Author: Baghdasarian Karlen

TURKEY’S PM SAYS AKP WILL NOT SUCCUMB TO ‘JEWISH LOBBY’

Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
Feb 8 2015

ISTANBUL – Anadolu Agency

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has said his government will not
succumb to the Jewish lobby, the Armenian lobby or the lobby of the
Turkish-Greek minority, a sentence he said in regards to President
Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s words on Jan. 31 that the Gulenists in the
country, which he dubs “the parallel structure,” have joined forces
with the Israeli intelligence service.

“I announce it from here: we have not and will not succumb to the
Jewish lobby, the Armenian lobby or the Turkish-Greek minority’s
lobbies,” said Davutoglu during a speech at the ruling Justice and
Development Party’s (AKP) provincial congress in Istanbul Feb. 8. “I
call out to the parallel lobby that sent them a message: We will
stand before you with dignity no matter where you are; you will be
despicable for the treason you have done to this nation.”

While addressing a meeting of business leaders in Istanbul on Jan. 31,
Erdogan had said the U.S.-based Islamic scholar Fethullah Gulen’s
supporters, “the parallel structure,” was in cooperation with Israeli
intelligence organization, the Mossad.

“The sincere people backing this parallel structure should see this
structure is cooperating with … Shame on them if they still cannot
see that this structure is cooperating with the Mossad,” Erdogan said.

Erdogan accuses the followers of Gulen of illegal wiretappings and a
“coup attempt,” starting from the revelation of a large corruption
investigation in December 2013 that included four former ministers
and their sons, who were later acquitted of all the charges pressed
against them.

February/08/2015

From: Baghdasarian

WATCH: TIGRAN HAMASYAN UNVEILS ANIMATED VIDEO FOR “MOCKROOT” SONG “KARS 2 (WOUNDS OF THE CENTURIES)”

NoneSuch
Feb 9 2015

Tigran Hamasyan, whose Nonesuch Records debut album, Mockroot,
is out now in Europe and due February 17 in the United States, has
unveiled an animated video of the album track “Kars 2 (Wounds of the
Centuries).” The video, which premiered on Les Inrocks, was created
by his sister, Melanya Hamasyan. You can watch it below.

The song was written about the town of Kars, the ancestral home of
Hamasyan’s maternal grandparents, a place that became part of Turkey
in the years that followed the Ottoman genocide of Armenians during
the First World War.

“They call Armenia a country of stone, because there are so many huge
mountains made up of crazily shaped and oddly coloured stones,” says
Hamasyan. “Every time I see these mountains, they tell me something.

They have a story. And, even though the town of Kars is no longer part
of Armenia, and even though the Armenian culture in that environment
doesn’t exist anymore, it has been preserved in those cliffs and those
rocks. That’s what I’m trying to capture in this simple, eight-bar
phrase that goes with a poem.”

To order Mockroot now in Europe and pre-order in the US, head to
iTunes or Amazon. To pre-order in the US, you can also head to the
Nonesuch Store, where CD orders include a download of the complete
album starting February 17.

From: Baghdasarian

TODAY IS VAHAN TERIAN’S BIRTHDAY

11:42 09/02/2015 >> CULTURE

February 9 marks the birthday of great Armenian poet, lyrist and
public activist Vahan Terian.

Vahan Terian (January 28, 1885 – January 7, 1920) is known for his
sorrowful, romantic poems, the most famous of which are still read
and sung in their musical versions.

Terian was born in the Gandza Armenian village of Javakheti region in
Russian Empire (now in Georgia). Schooled in Tiflis, he then studied
at the Lazarian College in Moscow, where he was exposed to symbolism
and joined the Russian Social Democrats. He was jailed by Czarist
police for his political activity.

He published his first book of poems, “Dreams at Dusk”, in 1908,
which made him an immediate sensation, Hovhannes Tumanian calling
him the most original lyric poet of his age. He later published
“Night Remembrance”, “The Golden Legend”, “The Return”, “The Golden
Link”, “In the Land of Nairi” (where the substitute the word ‘Nairi’
for each instance where the word ‘Armenia’ would have suited), and
“The Cat’s Paradise”. His poems are filled with images of rain, mist,
pallid fields and shapeless shadows, symbols of sorrow, despair and
eventually, peace.

In 1913, Terian left Moscow University for the University of St.

Petersburg, where he majored in oriental languages, intensifying his
political involvement. After the revolution he became representative
of Armenians in the Ministry of Nations, personally working with
Lenin and Stalin. He died in Orenburg of tuberculosis shortly before
his 35th birthday. Each year there is a commemoration of his life
in Javakhk region (Akhaltsikhe and Akhalkalak), at Gandza village,
where he was born.

From: Baghdasarian

RUSTAM GASPARYAN: PEOPLE SHOULD UNSEAT SERZH SARGSYAN: THERE IS NO OTHER OPTION

17:29 | February 9,2015 | Politics

At the conference of ‘non-governing’ forces organized by Prosperous
Armenia Party (BHK), Gagik Tsarukyan announced that the ‘ball is in
the court of the government.’

Aravot.am has asked BHK lawmaker Rustam Gasparyan to explain
Tsarukyan’s statement. What is Serh Sargsyan expected to do? Is he
supposed to fulfill the 12-point demands of the opposition forces to
prevent people from holding street demonstrations?

“Should Serzh Sargsyan have any intention to fulfill the demands
he would have done it long ago. We do not have any expectations
from Serzh Sargsyan. People should stand up and unseat him through
rallies. There is no other option,” he said.

When asked what way of struggle they suggest if they exclude bloodshed,
violence, and Maidan, Mr Gasparyan said, “Was there any bloodshed
when the Communist system collapsed? No, there wasn’t.

People stood up for their rights and pushed for Communists’
resignation. It was a critical moment and the Communists stepped down.

From: Baghdasarian

HOLOCAUST DENIAL PUNISHED, NOT ARMENIAN GENOCIDE?

IAGS (International Association of Genocide Scholars) considers
denial of Genocide perpetuation of it. On 23rd of January Human
Rights Association, Turkey, and the Center for Truth Justice Memory
held a press conference and issued a press release, announcing that
as an intervening party they will take part in the Perincek case of
Genocide denial. It is posted in Keghart.com for the record along
with Kamo Mayilian’s and Nora Koloyan-Keuhnelian’s articles. The
trial took place on January 28, 2015 as scheduled and it may take up
to six months for the release of the verdict.-Ed.

Press Release

On January 28, 2015, the lawsuit Dogu Perincek v. Switzerland will
begin retrial in the Grand Chamber, which acts in the capacity of
court of appeals for the European Court of Human Rights.

It is now common knowledge that in 2005, Dogu Perincek traveled to
Switzerland, which has officially recognized the Armenian Genocide and
passed a law criminalizing its denial, in order to issue declarations
in Bern and Lausanne where he impugned the Armenian Genocide as
a fabrication. In 2007, Perincek was found guilty of deliberately
violating national law and convicted by the court of Lausanne. Upon
Perincek’s appeal, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in his
favor in 2008 and found that the court of Lausanne had violated the
freedom of expression principle enshrined in the European Convention
of Human Rights, article 10.

The Human Rights Association sent a letter to the Swiss Federal Office
of Justice in 2014, demonstrating in detail how the denial of the
Armenian Genocide incites hostility toward Armenians and imploring
Switzerland to appeal the ECHR decision. Switzerland’s subsequent
appeal and request for retrial were accepted in June 2014.

The first hearing of the said retrial will take place on January
28, 2015.

The Human Rights Association from Turkey joined The Center for
Truth Justice Memory and the Toronto-based International Institute
for Genocide & Human Rights Studies to appeal to the ECHR in July
to present a Third Party Opinion File, i.e., to be accepted as
intervening party. The ECHR approved this request by the three human
rights organizations.

We have explained in this file that the denial of the Armenian
Genocide provokes ethnic hatred in Turkey and encourages anti-Armenian
elements. Neither the ECHR ruling and nor the file we have presented
as third party concerns itself with the historical reality of the
1915-1917 massacres or their precise legal definition. The crux of the
issue lies in the fact that Perincek’s declarations are conducive to
racism and discrimination. In this sense, the retrial in the Grand
Chamber carries special significance as a precedent in addressing
denial, minimization, and justification in a context outside of
the Holocaust.

The ECHR decision had restricted denialism and discrimination to their
effect on Swiss Armenians and disregarded Perincek’s leadership of
the Talat Pasha Committee, as well as the fact that his refutations
of the genocide as an international lie have direct bearing on the
Armenians of Turkey even if they were pronounced in Lausanne. We
have therefore argued in our file that Perincek’s declarations do
not only concern the definition of events, but also commit the crime
of discrimination; that the ruling must take into account Perincek’s
position as a prominent politician from Turkey, the head of the Labor
Party, and the leader of the Talat Pasha Committee–as well as that
Committee’s objectives and operations.

Yes, the act that was found criminal according to the Swiss law
was committed on Swiss soil, but the Talat Pasha Committee and its
leaders, including Perincek, have been conducting operations in Turkey
and targeting Turkish society. The recipient of their message–that
those who listen to Armenians will be subject to intervention and
retribution, even if they are at the other ends of the world–was
Turkish society. The same Turkish society that is being targeted
by this message has been fueled by hostility toward Armenians and
other non-Muslim peoples for generations. Anti-Armenian sentiments
and thoughts have been exacerbated throughout Republican history
by the constant dogma, mass media dissemination and educational
indoctrination of the notion that the eradication of the Ottoman
Armenian population and civilization is a lie.

Denialism does not simply consist of declarations along the lines of
“no genocide has taken place.” Denialism requires the justification of
the irreversible and inexpiable eradication of a people: The notion
that “it is Armenians who are responsible for the events,” namely
that Armenians had deserved eradication, that they had “stabbed Turks
in the back” and collaborated with the enemy, has always been and is
still perpetually reiterated in classrooms, university conferences,
TV series and programs, and books.

Hostility toward Armenians is not confined to mere words but also
takes lives. In this context of discrimination and ethnic hatred,
Armenians were attacked and Hrant Dink, the founder and director of
Agos, was the victim of an assassination whose perpetrators have yet
to be brought to justice. Armenian private Sevag Å~^ahin Balıkcı
was shot dead in 2011 by another soldier in Batman, where he was on
military duty, specifically on the day of April 24, the universal
commemoration day marking the beginning of the Armenian Genocide.

Court proceedings have met with significant public distrust, while the
press has indicated that commanders pressured privates to testify that
the incident was “an accident.” Furthermore, the “Hodjali Protests”
of February 27, 2012, which took place in the central Taksim square
and featured as a speaker the Minister of Internal Affairs, displayed
banners proclaiming “You Are All Armenians, You Are All Bastards.”

Within the span of two months from 2012 to 2013, the Samatya district
of Istanbul, which is densely populated by Armenians, saw similar
and successive attacks on elderly Armenian women–among them the
murder victim Maritsa Kucuk, whose bones were smashed and entire
body relentlessly stabbed. And on February 23, 2014, banners saying
“Long Live Ogun Samasts, Damned be Hrant Dinks” were displayed,
unprohibited, in front of the newspaper Agos.

In sum, genocide denial is the chief, most fundamental basis for the
state-sanctioned threat to existence under which Armenians continue
to live in Turkey.

As two human rights associations that have witnessed first-hand and
up close the provocation of ethnic hatred by anti-Armenian acts and
declarations, we, the Human Rights Association and the Center for
Truth Justice Memory, consider it our natural duty, as per our raison
d’être and field of operation, to present our observations to the
European Court of Human Rights in order to contribute to the making
of a fair and just decision.

Finally, we insist yet again: Denial causes hatred and hatred kills.

We defend the inalienability of the right to live in safety, unafraid
of tomorrow, and hope that the European Court of Human Rights will,
in the name of the universal law of human rights, obstruct discourses
that incite acts in violation of this inalienable right.

Amal Clooney Takes on Armenian Case

Kamo Mailyan, Toronto, 14 January 2015

Amal Clooney, a prominent international and human rights expert,
George Clooney’s wife, has taken on the protection of the Armenian
side in the “case of Dogu Perincek,” The Telegraph reports.

Dogu Perincek, a representative of the Left-wing Turkish Workers’
Party, was found guilty by the Swiss court during a visit to
Switzerland in 2008 for denying the fact of the Armenian Genocide
1915, perpetrated by the government of Ottoman Empire with a plan
of exterminating the whole Armenian race (as it was later described
by New York Times). During his visit to Switzerland, Dogu Perincek
called the Armenian Genocide 1915 “an international lie” and was
fined by the Swiss court for denial.

Dogu Perincek appealed the Swiss court’s decision to the European
Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which ruled that the Swiss court had
violated the right of free expression.

The ECHR’s ruling is challenged by the Armenian party. The case will
be heard in Strasbourg by ECHR. The first hearing is scheduled on
January 28.

Amal Clooney will work in a team with Geoffrey Robertson, who
wrote a book called “An Inconvenient Genocide: Who Now Remembers
the Armenians?” Amal Clooney has been involved in high profile
international cases, some of which include representation of the
Wikileaks’ founder Julian Assange, as well as Yulia Timoshenko
of Ukraine.

Among questions to be asked to the ECHR should be whether its decision
is not a dual standard. If the ECHR determines and reaffirms that the
Swiss Courts’ decisions have limited the right of free expression,
this will result in a strong case law and precedent that can be
used to combat strict limitation on freedom of expression by the
Turkish government through its Article 301, which limits not only
recognition of the Armenian genocide by individuals inside Turkey but
has even strictly controlled public opinion in relation to this matter
(however, it cannot stop future criminalization and punishment for
genocide denial).

In fact, Dogu Perincek can be found guilty for perpetrating/an attempt
of genocide through denial. The Genocide Watch establishes that
the 8 stages of genocide, commonly adopted and used by scholars and
historians, include: 1. Classification (of culture as “them and us”);
2. Symbolization (giving names to a national group such as the “Jews”
or “Gypsies”); 3. Dehumanization (when one group denies the humanity
of another); 4. Organization (planned by a party such as a state); 5.

Polarization (extremists drive the groups apart); 6. Preparation
(victims are identified based on their religious or ethnic identity);
7. Extermination (massacres start and turn into a mass killing legally
called a “genocide”); and 8. DENIAL (which is a stage that always
follows a genocide).

According to the classification above, Dogu Perincek committed a
genocide / genocidal act through denial.

Another precedent the ECHR shall take into account is the fact that
negating the Holocaust, a horrible crime against humanity and a
genocide that followed the first genocide of the 20th century (the
Armenian Genocide 1915) and took the lives of six million Jews, is a
punishable offense in many countries. The ECHR should be prepared to
answer the question what makes the Armenian case different. Is there
any step out of the eight steps of genocide described above that does
not exist in the Armenian case? Or, maybe because we are “ARMENIANS”?

Nowadays different pro-government groups in Turkey are discussing
the possibility of granting diplomatic immunity to Dogu Perincek,
obviously understanding that this is a case that they are going to
lose, and they will have to be prepared to protect their official.

Likewise, Turkey granted diplomatic immunity to Egemen Bagis, its
EU Minister, to protect from potential liability stemming out of an
investigation by Zurich prosecutors after genocide denial comments by
Egemen Bagis at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2012,
which were found as a violation by the anti-racism legislation of
Switzerland.

The two cases are very similar, and a question the ECHR should be
asked is how many more officials are going to be “saved” by Turkey
through giving diplomatic immunity after a crime/violation is made,
and whether it can be viewed as retrospective and be applied for the
time when the real violation/crime was made.

Clooney goes to court for Armenia

Nora Koloyan-Keuhnelian, Al-Ahram, Cairo, 5 February 2015

International human rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin Clooney and UK
barrister Geoffrey Robertson appeared at the European Court of Human
Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg, France, last week. They were representing
Armenia in the century-old dispute between Armenia and Turkey over the
1915 genocide committed by the Ottoman Turks against the Armenians,
in which 1.5 million people died.

The case comes following an appeal by Switzerland to the ECHR after a
previous ruling that the right of the leader of the Turkish Workers
Party, Dogu Perincek, to express his views had been violated by a
Swiss court.

In 2007 Perincek was sentenced to four months in prison after saying
the Armenian Genocide was an “international lie” at a conference in
Lausanne in 2005. Denial of the genocide is against Swiss law.

In 2008 Perincek appealed to the ECHR, citing his right to freedom of
expression, and in December 2013 the ECHR found in Perincek’s favour.

Turkey and Armenia then became parties to the case, and the appeal
against the 2013 decision began last week.

In her opening statement, Clooney said the judge’s decision in the
2013 case was “simply wrong,” but added that in bringing the appeal
Armenia did not want to prohibit free speech. “Armenia is not here
to argue against freedom of expression any more than Turkey is here
to defend it. This court knows very well how disgraceful Turkey’s
record on freedom of expression is,” she said.

As many observers have noted, Turkey’s claim to defend free speech is
ironic at best. In December, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
arrested opposition journalists and accused them of “forming a
terrorist organisation” and “trying to seize control of the state.”

Only last week, Turkish authorities arrested a former Miss Turkey
for “insulting” Erdogan by quoting him in a poem published on social
media. In September 2014, the US-based Human Rights Watch also said
that Erdogan and the ruling Turkish Justice and Development Party
were taking far-reaching steps to weaken the rule of law, control the
media and clamp down on critics and protesters, stating that these
“changes are really worrying.”

Paparazzi who filled the courtroom for the appeal appeared to be
more interested in the fact that one of the two lawyers is the wife
of actor George Clooney than the case being heard.

Lawyers Robertson and Clooney atthe European Court of Human Rights
in Strasbourg, France

Aram Hamparian, executive director of the Armenian National Committee
of America (ANCA), told Al-Ahram Weekly that the media storm in no
way distracted from the importance of the case. “Armenians worldwide
welcome Amal Clooney and Geoffrey Robertson’s compelling presentation
of the facts, the law and the morality of Armenia’s case against the
denial of the Armenian Genocide,” he said.

Their stature as international human rights lawyers will help focus
the world’s attention on this still unpunished genocide, he said,
brining Turkey’s denial campaign into the light of day and contributing
to the growing international consensus that there must be resolution
of the crime, Hamparian added.

Some observers say that the case may be understood to be about freedom
of expression and that the judges may again decide against Switzerland,
though this should in no way be seen as endorsing Turkey’s views on
the genocide.

Others say that denying the genocide should be understood as a hate
crime under Swiss law in the same way that denying the Holocaust is
a punishable offence in many countries. One judge at the court said
that Perincek’s case remains strong because it turns on freedom of
speech and not the genocide.

In his remarks to the court, Robertson described Perincek as a
“vexatious litigant pest” and he questioned why the court was “giving
comfort to genocide deniers.”

“What is really worrying are the vast errors of Chamber 2, which we
urge the Grand Chamber to correct, in the fact that they promote
the idea that the Holocaust is the only real genocide … it is
wrong to excuse or to minimise other mass murders on the grounds of
racist religions because they had fewer victims or different methods
of killing.

“What matters to Armenians, to Jews, to Bosnians and Cambodians, to
Rwandan Tutsis and today to Yazidis is not the manner of their death
or whether an international court has convicted the perpetrators,
but the fact that they were targeted as unfit to live because they
were Jews or Armenians or Yazidis.

“The reasoning in this judgement [in 2013] damages the vital human
rights cause of genocide prevention … That there is any doubt
about the truth of the Armenian Genocide should not feature in its
[the court’s] reasoning. It was not, as genocide deniers pretend,
a tragedy. It was a crime, an international crime of genocide.”

In the past many observers, including British prime minister Winston
Churchill, described the events as the “Armenian Holocaust.” Robertson
recently published a book titled An Inconvenient Genocide: Who
Now Remembers the Armenians? The book argues that the 1915 events
constituted a crime against humanity, known today as genocide.

Robertson will also be a speaker at an international conference
marking the centenary of the Armenian Genocide in New York in March.

Diaspora Armenians are organizing events across the world to mark the
centenary of the genocide in April. However, in what is being seen as
a cynical move, Erdogan last month sent invitations to more than 100
international figures, including Armenian President Serj Sarkissian,
asking them to participate in the centenary of the Battle of Gallipoli
which will be marked in Turkey on the same day as the genocide
centenary. The move is seen as an attempt to distract attention from
the centenary of the genocide, which Turkey continues to deny.

Amal Alamuddin Clooney, 37, is the daughter of a Lebanese family. Her
father is a Druze businessman who moved to London when Amal was a
child, after the outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War. She has previously
acted in other high-profile cases, including those involving former
Libyan intelligence chief Abdallah Al-Senussi and WikiLeaks founder
Julian Assange.

“The case of Dogu Perincek shows that Turkey’s walls of denial are
crumbling and Ankara’s obstruction of justice will be the next to
fall,” Hamparian told the Weekly.

From: Baghdasarian

ARMENIE
L’Universite d’ingenierie d’Armenie se transforme en fondation

Le gouvernement d’Armenie a decide de transformer l’Universite
d’ingenierie d’Armenie en une Fondation de > .

Le ministre de l’education et de la science Armen Ashotyan a dit
que cela permettra a cette structure de gagner plus de liberte et
d’independance institutionnelle.

La transformation permettra a l’universite de commercialiser son offre
educative a dit Armen Ashotyan. Dans certains domaines, l’universite
peut etre interessante et competitive en termes d’innovations,
a-t-il dit.

From: Baghdasarian

21ST CENTURY HERESY HUNTING

IAI News, UK
Feb 9 2015

A new thought crime is upon us: denial. Its persecution presents a
new challenge to our most basic freedoms.

Frank Furedi | Commentator, author and sociologist whose recent work
explores the nature of authority and mistrust. A leading voice in
discussions of fear, risk and the unknown.

Contemporary society is more comfortable with values in the plural than
with a value that everyone can embrace. Instead of “the truth”, society
prefers to lecture about truths. The celebration of non-judgmentalism
and difference can be interpreted as a self-conscious attempt to avoid
having to make moral judgments. On most issues we are free to pick
and choose our beliefs and affiliations. Educators continually inform
university students – especially in the social sciences and humanities
– that there is no such thing as a wrong or right answer. Instead of
an explicit moral code, Western society seeks to police behaviour
through a diffuse rhetoric – such as appropriate and inappropriate
behaviour – that avoids confronting fundamental existential questions.

Paradoxically, the absence of moral clarity encourages an illiberal
climate of intolerant behaviour. In a world where moralists find
it difficult to clearly differentiate between right and wrong it
is important that some kind of line is drawn between acceptable and
unacceptable behaviour. Without a moral grammar to express ideas about
right and wrong ethical guidance often has a forced and artificial
character. Too often evil is represented in the caricatured form of
the serial killer or the paedophile. The Holocaust has been plucked
out of its tragic historical context and transformed into a generic
metaphor of evil. It is joined by environmental pollution as a highly
visual representation of moral depravity. The very few examples of
unambiguous evil – paedophilia, Holocaust, pollution – are constantly
seized upon to map out acts of potential moral transgression.

Discovering new taboos is part of the job description of heresy
hunters today. Not being against the Holocaust is probably the most
ritualised and institutionalised taboo operating in western societies.

Numerous countries now have laws against Holocaust denial. For example
in Austria the denial of the Holocaust is a crime that carries a
prison term of up to ten years. Targeting Holocaust deniers is a
culturally affirmed enterprise that allows politicians to occupy the
moral high ground.

Moral entrepreneurs constantly embrace the Holocaust to lend legitimacy
to their enterprise. They also insist that anyone who questions their
version of events should be treated in a manner that is similar to
those who deny the real Holocaust. “Do Armenian citizens of France”,
asks an advocate of criminalising the denial of the Armenian genocide,
“not deserve the same protection as their Jewish compatriots?”

During the past two decades the act of denial has become the most
recognisable characteristic of the 21st century heretic. Just as
the charge of Holocaust denial serves as a moral warrant to withdraw
the right to freely question a particular version of events so the
denial of claims made by fashionable causes invite censorship and
intolerance. Following the precedent set by the anti-Holocaust denial
laws, in October 2006, the French National Assembly passed a law that
could sentence to a year’s imprisonment anyone who denied the 1915
Armenian genocide.

It is a sign of the time that very few people questioned the right
of the French state to pronounce which interpretation of the past was
legitimate and which was a crime. Yet the implication of authorising
the state to possess the power to dictate what people should believe
and what constitutes the historical truth represents a fundamental
threat to freedom. The very idea of toleration evolved because
far-sighted people understood that the meaning of the truth and the
true religion was contested and ought to be a matter for individual
reflection. From the standpoint of tolerance, truths – historical or
otherwise – are discovered by independent thinking citizens learning
from one another in the course of a debate. They should not be laid
down in a decree of the state. No doubt those who deny the Holocaust
personify the most backward and vile human sentiments but to ban their
ideas is far more dangerous than the impact of their speech. Worse
still, the suggestion that society fears the claims of Holocaust
deniers betrays an insecurity about its own ideas. By assuming the
role of the censor it betrays its own democratic principles and risks
losing the moral authority of its version of events.

The transformation of the act of denial to a transcendental generic
evil is shown by the ease with which its stigmatisation has leaped
from the realm of historic controversies surrounding acts of
genocide to other areas of debate. Denial has acquired the status
of a free-floating blasphemy that can attach itself to a variety of
controversies. One opponent of climate change denial observes that the
“language of ‘climate change’, ‘global warming’, ‘human impacts’ and
‘adaptation’ are themselves a form of denial familiar from other forms
of human right abuse”. It appears that moral crusaders have become
so overwhelmed with the act of denial that they no can no longer tell
what a difference in opinion looks like. The rhetorical inflation of
the consequences of denial is informed by the aspiration to construct a
plausible ideology of evil. The very term “denial” implies that what’s
at stake is the status of truth. Those who deny wilfully refuse to
recognise the self-evident truth. The vilification of denial ensures
that its practitioners are dispossessed of the right to have a voice.

Sadly not accepting a received wisdom is often represented not as
disagreement but as an act of denial – and with the stigmatisation of
denial this charge has acquired the form of a secular blasphemy. So
a book written by an author sceptical of prevailing environmentalist
wisdom was dismissed in Nature with the words; “the text employs the
strategy of those, who for example, argue that gay men aren’t dying of
AIDS, that Jews weren’t singled out by the Nazis for extermination,
and so on.” The suggestion that there is a common strategy of denial
used in these three highly-charged issues betrays the conspiratorial
imagination of heresy hunters.

The stigmatisation of denial represents the prelude for the demand
that it be censored. Take the attempt to stifle anyone who raises
doubts about the catastrophic representation of climate change. Such
sceptics are frequently stigmatised as “global warming deniers” and
their behaviour is often compared to those of anti-Semitic Holocaust
deniers. Some moral entrepreneurs advocate a policy of zero tolerance
towards the target of their crusade: The language used to condemn
the heretic typically appeals to a sacred authority that must not be
questioned. According to this model “overwhelming evidence” serves as
the equivalent of revealed religious truth and those who dare question
“scientists of unquestioned reputation” – that is, a new priestly
caste – are guilty of blasphemy.

Heresy hunters who charge their opponents with “ecological denial”
also warn that “time for reason and reasonableness is running short”.

It appears that ecological denial or the refusal to embrace an
environmentalist word view is to be complicit in the commitment of
a long list of “eco-crimes”. Those who denounce the new heresy often
cannot resist the temptation of seeking to shut down discussion. Some
claim that, like Holocaust deniers, those who refuse to accept the
sacred narrative on global warming should simply be silenced in
the media. “There becomes a point in journalism where striving for
balance becomes irresponsible”, argues CBS reporter Scott Pelley in
justification of this censorious orientation. From this illiberal
standpoint the media has a responsibility to silence global warming
deniers by whatever means necessary.

Crusaders against denial are not merely interested in silencing their
opponents. In the true tradition of heresy hunting they also want
to inflict punishment upon those who deny the true faith. Those who
deny the official consensus on the spread of AIDS are castigated as
“AIDS deniers”. And “if Holocaust-deniers deserve to be punished,
so do Aids deniers” argued A Smyth in First Post, before adding that
“it is high time African governments outlawed denial of the epidemic,
and persecuted those who perpetuate misinformation about AIDS or in
any way undermine efforts to tackle it”.

A similar approach is adopted by illiberal opponents of “climate
change deniers”. Australian journalist Margo Kingston wrote that as
“David Irving is under arrest in Austria for Holocaust denial” perhaps
“there is a case for making climate change denial an offence”. Why?

Because it is a “crime against humanity, after all”. David Roberts,
a journalist for the online magazine Grist, would also like to see
global warming deniers prosecuted like Nazi war criminals. With the
tone of vitriol characteristic of dogmatic inquisitors he has noted
that “we should have war crimes trials for these bastards”, adding
“some sort of climate Nuremberg”.

The arguments used by moral entrepreneurs suggest that denial
constitutes what traditional religion used to classify as sinful or
dangerous ideas. A long time ago theocrats realised that the authority
of their belief system would be reinforced if they insisted that
“God punishes disbelief”. Moreover they also need to be punished
because of the evil impact that their blasphemy has on others. Today’s
inquisitors have taken on board this insight and insist that since
people need to be protected from disbelief its repression is often
depicted as an act of responsible behaviour.

From: Baghdasarian

TSARUKYAN’S PRESS-SECRETARY REPLIES TO ARMENIA’S PRIME MINISTER: ALL THE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE SITUATION IN THE COUNTRY WILL REST THE AUTHORITIES OF ARMENIA

by Tatevik Shahunyan

Monday, February 9, 18:10

The authorities of Armenia are responsible not only for the incident
on beating up of a member of the Prosperous Armenia Party, activist
Artak Khachatryan, but also for the whole situation created in the
country, press-secretary of the PAP Gagik Tsarukyan, Iveta Tonoyan,
told Arminfo correspondent when commenting on Prime Minister Hovik
Abrahamyan’s statement, according to which the possible escalation
of the domestic political situation in Armenia will rest with the
PAP leader Gagik Tsarukyan.

‘The atmosphere of injustice and indefiniteness has been reigning
in Armenia. The migration level has again grown. The economy is
depressed. And the authorities of Armenia are responsible for all
that. Actually, if one wants to learn, who is responsible and for
what, he should ask the community about it. I think that the answer
will be unequivocal”, – Tonoyan concluded.

To note, the responsibility for possible escalation of the domestic
political situation in Armenia, as a result of the emotional and
irresponsible statements of members of the Prosperous Armenia Party,
will rest with the PAP leader Gagik Tsarukyan, Armenia’s Prime Minister
Hovik Abrahamyan said today when commenting on beating up of a member
of the PAP political council, Artak Khachatryan, and the ultimatum
statements of the PAP members after the incident.

Having recalled that Republican Party of Armenia has already condemned
the violence upon Artak Khachatryan, Abrahamyan emphasized that the
statements made by the PAP members after the incident are hasty, harsh
and unacceptable. “I expect that Gagik Tsarukyan should personally
watch the statements made by his party members and their emotional
nonsense, otherwise, we shall be forced to watch these statements as
Tsarukyan’s personal position. In this case, the responsibility for
possible escalation of the domestic political situation in Armenia
will rest with Gagik Tsarukyan”, – Abrahanyan said.

To note, members of the parliament from the PAP made ultimatum
statements during today’s protest actions in front of the government
building and gave a term to the authorities to solve the incident on
beating up of Khachatryan for several days, otherwise the PAP will
demand resignation of several high rank officials.

According to the PAP representatives, Artak Khachatryan, a member of
the PAP Political Council, was abducted by the three unknown in masks
on February 7 in the evening. Several hours later, he was found near
his apartment severely beaten up. PAP has disseminated a statement
over the incident, wherein it strongly condemned the violence against
Khachatryan. The Party blames the political leadership of Armenia for
the incident that happened shortly after Khachatryan took an active
part in the protests against the Law on Turnover Tax.

From: Baghdasarian

TURKISH INTELLECTUALS WHO HAVE RECOGNIZED THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE: DILEK KURBAN

By MassisPost
Updated: February 8, 2015

By Hambersom Aghbashian

Dr. Dilek Kurban received her bachelor’s degree in political science
and international relations from Bogazici University, Istanbul. She
received her master’s in international affairs in human rights from
Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs,
and her Jurist Doctor degree from Columbia Law School. Between 1999
and 2001, she worked as an associate political affairs officer at
the Security Council Affairs Division of the UN Dept. of Political
Affairs in NY. Currently, she is the program officer for the (TESEV)*,
and an adjunct professor of law at the Political Science Department
of Bogazici University. She is an editor for Agos, a Turkish-Armenian
bilingual weekly and a founding member of the Diyarbakir Institute
for Political and Social Research. She has published in the areas of
minority and human rights in Turkey, international displacement in
Turkey, and on European minority and human rights law.(1)

According to “aghet1915.wordpress.com”, Dilek Kurban is one of the
Turkish intellectuals who have recognized the Armenian genocide.(2)

Dilek Kurban was criticized by “” an
Anti-Genocide recognition source, which categorized her as one of the
most prominent turncoats, because of her recognition of the Armenian
Genocide.(3)

Talia Jebejian wrote on April 25, 2001, “Approximately 140 people,
primarily of Armenian and Turkish descent, gathered to participate in A
Psycho-spiritual and Educational Dialogue Between People of Armenian
and Turkish Descent, sponsored by the Armenian American Society
for Studies on Stress and Genocide (AASSSG) and co-sponsored by the
International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies (ISTSS) NY Chapter,
The World Federation for Mental Health (WFMH) and Fordham University.

This open dialogue was held in commemoration of the 86th Anniversary
of the Ottoman Turkish Genocide of the Armenians and was met with
overwhelming success. Rational and intellectual dialogue was presented
and exchanged between the panelists and audience members, resulting
in a positive step toward reconciliation between Turkish citizens
and Armenians.” She added a list of The facilitators of the program
and The panelists participating in it. Dilek Kurban was mentioned as
one of the participants.(4)

“hakikatadalethafiza.org.”, wrote under “Background, Situation
Analysis”: Turkey and its historic and legal predecessors have a
longstanding track record of human rights violations…, Just in
the last 100 years, widespread violations were committed in several
different periods… The most notable ones were the Armenian genocide
of 1915. An estimated 1.5 million Armenians were killed or deported
from the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1917. The Republic of Turkey,
even though it is a legal successor of the Ottoman Empire, never
acknowledged the campaign of persecution of Armenians as genocide. In
Dilek Kurban’s book “Reparations and Displacement in Turkey, Lessons
Learned from the Compensation Law, Int. Center for Transitional Justice
and LSE – Brookings, July 2012”, it is stated that “Although it can be
noted that countries that have the responsibility for massive abuses
effectively take on a huge financial and administrative burden by
a formal recognition, this cannot be used as an argument to avoid
such responsibility.”(5)

Under the title “JUDICIARY AND STATE BEHIND ALIENATION OF NON-MUSLIMS”,
Today’s Zaman wrote on March 16 2009, “Turkey’s non-Muslim communities
have been alienated, and it was done by the state and judiciary,
said the writers of a new report revealing the facts behind the real
estate ownership problems of non-Muslim foundations dating from the
Ottoman period.” Zaman quoted Kezban Hatemi, the co-author of the
report, titled “The Story of an Alien(ation): Real Estate Ownership
Problems of Non-Muslim Foundations and Communities in Turkey,” saying
“In the 1930s, it became evident that pushing or directly forcing
the few non-Muslims left in Turkey to abandon the country was an
explicit state policy,” the report was released as part of the
(TESEV)*program. Dilek Kurban, co-author of the report, said that
when Turkey became a candidate for European Union membership, it
became evident that it was not possible to sustain this state policy
toward non-Muslim communities. Kurban started filing lawsuits with
the European Court of Human Rights after exhausting avenues within
the Turkish legal system.”It was no longer easy for the bureaucracy
to take over the assets of non-Muslim foundations, and the government
was expected to take legal action to return or pay indemnity for
seized assets,” Kurban said.(6)

————–

*TESEV : Democratization Program of the Turkish Economic and Social
Studies Foundation 1-
2-
3-
4-
5-
6-

From: Baghdasarian

MUST PICK UP THE GAUNTLET: PROTEST IN SUPPORT OF KIDNAPPED AND BEAT UP ACTIVIST (VIDEO)

02.09.2015 18:06 epress.am

Until society counters the authority’s acts of violence, incidents of
people being subjected to violence will be continues, said Armenian
National Congress (HAK) MP Aram Manukyan in front of the government
building during a solidarity protest for Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK)
political councilor Artak Khachatryan. Khachatryan was kidnapped and
brutally beaten on Saturday.

According to Manukyan, society has to pick up the thrown down gauntlet,
but need to counter attack not through violence like the authorities
do, but by consolidating power through civil and political forces.

BHK faction MP Naira Zohrabyan found it obvious that the attack on
Artak Khachatryan had a political nature and it occurred only after
he joined the Law on Turnover Tax protest movement.

Zohrabyan stressed that such incidents in reality remain undiscovered,
for example, the case of MP Aram Manukyan’s attack, where after the
suspect confessed, his motives were entirely uncredible.

Khachatryan’s brother Artyom Khachatryan, said that he believed his
brother’s attack was connected to his participation in the “Kasetsum”
(Suspend) movement, and not with his connection to the BHK. He said
that today, Artak Khachatryan is already able to give a testimony
to what happened. Note, that dozens of entrepreneurs were present at
the protest, as well as MPs. Many of the participants held placards
writing “We are all Artak.”

After half an hour in front of the government building, the
demonstrators began their rally toward the police and prosecutor’s
office, demanding a fair investigation and that those guilty be
discovered.

From: Baghdasarian