Author: Emil Lazarian

Cyprus Mail, Cyprus
Jan 27 2007

IN MEMORY: HRANT DINK should be awarded every international accolade
possible for peace and co-operation. Not even all the Nobel Peace
Prizes in the world can bring this heroic Armenian journalist back to
life. What was this person’s crime, simply stating the truth about
how Armenian people were massacred a century ago? It’s not that he
wanted to live in the past – just that he wanted to live in the
future with dignity.
The youth who shot Hrant Dink still believes he is right, that’s
perhaps the worst part of his hate crime, not realising his guilt. It
will haunt him for life – whether he likes it or not and whether he
recognises it or not. The same goes for Turkey in not recognising the
plight of the Armenian people. Maintaining blinkered vision will mean
paying a heavy price, not only in terms of the EU but the whole free
thinking democratic world. RiP…

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Cyprus Observer, Cyprus
Jan 27 2007

Thousands mourn for Dink

26.01.2007

In Hrant Dink’s version of Turkey, minorities and Turks lived side by
side, spoke freely of their thoughts, and listened to each other’s
opinions, trying to reach a better future.

By Sebnem Arsu Istanbul

Hrant Dink was a Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, but represented
a noble struggle for the rights and ideals of a population far beyond
his ethnicity, until the last day of his life when a 17-year-old
gunned him down in a crowded street in Istanbul on Friday.
Fury, sadness and helplessness tore through the hearts and minds of
those who knew Dink in person and had seen his love and admiration
for his country as well as his determination to build a better future
for the children of Turkey in his very eyes.
Tens of thousands of mourners poured into the streets to reach the
scene of the crime, in protest of the murder, which shamed the
country, hurt their sense of justice and rekindled fears of the
reawakening of an era of political assassinations that once shadowed,
and still haunt, Turkey’s democratic life.
Dink was the 61st journalist to be assassinated in Turkey since the
beginning of the 20th century, and his killing was not a surprise to
those who felt it coming after reading his last article in Agos
newspaper, printed on the day of his murder:
`The memory of my computer is filled with angry, threatening lines,’
he said. `How real are these threats? To be honest, it is impossible
for me to know for sure.’
`What is truly threatening and unbearable for me is the psychological
torture I place myself in. The question that really gets to me, is:
`What are these people thinking about me?’ Unfortunately I am now
better-known than before and I feel people looking at me, thinking:
`Oh, look, isn’t he that Armenian guy?”
`I am just like a pigeon, equally obsessed by what goes-on on my left
and right, front and back. My head is just as mobile and fast.’
Unfortunately, Hrant Dink’s head didn’t turn to see Ogun Samast
approaching from behind, but security cameras recorded him running
from the scene. His images were displayed all around Turkey the next
day, including in his hometown of Trabzon, where his father went to
the police to report that he recognised his son.
After his capture in a bus station in Samsun en route to Trabzon,
Samast said that he was not sorry and that he had killed an enemy of
the state. As a minor, he was interrogated by a prosecutor assisted
by a psychologist, not the police.

Pamuk threatened by
captured suspect
Yasin Hayal, an ultra-nationalist, who was jailed for 11 months for
bombing a McDonalds’ restaurant in Trabzon, was officially arrested
two days later and charged with inciting Dink’s murder.
As he was being escorted into the prosecutor’s office in Istanbul,
Hayal hurled threats at Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk, who was also
prosecuted on the same charges as Dink last year. `Orhan Pamuk had
better be careful!’ he yelled at cameras, after which the author was
provided protection by the Istanbul police.
Three other suspects from Trabzon were also arrested and charged for
their links to the crime. Who are these people? What is going on in
Trabzon?
It was only a year ago that a 16-year-old boy killed Andrea Santaro,
a Catholic priest in Trabzon. In the same town, between 2004 and 2007
a group of ultranationalists almost lynched a group of left-wing
protesters, two professors were gunned down – one with his 3-year-old
son, and several minor bomb attacks were launched on targets at odds
with nationalists groups.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that the more than 70%
unemployment rate in the city provides fertile grounds for violence
among the frustrated young population. Combined with the widespread
and traditional use of weapons and the popularity of
ultranationalism, there is little room for surprise.
Dink’s trial in 2006 on charges of insulting the Turkish identity was
brought by a group of ultranationalist lawyers who took exception to
his comments on the alleged Armenian genocide and portrayed him as an
enemy of the state, making him an open target to their more militant
brothers.

301 a lynch marker
Zulfu Livaneli, called Dink’s assassination a `301 murder’ in Vatan
newspaper, and condemned the government for letting the law stand,
which, he says, not only hurts Turkey’s efforts to join the EU but
also creates a lynching list of intellectuals.
`Hrant Dink was killed because he was charged with Article 301,
brought to the public eye and shown as a target for being `the
Armenian insulting the Turkish identity’,’ Livaneli wrote.
If only these so-called nationalists could read and listen to what
Dink actually said in his articles or in public speeches they would
be impressed by the true patriotism he represented.
In his ideal version of Turkey, minorities and Turks lived side by
side to bring about a powerful country. People spoke freely of their
thoughts, listened to each other’s opinions in mutual respect and
tried to reach a consensus for a better future for their children.
Borders remained opened between neighbours, regional peace supported
financial and cultural trade. High quality education swept away
ignorance in rural Turkey when books were filtered of cheap
nationalistic propaganda that served no purpose other than to incite
hatred between diverse ethnicities.
In realisation of a dream Dink couldn’t achieve while alive, senior
Turkish and Armenian officials joined together at his funeral on
Tuesday in a rare display of unity and cooperation. Spiritual leaders
of the Armenian community around the world as well as the Armenian
Deputy Foreign Minister Arman Kirakossian, and Karen Mirzoyan,
Armenia’s permanent representative at the Organisation of the Black
Sea Economic Cooperation, were seated behind the few senior Turkish
government officials present.

Top state officials absent
In a lost opportunity to address all of the major issues Turkey faces
today, and that the assassination pointed out, President Ahmet Necdet
Sezer, on principle, chose not to attend the funeral while Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan attended the opening of a highway
tunnel instead and Minister of Foreign Affairs Abdullah Gul cited
scheduling conflicts. A chance to make a symbolic gesture in support
of real progress on the subjects of EU membership, minority rights
and freedom of expression, as well as malfunctions in the rule of
law, was lost.
It was the first appearance of senior Armenian officials in a public
event in Turkey since relations soured in 1993, when borders were
closed and diplomatic relations were frozen over a dispute over the
Nagorno-Karabakh region, which Armenia claims but Turkey recognises
as Azerbaijan territory.
The true heart of the dispute between the countries, however, is over
the terminology to be used in defining mass killings of Armenians
around 1915, which many countries consider to have been genocide.
Dink’s suggestion had been to adopt a brand new terminology in order
to overcome prejudices and start a dialogue.
Turkey’s stance has been that an inter-governmental history
commission should be formed of envoys from both sides to analyse the
issues, while Armenia expressed willingness to participate in such a
discussion but insisted that the border must be reopened to trade
before it would join.

Tragedy may lead to
dialogue
Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister Kirakossian’s statement in Istanbul
on Wednesday, however, set a tone that could pave the way for a brand
new era in bilateral relations. Impressed by the size and the
diversity of the crowd that attended the three days of public
protests and the funeral, he said that Armenia was unconditionally
ready to revive diplomatic relations with Turkey, the semi official
Anatolian Agency reported on Wednesday.
His statement was partially echoed in Turkish Foreign Minister Gul’s
carefully worded statement in Ankara the same day. `Today, we improve
our relations with all our neighbours on the basis of mutual trust
and respect,’ he said. `Of course, we wish to improve relations also
with Armenia.’
`If any progress can be achieved to revive diplomatic relations
between the two countries, it would be one of the biggest dreams of
Hrant Dink coming true,’ Aydin Engin, a writer of the Agos newspaper,
said with cautious optimism. `These statements can be considered as
the first steps in breaking the mutual years’ of long silence.’
Ultranationalist groups eager to mark minorities who lived on
Anatolian soil for hundreds of years as enemies of the state should
realise that there are millions more behind the thousands of people
who attended Dink’s funeral on Wednesday.
It is the responsibility of the Turkish state to bring to all its
people a proper education and training in the basic principles of
democracy, which will ultimately reign in Turkey, despite the forces
of ignorance and short-sightedness.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

amNewYork, New York
Jan 27 2007

‘Screamers’ remembers genocide
By Jay Carr

January 26, 2007

Before there was Hitler’s Holocaust, there was Turkey’s, where 1.5
million Armenians were exterminated between 1915 and 1923. Who, asked
Hitler on the eve of his genocide, remembers the Armenians?

"Screamers," Carla Garapedian’s documentary driven by the abrasive
metal uproar of the band System of a Down, does. And she wants us to,
as well. When she and the band, comprised of descendants of Armenian
genocide victims, aren’t busy taking Turkey to task, they raise other
inconvenient questions, lapped up by young audiences receptive to
anti-establishment edge.

If the Armenian genocide had been protested, or even questioned, one
band member asks, who’s to say that Cambodia, Bosnia, Rwanda, Darfur
and the Holocaust might not have been mitigated? As even Turkish
writers (Orhan Pamuk, Taner Ackam) boldly question the long silence,
the band’s outcry keeps the pressure on countries (including the
U.S.) to put geopolitcal expediency aside and lean on Turkey, where
the issue is met with denial and repression. As the concert footage
bumps heads with the archival footage, "Screamers" keeps the issue
alive like a hot coal.

SCREAMERS. Documentary by Carla Garapedian

eamers,0,6861007.story?coll=am-entertainment-utili ty

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Today’s Zaman, Turkey –
Jan 27 2007

Erdogan noncommittal on changes to Article 301

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has declined to give
assurance to the EU over changing Article 301 of the Turkish Penal
Code (TCK) but reaffirmed that his government was open to idea of
amending the article.
The EU has bitterly criticized Article 301, saying it restricts
freedom of expression, but Turkey has so far avoided taking steps to
directly amend it. Pressure on the government to change the
controversial article, under which numerous writers, intellectuals
and journalists have landed in court, has been increasing since the
murder of a Turkish-Armenian newspaper editor.
Hrant Dink, editor-in-chief of the bilingual Agos newspaper, was shot
dead by a 17-year-old assailant outside his office on Friday. He had
been tried under Article 301 for "insulting Turkishness" and
sentenced to a six-month suspended imprisonment for an article he
wrote about an alleged genocide of Armenians at the hands of the
Ottoman Empire.
Turkey’s top business group, the Turkish Industrialists and
Businessmen’s Association (TÜSİAD), and the Parliamentary
Assembly of the Council of Europe have raised concerns over the
article.
Ambassadors of EU countries, meeting with Erdogan at a dinner on
Wednesday evening in Ankara, clearly expressed the bloc’s
expectations for changes to Article 301, according to the private
ANKA news agency.
Erdogan made no reference to Article 301 in his speech to the
ambassadors but touched on the issue in a question-and-answer
session. Responding to the diplomats’ questions, Erdogan
repeated the line of his government and said most of the problems
stemmed from the way the law was implemented.
He also complained that the EU had not expressed any concern over
Article 301 in its preparatory stage and added that some EU member
countries also had similar laws in their national codes.
The EU continues to have firm expectations that Article 301 be
amended, but some ambassadors showed "understanding" toward the
Turkish government’s position, given that two critical elections lay
ahead, according to ANKA.
Presidential elections are scheduled for May and parliamentary
elections will take place in November. But in his speech,
Erdogan said the upcoming elections would not affect the
government’s determination for reforms.
In comments on Dink’s killing, Erdogan said the attack was
against Turkey. During Dink’s funeral, up to 100,000 people gathered
in Istanbul to attend and carried banners reading "We are all
Armenians" and "We are all Hrant Dink."
"Turkey is the inheritor of a great civilization that embraced people
of different races and faiths for centuries," Erdogan told the
ambassadors.

27.01.2007

Ankara Today’s Zaman with wires

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Today, Azerbaijan
Jan 27 2007

Araz Azimov: "Gukasyan and others should understand that the better
life and defense of their rights can be ensured in Azerbaijan"

27 January 2007 [01:48] – Today.Az

"Arkady Gukasyan and others should understand that Azerbaijan is
developing and better life, the protection of rights of Armenians can
only be ensured in being in the composite of Azerbaijan. To come to
joint opinion with Mr. Merzlyakov and with some others does not mean
that the positions of the sides in the settlement of the conflict are
the same," Deputy Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Araz Azimov said when
commenting on the issue whether Kosovo variant is precedent for
Azerbaijan.

Saying that Russian co-chair Yuri Merzlyakov has his own agenda;
deputy minister stressed that to say something in the frame of this
agenda does not mean that Azerbaijani side will adopt it.

"The settlement of Kosovo problem has not completed yet and
Azerbaijan and some members of international society consider that
proposed model for the settlement of the Kosovo conflict should be
satisfactory for both sides. At the same time, Azerbaijani side
thinks that NK’s belonging to Azerbaijan is not under question," he
said.

The deputy minister touched on further meetings in the framework of
the settlement of the conflict and noted that the date has not been
set yet.

The official did not rule out the meeting of the presidents either.

"Azerbaijani side will be ready to negotiations on condition of
concrete motives for discussions," he said. APA

URL:

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Golos Armenii, Yerevan,
27 Jan 2007

Armenian army strongest in region – military aide

The Armenian army is well-trained and well-equipped, a top military
aide to the Armenian president has said. Col-Gen Gurgen Dalibaltayan,
the chief inspector of the Armenian army, said that according to
international experts, the Armenian army is the strongest one in the
South Caucasus region. He also said that while some of the service
personnel serve on a contract basis in the army, the Armenian army
will not become a fully professional one in the near future, The
following is an excerpt from Zara Gevorgyan’s report by the Armenian
newspaper Golos Armenii on 27 January headlined "We were waging a
liberation war and at the same time, setting up an army in the home
front":

The adviser to the Armenian president and the chief military
inspector of the Republic of Armenia, Col-Gen Gurgen Dalibaltayan,
has answered questions put by a Golos Armenii correspondent.

[Correspondent] Gurgen Harutyunovich, the Armenian army will
celebrate its 15th anniversary on 28 January. Let’s recall how
everything started and how the Armenian army formed, grew and
strengthened out of several militia detachments.

[Dalibaltayan] In May 1991, the Armenian government set up a defence
committee that started putting together detachments of volunteers and
planned, directed and organized the range and zone of their
activities.

…

[Correspondent] We often proudly say that the Armenian army is the
strongest and most organized one in the region.

[Dalibaltayan] This is what international experts say, who, when
comparing the armed forces of the South Caucasus countries, have
always put the Armenian army in the first place. Recently, a Western
military specialist said that there are "armed forces in Georgia and
Azerbaijan, and an army in Armenia". What is the difference? If you
give weapons to any grouping it will sooner or later become "an armed
force", while a classic army is a far deeper and complete notion.

[Correspondent] So, we proudly say that our army is the strongest in
the region. However, time goes on. Foreigners invest a lot of money
in the Georgian army; Azerbaijan’s army expenses grow constantly.
Should I continue my question?

[Dalibaltayan] No, it is clear. The Americans have assumed the
patronage of the Georgian army and train it in the NATO style.
However, that type of an army is not too strong, and the sense of
patriotism (the most important thing) is far weaker compared to the
army that is established in its own homeland and rests on the
experience of generations and the strength of its soil. Today
Azerbaijan is able to spend a lot of money on its military, but
having top military hardware does not mean having a top army. We
spend less, but the money is strictly directed (for the needs of
troops, weapons and replacement of obsolete weapons with new ones)
without wasting money on secondary goals. Armenia really has an army
the military might of which is the key condition for peace.

[Correspondent] Do we have domestic weaponry manufactured here in
Armenia?

[Dalibaltayan] Armenia has appropriate factories. We, however, buy
weapons from Russia because it is cheaper to do so. It is more
expensive to manufacture them here than import them. However, we can
always manufacture rifles, mortars; to cut it short, everything but
heavy hardware. There is nothing to worry about in that respect; we
can have everything we need. By the way, there are also repair
facilities in Armenia, which are constantly modernized. Military
hardware is constantly modernized in those facilities in accordance
with new modern technologies.

[Correspondent] Is Armenia going to manufacture hardware in the
future?

[Dalibaltayan] It is envisaged in the plan of mobilization training.

[Correspondent] I know that the service personnel of some units will
serve as contractors. Tell me more about it.

[Dalibaltayan] It is true. These will be people who have served in
the army and transferred into reserve. They will continue working as
contractors. Therefore, as you understand, we are not increasing the
personnel. Those units currently serve on our state borders, while
the young serve inside Armenian territory. However, it is very
difficult to implement that system completely. The Americans made
their army professional only after the Vietnam War. And that country
is very rich. That kind of a change for an army is a very expensive
process, which we cannot afford at this stage. However, it is worth
it because having a professional army is better in the long run. This
is, however, in the future. At this stage, it is better for us to
accumulate mobilization resources.

The Daily Star, Lebanon
Jan 26 2007

Turkey is changing, despite Dink’s murder
By Rayyan al-Shawaf
Commentary by
Friday, January 26, 2007

Less than a week before Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was
assassinated, his compatriot Orhan Pamuk, winner of the 2006 Nobel
Prize in Literature, was made editor-in-chief for a day at Radikal, a
small but influential newspaper. In a front-page article, Pamuk drew
attention to the throngs of security personnel needed to ensure that
Greek Orthodox religious ceremonies, considered provocative by
Turkish ultra-nationalists, passed without incident. The lead
article, however, discussed the persecution of writers and
intellectuals in Turkey. Pamuk focused on Nazim Hikmet (1902-1963),
Turkey’s poet laureate, who was vilified in the press for his
communist convictions and spent his last years in exile.

It is ironic that the assassination of Dink should have come so close
on the heels of Pamuk’s lament, as though to confirm the continued
vulnerability of Turkish writers. Yet the outpouring of grief and
condemnation by Turks of virtually all political stripes signaled a
major shift in the public’s perception of free speech. This political
maturation may lead to pressure on the state to further enshrine
intellectual freedoms.

Many of the reforms Turkey has recently pushed through have
admittedly come at the behest of the European Union, which is using
its leverage with membership-hungry Turkey to spur democratic change.
Yet Turkish intellectuals have played a leading role in challenging
taboos. And though much of this activism has traditionally emanated
from the political left, even this trend may be changing. After all,
the ruling Justice and Development Party – which has accelerated
Turkey’s reform drive – is conservative in orientation. Many of its
prominent members – including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan –
have roots in political Islam. The right itself, whether nationalist
or Islamist, is not monolithic. Alongside the mainstream media’s
condemnation of Dink’s assassination, the headline of the Islamist
newspaper Yeni Safak read: "Our Hrant is Murdered." Make no mistake:
Political culture in Turkey is changing.

This has been a long time coming. Over half a century ago, Hikmet
made a moving – albeit brief – reference to the slaughter of
Armenians in his poem "Evening Stroll." World-renowned Turkish
novelist Yasar Kemal, who is of Kurdish origin, repeatedly condemned
his country’s treatment of its Kurdish minority, and was jailed on
several occasions. Beginning in 1977, Ragip Zarakolu and his wife
Ayse Nur Zarakolu, who died in 2002, used their Belge Publishing
House to release trailblazing works dealing with minorities in
Turkey. And in 2005 Pamuk condemned the silence regarding treatment
of Armenians and Kurds.

Dink himself openly called the massacres of Armenians in 1915-1918 a
genocide, something unthinkable in the 1980s and 1990s, when the
Armenian question didn’t exist in Turkey. Indeed, in those days it
was considered treasonous to take a stand for Kurdish rights, a
position which has since become commonplace. Parliamentarian Leyla
Zana spent 1994-2004 in jail, in part for having addressed the
Turkish Parliament in Kurdish. Laws restricting communication in
Kurdish and other languages were softened in 2002.

In recent years, a number of Turkish academics have addressed the
Armenian tragedy, exposing painful truths and urging their
compatriots to acknowledge the suffering of the Armenians. Many of
these scholars were involved in a landmark event in 2005, the
ramifications of which continue to reverberate in Turkey.

It was in September 2005, at Istanbul’s Bilgi University, that a
twice-delayed conference dedicated to discussing "Ottoman Armenians
during the decline of the Empire" was finally convened. The
conference, which brought together Turkish academics from around the
world, represented the first "official" attempt by a Turkish body to
deal with the Armenian question. Claims of genocide were openly
discussed. No outstanding issues were resolved, but the "final taboo"
had been broken.

The Turkish government, eager to emphasize its belief in free
intellectual inquiry, gave its full support to the idea of the
symposium. When ultra-nationalist pressure threatened to scuttle the
conference, Erdogan intervened to guarantee that it take place.

There was opposition to the event, yet much had happened to stoke
public curiosity in Armenian issues. In 2004, a Turkish-language book
with the bland title "My Grandmother" appeared on bookshelves. It
would spark widespread interest in a long-suppressed facet of Turkish
history: the conversion of thousands of Armenians to Islam in the
waning days of the Ottoman Empire as a means of escaping persecution.
The author, Fethiye Cetin, related how her grandmother was adopted
and raised by a Turkish Muslim family after her kin had been killed.
Thanks to the book, acknowledgment by many Turks of their Armenian
heritage started to become acceptable. Fittingly, Cetin, a lawyer by
trade, served as Dink’s counsel in his constant battles with the
judiciary, which prosecuted him for "insulting Turkishness."

Reformist intellectuals have long agonized over how to confront this
issue of Turkishness. Acclaimed British novelist Moris Farhi, who is
of Turkish-Jewish origin, has one of his characters make the
following claim in his novel "Young Turk" of 2004: "True Turkishness
means rejoicing in the infinite plurality of people as we rejoice in
the infinite multiplicity of nature!" Then, not without irony, the
same character pursues this line of thought to its logical
conclusion: "It means rejecting all the ‘isms’ and ‘nesses’ –
including Turkishness."

Will Turkey succeed in disentangling ethnicity from Turkishness? Can
Turkishness become inclusive enough to embrace groups – like Kurds,
Armenians, and others – that are not ethnically Turkish? If so, this
will likely remove one of the last major impediments to a thorough
reappraisal of Turkish history. For if ethnic nationalism ceases to
be the ideological glue of the country, recognizing the history of
non-Turkish groups will no longer be perceived as threatening to
national unity. Perhaps then Turkey can fully integrate people who
have for centuries constituted a part of Ottoman and now Turkish
society.

Rayyan al-Shawaf is a freelance writer and reviewer based in Beirut.
He wrote this commentary for THE DAILY STAR.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

A Promising Armenian Questionnaire
by Abdulhamit Bilici
Today’s Zaman
Jan. 27, 2007

aberno=101233

I never expected to see hope of a thaw in Turkish-Armenian relations
occur in a platform controlled by diaspora Armenians.

You may call it bias or lack of trust, but I believe this feeling is
shared by many Turks as a result of the diaspora’s uninterrupted
efforts to convict Turkey of a shameful crime all over the world; from
Paris to Buenos Aires, from Washington to Strausbourg. Even if there
exists hope that Turkey will one day have good relations with Armenia,
most Turks don’t expect the same with the diaspora.

This sign of hope emerged when I saw the results of a questionnaire
posted by armeniadiaspora.com. It is a credible diaspora website, at
least in the eyes of Armenians, because the Armenian Foreign Ministry
has a link to that site on its homepage. It is a platform where the
Armenian diaspora exchanges opinions gets community news, lobbies for
their causes, etc.

The questionnaire’s aim was to understand the impact of Hrant Dink’s
slaying on Turkish-Armenian relations.

One question asks, "Do you think that slaying of Hrant Dink a) makes
dialogue between Armenia and Turkey impossible, b) is another step
toward denial of an Armenian genocide or c) makes dialogue between
Armenia and Turkey easier, especially considering the reaction to the
murder in both countries."

When I was writing this piece, 61 percent of the participants were
saying that Dink’s slaying will help Turkish-Armenian relations.

It was a good decision for the Turkish government to turn tragedy into
opportunity by inviting leading figures from Armenia and the Armenian
diaspora to the ceremony. The reactions of those who witnessed Dink’s
funeral were also in line with that statistic.

For instance, Samson Ozararat, who is part of the Armenian diaspora in
France and an adviser to the Armenian foreign minister, attended the
funeral. He was hopeful as he expressed his feelings about the event:
"What I saw in the funeral was encouraging. The funeral did most of
what Hrant was trying to do in his life. All the colors of Anatolia
met in the funeral."

Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister Arman Kirakosyan also attended to the
funeral and made a statement declaring their readiness "to establish
diplomatic relations with Turkey with no preconditions."

Indeed, in the past Turks have seen positive results coming from
disasters in their foreign policy. One of the most recent and sounding
examples of that was the terrible 1999 earthquake, which rescued
Turkish-Greek relations. Both sides of the Aegean tried to help each
other, creating positive feelings in both capitals. This happened
despite the fact that terrorist organization Kurdistan Workers’ Party
(PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan was caught in the Greek embassy in Kenya
in the same year.

Similarly, we saw an earthquake play an important role in relations
between India and Pakistan.

However, such tragedies have the potential only to change people’s
minds, an essential but not sufficient factor in making big leaps
toward radical decisions. If this positive environment is not
supported by politicians and foreign ministries, it will be hard to
expect an end in the deadlock between Armenia and Turkey.

Because of this, Ankara is in a difficult position to convince its
Azeri brother that good relations between Turkey and Armenia can
benefit both countries. On the Turkish side, it may get the genocide
tool out of the hands of Western capitals. On the Azeri side, Turkey
may have bigger leverage over Yerevan to end its occupation of
Nagorno-Karabakh, a part of Azerbaijan. But this is not an easy task
for any Turkish politician, irrespective of their ideology, especially
when Armenia and the Armenian diaspora continue encouraging Western
parliaments to pass laws condemning Turkey and occupy 20 percent of
Azerbaijan.

Under these circumstances, let’s hope that at least civil society, the
media and intellectuals on both sides can interact more and learn each
other’s true thoughts.

[email protected]_ (mailto:[email protected])

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

When bad things give way to good ones
by Kerim Balci
Today’s Zaman
January 27, 2007

.do?haberno=3D101176

Turkish Muslim tradition abounds in stories with no historical
credibility but with fine morals to be learned. This one I love the
most. It happens that Omar, the second caliph, was sleeping in his bed
and was awakened by a foreigner shaking him awake. Omar was shocked to
see a stranger by his bedside calling him to wake up for the morning
prayer. "Who are you, in my bedroom?" asked Omar. "I am
Satan,"replied the stranger. "Why on earth Satan would wake me up for
the morning prayer?" Omar asked with skepticism. Satan explained:
"Yesterday you couldn’t wake up for the morning prayer. But then, all
day long, you cried so sincerely and repented with such a broken heart
that I realized your penitence was more valuable to Allah than your
morning prayer. So, I didn’t want you to miss one more morning prayer,
and cry and repent again." The moral of this story overlaps with the
Muslim belief that good things may stem from things we think to be
evil.

Turkey was shaken by the murder of Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant
Dink.

But an instantaneous outcry came from the souls of the nation
condemning the murder, condoling the family of Dink and his
co-patriots, sharing their sympathies with the minorities of this
country, to a point that one is tempted to say Dink’s death served to
the betterment of Turkish-Armenian relations more than his life. This
is not naïve optimism about the future of relations, neither a hidden
nationalism trying to praise the Turkish public’s response to the
murder while belittling the fact that Dink was slain at the hands of a
Turkish national. This is a realistic appraisal of the situation:
Turkish-Armenian relations will never be the same, and Hrant Dink’s
death is going to start a new era not only in state level relations
but also at the level of interpersonal perceptions.

As I started with a parable, let me finish with another: Once a
caravan traveling through the deserts of Arabia came upon a lonely old
man left todie in the fierce conditions. The chieftain of the caravan
pitied the old man and took him into his caravan, giving the poor man
a camel to ride. Days passed and a group of robbers accosted the
caravan and took whatever valuables they had. Before leaving, the head
of the robbers asked if they had left anything behind. The old man
said something rather strange and told the robbers that the chieftain
of the caravan had a silk shirt under his coat. The robbers took that
shirt also. The chieftain was furious with the old man, who had
replied to his generosity with such treason. Eventually the caravan
reached a cityand heard at the gates of the city that some robbers
were caught, if they were one of those caravans robbed then they
should go and reclaim their affairs from the police. Upon hearing
this, the chieftain asked the old man the reason for his treason. The
wise man replied: "Son, the eyes of my heart are open. I realized that
these robbers had done so many bad things and aroused the anger of
Allah that, they only needed to rob only an extra silk shirt to be
punished by God. So I let them steal that extra shirt…"

Hrant Dink was that extra shirt. Hopefully the last "robbed" life to
arouse enough awareness and willingness to further democratize this
country, to fight ultra-nationalism, xenophobia, Turkish and Armenian
fascism, and allkinds of ‘otherification’ attempts imposed upon the
minorities…

27.01.2007
_k.balci@todayszaman .com_ (mailto:[email protected])

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

PanARMENIAN.Net

During 15 years troops protecting Artsakh became most efficient army in region
27.01.2007 13:57 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The Chairman of the National Assembly of the
Republic of Armenia Tigran Torosyan sent a congratulatory message on
the occasion of the 15th anniversary of the Armed Forces of RA, the NA
Press Office reports. Particularly, the message says, `Dear
compatriots, 15 years ago it would seem impossible that during such a
short period of time the troops protecting Artsakh will became the
best, the most efficient army in the region. Today it’s an
indisputable fact, which was provided by heroic endurance of our
nation, by devotion of thousands of sons of Armenian nation, by
courageous service to the fatherland. The pride and admiration by the
existence of the army, which has honorably overcome all severities of
war and peace, is a one more cause to pay tribute and gratitude to
sons of our nation, who bravely passed the heroic way for the sake of
founding the Army-the guarantee of peaceful life of our nation,
freedom, security and integrity of the fatherland. I congratulate our
nation, officers and soldiers on the occasion of the 15th anniversary
of our glorious army.’

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress