and sided with invading Russian troops.

– Rise of a movement –

For some 30 years after the killings no one thought of calling the
massacres of Armenians a genocide — because the term itself did
not exist.

Up until then, Armenians referred to the tragedy simply as the “Great
Catastrophe” — or Medz Yeghern in Armenian.

Coined only in 1944 by Polish-Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin, the word
“genocide” became codified in law in the 1948 United Nations Genocide
Convention, which defined it as “acts committed with intent to destroy,
in whole or part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.”

The start of the clamor for recognition came later in 1965 as Armenians
around the world marked the 50th anniversary of the killings.

In Armenia itself — then a republic of the Soviet Union —
discussing any official acceptance of the genocide was a taboo but
an unprecedented protest that saw some 100,000 take to the streets
forced the Kremlin to start reevaluating its position.

“It was like a genie was let out of the bottle,” Rolan Manucharyan,
a physics professor who took part in the 1965 demonstration in downtown
Yerevan, told AFP.

The 1980s then saw an surge in the international movement for
recognition, mainly fuelled by the Armenian community in the US,
with outbursts of violence as radical groups killed Turkish officials.

So far, Armenia says 22 countries — prominently France, with its
large Armenian community — have recognized the genocide.

Last Sunday Pope Francis became the latest international figure to
wade into the controversy as he used the term “genocide” to describe
the killings, sparking a furious reaction from Turkey.

For American presidents the issue has always been a thorny one.

Ronald Reagan used the term in the early 1980s but since then the
commanders-in-chief in Washington have shied away.

Barack Obama — who pledged before he won the presidency to recognize
the genocide — has sidestepped the contentious term by using the
Armenian term Medz Yeghern.

– Return of land? –

The fallout from the massacres still shapes the region with official
ties between Turkey and Armenia frozen.

Part of the fear in Ankara over the push for genocide recognition is
that it could see Armenians lay claim to land in eastern Turkey.

“The term ‘genocide’ is not just an academic concept but also a
legal one. It means that a crime was committed and suggests that
there should be punishment and compensation,” said Ruben Safrastyan,
the director of Yerevan’s Institute of Oriental Studies.

At present Armenia has no official territorial claims against Turkey
but in 2013 prosecutor general Aghvan Hovsepyan sparked fury in Ankara
by saying Armenians should have their “lost territories” returned.

But despite the dreams of some Armenians to reclaim their land,
analysts said few outside the community seriously think there will
be any move to retake the land.

“It would be very difficult for any Armenian political leader to say
that Armenia has no territorial claims to Turkey,” Svante Cornell
from the Washington-based Central Asia-Caucasus Institute told AFP.

“But Western politicians don’t take seriously” the possibility of a
land dispute.

As the 100th anniversary of the killings approaches, the struggle
for official recognition is as intense as ever.

And the burden of what happened — and getting recognition for it —
still weighs heavily over Armenia and Armenians around the world.

“The pain forces us to constantly look back into the past,” said
Armenian author Ruben Hovsepyan, whose mother fled the killings as
a child.

“It does not allow us to fully build our future as we use up so
much national energy and potential on forcing Turkey to recognize
the genocide.”

(AFP)

THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE AND HAGIA SOPHIA

Kathimerini- Greece
April 16 2015

By Nikos Konstandaras

Pope Francis’s declaration that the slaughter of Armenians by Ottoman
forces 100 years ago was “the first genocide of the 20th century”
will hasten the conversion of the Hagia Sophia museum into a mosque,
the top Muslim official in Ankara responded. The Turkish government
has long wanted to turn the symbol of Orthodox Christianity into a
mosque, and last Friday – Good Friday for the Orthodox – verses from
the Koran were recited at the opening of an exhibition at Hagia Sophia,
84 years after it was converted from a mosque into a museum by the
founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. The statement by
mufti Mefail Hizli, reported by the Hurriyet Daily News on Thursday,
suggests that Turkey’s rage at its inability to stop a growing tide
of recognition of the Armenian genocide is encouraging autocratic
tendencies and bigotry. It is not only the country’s few remaining
Christians who will suffer but Turkish society as a whole.

It is difficult to comprehend how a papal statement on the Armenian
issue should weigh on Hagia Sophia, seeing as the roads of Catholic
and Orthodox Christians separated nearly 1,000 years ago (in 1054).

Today’s Turkish government shows the arrogance of a conqueror
who believes that all he sees is hostage to his will. The Ottoman
conquerors did convert the Hagia Sophia church into a mosque, but they
also commissioned their best architects to build grand new mosques –
the Fatih, Suleyman and Sultan Ahmet mosques – honoring Hagia Sophia
by trying to outdo it. In his conviction that Turkey had to be built
on secular foundations, Ataturk turned Hagia Sophia into a museum,
acknowledging the building’s ecumenical significance.

Under the dominance of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who was prime minister
from 2003 until his election as president last year, Turkey is at the
crossroads between East and West, between autocracy and democracy,
between tolerance and bigotry. In next June’s parliamentary elections,
the AKP party which Erdogan founded and still controls, could triumph
with about 50 percent of the vote, according to recent polls. After
the election, Ergodan aims to strengthen the office of the presidency
and will do all that is necessary to achieve this. Converting Hagia
Sophia into a mosque will please the AKP’s religious voters and also
make clear that the secular regime founded by Ataturk is dead.

Recently, Erdogan has shown increasingly autocratic tendencies. Now,
the government’s inability to prevent international recognition of
the Armenian genocide is driving him to greater displays of anger,
arrogance, greed and envy. He will learn that he can neither ignore
history nor subject an ecumenical symbol to his will.

ARMENIAN GENOCIDE BANNER RETURNS TO WEST HARTFORD GREEN

Hartford Courant, CT
April 17 2015

By Suzanne Carlson

WEST HARTFORD — A banner commemorating the Armenian genocide was
removed from the town green Wednesday, but was replaced by the end
of the day Thursday.

Public works Director John Phillips said the banner did not comply with
town regulations, which require such signs to notify the public of a
specific event. The banner was modified to include notification of a
100th anniversary commemoration ceremony at the Capitol in Hartford on
April 25, sponsored by the Armenian Genocide Commemoration Committee
of Connecticut.

The banner, which had only included a general message commemorating
the mass killings of Armenians that began in 1915 under Ottoman rule,
“slipped through the cracks” and was installed Monday before the
error was corrected, Phillips said.

Lauren Varjabedian, commemoration committee chairperson, said the
group is pleased the banner was to be returned to the town green.

Because the initial banner was approved by the town and the group
was not notified of the error, Varjabedian said the banner is being
modified and reinstalled at no cost to the committee.

“The town of West Hartford has been great to work with in rectifying
the situation,” Varjabedian said.

Groups can apply to have a banner displayed on the north end of
Goodman Green at the intersection of South Main Street and Farmington
Avenue. Banners may also be placed at the south side of the bridge
on Park Road over Trout Brook, as well as the town auditorium on the
day of an event.

Phillips said town officials and representatives from the genocide
remembrance committee met Thursday to discuss the issue, and
Varjabedian said the banner will remain on the town green until Monday.

The Armenian Genocide Commemoration Committee of Connecticut has been
active for about 15 years. Although the group works with four Armenian
churches in the state to hold regular programs throughout the year,
the centennial remembrance is an especially important event for the
Armenian diaspora, Varjabedian said.

“We just make sure that we get the word out … and just really make
sure that not only the Armenian community is aware but the community
at large,” Varjabedian said.

The remembrance ceremony at the Capitol is scheduled for 11 a.m. to
1 p.m. on April 25, with keynote speaker Chris Bohjalian.