Author: Harutyunian Christine

Journal of Turkish Weekly, Turkey
April 25 2005

President Kocharian: 1915 Responsible for Our Economic and Spiritual
Problems

The ceremonies in commemoration of the 90th anniversary of what the
Armenians claim was a genocide in 1915 commenced in Yerevan on
Saturday evening with a march, and continued on until Sunday morning,
when wreaths were placed at a statue to Armenians who died in 1915.
It was hoped that half of Armenia’s population, or 1.5 million
people, would gather in the streets for Saturday evening’s march.

According to members of the foreign press corps present however, the
marchers numbered somewhere in the hundreds of thousands. In a speech
at the march, Armenian President Robert Kocharian said “Turkey,
responsible for the genocide, has surprised not only us, but the rest
of the world, with its refusal to recognize and take responsibility
for the genocide.”

Kocharian blamed the events of 1915 for Armenia’s current financial
situation, saying “The genocide altered the fate of the Armenian
people. Rather than developing normally, Armenia’s financial and
spiritual road was disrupted.”

Dr. Nilgun Gulcan from ISRO finds Kocharian’s statement as a ‘part of
domestic politics’.

“A president cannot balme foreign forces for everything goes wrong.
He as the leader of Armenia for almost a decade should be responsible
for someting. Yet he prefers the easiest way: He blames the Turks to
curtail all the problems Armenians face. However the real responsible
for the economic problems of Armenia is the current Armenian
administration. The source of the Armenian spiritual problems is the
Armenian Diaspora. Ter-Petrosyan knew that the Turks and Turkey could
help Armenia to survive. Thus he tried to close two nations.
Kocharian on the other hand is now on the wrong way. He just accuses.
The Diaspora just tries to harm Turkish interests. Nobody accept his
or her responsibility” added Dr. Gulcan.

Protests All Over

At the same time, ceremonies commemorating the Armenians’ day took
place in many European capital cities. Armenians living in Iran
gathered in front of a church in Tehran and shouted slogans against
Turkey. In Athens, Greek Interior Minister Prokopis Pavlopolous spoke
at a meeting in commemoration of the 90th anniversary of the
so-called genocide in the Atikkon Cinema.

Pan Armenian News

POLISH SPEAKER: TURKISH DOCUMENTS PROVE THERE WAS GENOCIDE OF ARMENIANS

22.04.2005 08:47

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The Polish Sejm acknowledging the Armenian Genocide does
not imply anything anti-Turkish, Polish Parliament Speaker Vladimir
Timoshevich stated. In his words, it becomes harder and harder for Turkey to
put off with the historical reality. When commenting on the fact of the
Turkish authorities having sent a letter to the Polish Parliament, censuring
the acknowledgement of the Armenian Genocide, Timoshevich noted, «Turkish
authorities do not wish to account for their own discrimination against the
Armenians.» «As of the question whether there was a genocide or not and
whether Turkey is guilty – there is no doubt and Turkish documents confirm
it,» Timoshevich underscored. «I understand it is psychologically hard for
Turks, moreover that the events took place 90 years ago,» Timoshevich noted.
However, in his words, such a response by Turkey is «incorrect and I do not
accept such criticism.» Simultaneously he noted that it is not in interests
of both Turkey and Poland not to drive the matter to discord over the
historical issue. «There is no sense in it,» the Speaker noted. «The Turkish
Foreign Ministry has done what it considered necessary on its part, however
I hope that in a few days the problem will not be available any more,» he
accentuated.

FRENCH AND ARMENIAN LEADERS TO PAY HOMAGE TO MASSACRE VICTIMS

Agence France Presse
Thursday, 21 April 2005

PARIS, April 21 (AFP) – Presidents Jacques Chirac of France and Robert
Kocharian of Armenia will lay a wreath Friday at a Paris monument
commemorating the victims of the massacres of Armenians by the Ottoman
Turkish authorities which began 90 years ago, Chirac’s office said.

The two men will hold talks at the Elysee palace at 5:45 p.m. (15H45
GMT) before being driven to the monument on the banks of the river
Seine which was inaugurated in 2003.

Armenia will this weekend mark the 90th anniversary of what it calls
the genocide perpetrated between 1915 and 1917.

Some 1.5 million people may have died in the massacres, though
the Turkish government puts the figure at between 250,000 and half
a million.

The French parliament adopted a controversial law in 2001 which states
that “France publicly recognises the Armenian genocide.”

France has a large community of Armenians, estimated at around 400,000.

Azeri official critical of mediators’ call for compromise on Karabakh

Trend news agency
19 Apr 05

Baku, 19 April: Baku has its own perception of the calls for a
compromise in the statements of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairmen
addressed to the Azerbaijani and Armenian people, the head of
the foreign relations department of the Azerbaijani presidential
administration, Novruz Mammadov, has said. In his view, such
statements run counter to the mission and powers of the mediators in
the Karabakh talks.

“We do not have to do what the mediators say. They are only mediators
in settling the conflict and should do their job. We do not need
their statements addressed to both nations,” Mammadov said. In his
opinion, the co-chairmen should address this statement to the Armenian
leadership and people.

There can be no talk of fundamental concessions on the part of Baku,
Mammadov said.

“Our position is firm – Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity must be
ensured, the occupied districts must be liberated and refugees must
return to their native land. Should there be a concession within this
framework, Azerbaijan will consider that and take a decision,” he said.

Speaking on the process of resolution, Mammadov said that the talks
benefit Azerbaijan.

“In this way, Baku demonstrates diplomatic supremacy, whereas
Yerevan is unable to go beyond political atavism. Armenia is in a
tight corner. They cannot take a decision independently. For them the
situation will not become normal regardless of whether they conduct
negotiations or not,” he said.

Commenting on separate meetings between the foreign ministers of
Azerbaijan and Armenia and the Minsk Group co-chairmen, Mammadov said
that the format of the negotiations was not to be changed. If this
does happen, this will be an indicator of the mood of the Armenian
side, he said.

He also touched on the fate of an OSCE fact-finding mission’s report
on the settlement of Armenians in the occupied territories. He reckons
that the topic is open for discussion in the UN, and on the other hand,
repeat visits of the mission to the region are possible.

Azeri president notes increased EU attention to Karabakh conflict

Azad Azarbaycan TV, Baku
19 Apr 05

[Presenter] The attention of the European Union to the resolution
of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict has increased, [Azerbaijani]
President Ilham Aliyev said at a meeting with a delegation of the
EU-Azerbaijan parliament cooperation committee.

The president said that the work of the EU special representative in
connection with the problem is an indicator of this attention.

For her part, the head of the delegation, (?Maria Ashler Bequin),
said that during her visit to Azerbaijan, she visited displaced people
who have settled in Barda District and witnessed that they live in
intolerable conditions.

[Video showed the meeting]

Russia boosting presence in Caucasus to counter US influence – Azeri expert

Ayna, Baku
19 Apr 05

Text of C. Sumarinli report by Azerbaijani newspaper Ayna on 19
April headlined “Russia is setting up two more military bases against
Azerbaijan” and subheaded “Baku’s agreement to US military bases has
prompted Moscow to intensify its political activities”

Russia intends to set up two new military bases in Armenia by the end
of 2007, Ayna newspaper has learnt from Russian military sources. One
of the bases is to be located in Noyemberyan District and the other
on the southern shore of the Goyca [Sevan] Lake.

Russian Defence Minister Sergey Ivanov is set to visit Armenia in
June to tackle some of the issues (financial, technical and so on)
brought about by the deployment of the bases, the sources said.

A special delegation from Russia will visit Armenia in the next
few days to inspect the areas where the bases will be stationed,
the Russian sources said.

Experts reckon that Moscow’s intention is to counter US hegemony in
the South Caucasus, ensure that Armenia becomes an “eternal outpost” of
Russia and prevent any possibility of a “velvet revolution” in Armenia.

It is very likely that the military bases withdrawn from Georgia
will be located in Armenia, Col (retd) Ildirim Mammadov said in an
interview with Ayna. “Russia will soon move its military bases from
Georgia to Armenia. In return for this “favour”, Moscow may secure an
“arms corridor” through Georgia [to Armenia],” Mammadov said.

Experts reckon that the choice of Noyemberyan District and the southern
part of the Goyca Lake for the military bases is no coincidence. “For
example, it is possible to control Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia and
the eastern provinces of Turkey from Noyemberyan,” Mammadov said. He
added that the bases may be built soon.

This vile intention of Russia may create a serious obstacle for
resolving the Azerbaijani-Armenian conflict, the colonel said. “Against
the background of Western support for Azerbaijan, Russia would not
like to see Armenia – its strategic ally – defeated. At best, this
may result in the protracted settlement of the Karabakh conflict, and
in the worst case scenario, this may lead to Karabakh’s alienation
from Azerbaijan,” Mammadov said. He fears that if Russia’s presence
in Armenia grows stronger, this may result in a change – unfavourable
for Azerbaijan – in the arms arsenal of the Karabakh separatists.

Against the background of these realities, Azerbaijan has to make a
definite strategic choice, Mammadov said. “Baku must openly say whom
it chooses and what it wants. Only in this case, can we change the
direction of processes to our advantage,” he said.

Experts believe that Russia’s plans concerning Armenia must be regarded
as a fear that NATO military bases may be deployed in Georgia and
Azerbaijan. To recap, the Baku government – at the level of foreign
ministers – no longer rules out the deployment of American military
bases in Azerbaijan.

In this context, the anxiety of Russia’s Caspian Sea Fleet commander
Vice-Adm Yuriy Startsev, who will leave Baku today, is easy to
understand. “I am against the military presence of countries from
outside the region in the Caspian. Countries should deal with their
own problems themselves,” Startsev said while commenting on the US
plans regarding the “Caspian guard”. Implementing such a programme
in the Caspian may shift the balance of forces, he said.

It seems that Azerbaijan is turning into a battlefield of a serious
strategic competition between superpowers. What will be the ultimate
result of the “conflict” depends on the political steps taken by the
Baku government.

Norwegian Refugee Council spends 10m dollars in Azerbaijan over 10 years

Assa-Irada, Baku
18 Apr 05

Baku, 18 April: The Baku office of the Norwegian Refugee Council
(NRC) reported on its activities over the past 10 years at a press
conference today.

Berit Olsen, NRC representative in Azerbaijan, (Yens Myaqobel?), head
of the international relations department at the NRC Baku office,
Norwegian ambassador to Azerbaijan Steinar Gil and four Norwegian
journalists attended the press conference.

Olsen said 10m dollars have been allocated to the NRC for the
implementation of projects over the past 10 years.

Speaking on future plans, Olsen said eight public buildings and
eight schools will be renovated and the living conditions of 2,500
internally displaced people will be improved in 2005. He also said
15 houses will be rebuilt in villages in Gadabay District bordering
Armenia, after which people will go back to their homes.

[Passage omitted: background of the NRC]

Associated Press Worldstream
Montag, 18. April 2005

“A forgotten Genocide”: 90 years ago, the deportation of the
Armenians – death marches, massacres – began; so far few nations have
recognized the Genocide, which Turkey protests…

»Ein vergessener Völkermord«;
Vor 90 Jahren begann im Osmanischen Reich die Vertreibung der
armenischen Bevölkerung – Todesmärsche, Massaker und Verhungern –
Bislang nur von wenigen Staaten gegen türkischen Protest als Genozid
anerkannt

Von AP-Korrespondent Uwe Käding

Frankfurt/Main

Sie wurden erschlagen, erstochen, erschossen, zu Todesmärschen durch
die syrische Wüste getrieben und dem Tod durch Erschöpfung oder
Verhungern überlassen. Dass dies vor 90 Jahren das Schicksal von bis
zu 1,5 Millionen Armeniern in der heutigen Türkei war, ist nicht mehr
umstritten. »Wer spricht heute noch von der Vernichtung der
Armenier?« fragte Adolf Hitler am 22. August 1939, am Vorabend von
Zweitem Weltkrieg und Holocaust. Bis heute umstritten ist aber, ob es
sich um den ersten Völkermord des 20. Jahrhunderts handelte.

Die Verfolgung der Armenier begann am 24. April 1915, als die
jungtürkische Regierung die gesamte armenische Elite in
Konstantinopel, dem heutigen Istanbul, verhaften ließ. Bis zum Ende
des 1. Weltkriegs 1918 wurde Schätzungen zufolge die Hälfte der
armenischen Bevölkerung in der Türkei getötet, vertrieben, zur
Assimilierung gezwungen.

Frankreich, Kanada, Russland, die Schweiz und die Niederlande haben
Jahrzehnte danach gegen zum Teil heftigen türkischen Protest
beschlossen, offiziell von einem Genozid an den Armeniern sprechen.
Viele andere Staaten – wie auch Deutschland, Großbritannien und die
USA – tun das bis heute nicht.

Neuerdings gewinnt das Thema angesichts des von der Türkei
angestrebten EU-Beitritts an Gewicht. »Das war ein vergessener
Völkermord«, sagt Wolfgang Gust, Herausgeber der aus Schriftstücken
des Auswärtigen Amtes erstellten Dokumentation »Der Völkermord an den
Armeniern 1915/16«, die gerade im Verlag Zu Klampen erschienen ist –
das »war« betonend. »Da die Türken die Tabuisierung des Völkermords
sehr weit getrieben haben, ist das natürlich die höchste Hürde, die
man ihnen stellen kann«, sagt der frühere »Spiegel«-Journalist im
Gespräch mit der Nachrichtenagentur AP.

Schon im 19. Jahrhundert hatte es Massaker an Armeniern gegeben.
Innerhalb der Jungtürken war es laut Gust eigentlich nur eine Gruppe
von rund 20 Mann, die sich in einen fanatischen Hass gegen die
Armenier hineinsteigerte. Als der Gründer der modernen Türkei,
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, wegen griechischer Kriegserfolge auf
Waffenlager der Jungtürken angewiesen gewesen sei, habe der Aufstieg
dieser extremen Kräfte bis in höchste Regierungsämter eingesetzt.
Abdul Talaat zum Beispiel, einer der Drahtzieher der Deportationen
aus Aleppo, wurde Innenminister.

Das Vorgehen sei planmäßig gewesen und von einem »Komitee für Einheit
und Fortschritt« gelenkt worden. »Das war, wenn man so will, so etwas
wie die NSDAP und diese so genannte Spezialorganisation, diese
Sonderorganisation (Teskilati Mahsusa), das war die SS. So war das
organisiert. Es gibt ein paar Quellen, wo die Deutschen staunen und
sagen: Für orientalische Verhältnisse ist das eigentlich unglaublich,
wie die in relativ kurzer Zeit von einem Jahr es geschafft haben, die
Armenier umzubringen oder zu assimilieren«, sagt Gust.

Kaiser Wilhelm II. hatte angesichts der deutschen Interessen schon
1909 die Devise ausgegeben: »Die Armenier gehen uns nichts an.«
Deutsche Diplomaten, Militärgesandte und Offiziere wurden zu Zeugen
des türkischen Vorgehens, über das sie auschließlich an ranghöchste
Stellen in Berlin berichteten. Korvettenkapitän Hans Humann,
Marineattache an der deutschen Botschaft in Konstantinopel,
berichtete bereits am 15. Juni 1915: »Die Armenier wurden … jetzt
mehr oder weniger ausgerottet. Das ist hart, aber nützlich.« Der
deutsche Reichskanzler Theobald von Bethman Hollweg definierte die
deutsche Haltung so: »Unser einziges Ziel ist, die Türkei bis zum
Ende des Krieges an unserer Seite zu halten, gleichgültig, ob darüber
Armenier zu Grunde gehen oder nicht.«

Der amerikanische Botschafter in der Türkei Henry Morgenthau,
notierte in seinem Kriegstagebuch: »Ich habe keinesfalls über die
schlimmsten Details berichtet, denn die ganzen Geschichten der
sadistischen Orgien, deren Opfer diese armenischen Männer und Frauen
wurden, können niemals in einer amerikanischen Publikation
veröffentlicht werden. Die perversesten Verbrechen, die sich Menschen
ausdenken können, wurden zum täglichen Unglück dieses treuen Volkes.«

–Boundary_(ID_MRWVdNwxPAYPA+9iMdpaLQ)–

Envoys Get Police Hotline
By Vladimir Kovalev, STAFF WRITER

St.Petersburg Times.ru, Russia
April 19 2005

Foreign diplomats working in St. Petersburg last week reached an
agreement with city police to create a direct line of communication
with local law enforcement management over improper police behavior
and hate crimes that the police take no action on, representatives
of foreign missions said.

“Sometimes the police behaves impolitely, not only in relation to
foreign citizens, but also to representatives of diplomatic missions
that are working here,” Ruben Akopyan, dean of the city’s diplomatic
corps, said Monday in an interview. “It sometimes happens that the
police do not know the rights of such people and how they should act
toward them.

“We have reached an agreement that if anything of this nature occurs,
we will inform the head of the police or a person responsible [for
this question],” he said.

Akopyan said neither he nor any other staff of the Armenian Consulate
in St. Petersburg had been ill treated by police, but indirectly
suggested that unpleasant incidents have affected representatives of
other diplomatic missions.

“Nothing of the kind has happened to me or people who work with me.
But if incidents of this or any other kind do happen, we solve them
using the law,” he said.

The latest reported case when diplomats were allegedly maltreated by
police officers happened at the end of January, when an unidentified
man stopped an Audi car with a Polish license plate on Zvenigorodskaya
Ulitsa and took the diplomat’s ID card. The criminal demanded $200
for the card to be returned, local media reported.

The city police could not be reached for comment Monday.

The U.S. embassy in Moscow on Monday warned its citizens about racist
attacks that could be initiated by skinheads on April 20, May 1 and
May 9.

“In previous years, extremist groups, particularly ‘skinhead groups,’
have marked these holidays by assaulting people of color, and in
particular, by targeting foreigners. These groups are very dangerous
and should be avoided. When out in town, do your best to avoid anyone
resembling a skinhead,” the embassy wrote on its web site.

“They typically shave their heads and wear black leather clothing
with Nazi swastikas. Tourist areas … are frequently targeted by
skinheads,” the letter said, “The police have informed us of the
potential for problems on the anniversary of Hitler’s birthday [on
Wednesday] and have assured us that they will take every precaution
deemed appropriate to ensure public safety.”

Human rights advocates have expressed their hope that the police will
do their job on Wednesday, but say what they do on other days is a
big question.

“I hope it will not be that dangerous for April 20 because the police
is expected to act,” Yury Vdovin, co-head of the St. Petersburg branch
of human rights organization Citizen’s Watch. “The problem is that
we live between fascism and communism, and I won’t be happy if either
of these sides win.”

“Foreigners, especially those who don’t appear to be from the West,
should unfortunately always beware in Russia,” he said Monday in
an interview.

Russia has almost as many skinheads as the rest of the world put
together, the Moscow bureau for human rights says.

“There are about 50,000 skinheads in Russia. In comparison, in the rest
of the world, except Russia, there are not more than 70,000,” Interfax
quoted Semyon Chyorny, an expert with the bureau, as saying Monday.

St. Petersburg has the most skinheads – some 10,000 to 15,000, the
expert said.

The northern capital is followed by Nizhny Novgorod with up to 2,500
skinheads, Rostov-on-Don with more than 1,500 and up to 1,000 in
Kaliningrad, Pskov, Yekaterinburg and Krasnodar. There are several
hundred skinheads in each of Voronezh, Samara, Saratov, Krasnoyarsk,
Irkutsk, Omsk, Tomsk, Vladivostok, Ryazan and Petrozavodsk, he said.

The groups are not united, operate independently and usually include
up to several tens of members, the human rights advocate said.

“If in the past the groups of skinheads existed only in major cities
and the towns of the southern part of Russia where the interethnic
relations are tense, today we can talk about this movement spreading
to all the territories, to the regional and district centers,” he said.

Most of the 40 killings committed on the grounds of national hatred
in 2004 in Russia were by skinheads, Chyorny said.

Spiegel, Germany
April 17 2005

SPIEGEL INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR EDGAR HILSENRATH

“I Felt Guilty Because I Survived the Holocaust”

Jewish author Edgar Hilsenrath survived the Holocaust in a Ukrainian
ghetto and then went on to become a best-selling author. He spoke
with SPIEGEL about his life in the ghetto, about writing satirical
Holocaust novels and about the Turkish massacre of the Armenians.

SPIEGEL INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR EDGAR HILSENRATH

“I Felt Guilty Because I Survived the Holocaust”

Jewish author Edgar Hilsenrath survived the Holocaust in a Ukrainian
ghetto and then went on to become a best-selling author. He spoke
with SPIEGEL about his life in the ghetto, about writing satirical
Holocaust novels and about the Turkish massacre of the Armenians.

DDP
Edgar Hilsenrath survived the Holocaust and went on to become a
well-known author.
SPIEGEL: Mr. Hilsenrath, in your novels you write about living and
surviving in the Jewish ghetto. Some people find it unsettling that
you talk about your experiences there with a certain amount of humor
and satire. Can you see what they mean?

Hilsenrath: If I could, I wouldn’t write like that. I just have a
rather perverse take on the events of the Holocaust.

SPIEGEL: There are some people who find that attitude offensive.

Hilsenrath: In Germany people want to make up to the Jews for what
happened by idealizing them. The Jews in the ghetto were every bit as
imperfect as human beings anywhere else. There are people who
criticize me for portraying the Jews in my novel “Night a Novel” as
suspicious, miserable and mean. I can only respond by saying that in
“Night a Novel” it is not the Jews that I was describing, but rather
the poverty of the ghetto…

SPIEGEL: …as well as what makes human beings human. “Night a
Novel”, your first novel, describes everything in such horrifying
detail that it is almost a descent into hell. Did you initially set
out to write a literary, rather than a factual, book?

Hilsenrath: Yes, I wanted to write a literary piece of work. At the
age of 14 I had already decided that I wanted to become a novelist.

Edgar Hilsenrath

Edgar Hilsenrath was born in Leipzig in 1926 as the son of a Jewish
merchant family. He survived World War II and the Holocaust in a
ghetto in Ukraine. After the end of the war, he went to Palestine for
a time and then on to the United States where his career as an author
began. His novels “Night a Novel” (1964) and “The Nazi & the Barber a
Tale of Vengeance” (1971) brought him popularity and helped him to
sell millions of books worldwide. In conjunction with the publication
of his annotated complete works by the Dittrich Verlag publishing
house, his 1989 novel “The Story of the Last Thought” has been
re-released. The book deals with the slaughter of the Armenians in
the Ottoman Empire.

SPIEGEL: Was the ghetto which you describe in “Night a Novel” similar
to where you lived in Mogilyov-Podolski in Soviet Ukraine?

Hilsenrath: It is actually the exact same ghetto. Just with a
different name.

SPIEGEL: Really? In your autobiographical novel “The Adventures of
Ruben Jablonski” you get the impression that your family was more
privileged than most of the ghetto.

Hilsenrath: That’s true. My life wasn’t ever really like the lives of
the characters in my novel “Night a Novel”.

SPIEGEL: Why were things different for you?

Hilsenrath: I arrived there with a whole group of Jews from Siret in
Bukovina (in present-day Moldavia). The leader of our group knew the
commander who was in charge of the ghetto. He not only allowed us to
use an old school building, but also gave us papers so that we were
not transported on again. The whole group, about 40 people, lived in
three classrooms. Everyone in the ghetto suffered hunger; there was
absolutely nothing. But we had smuggled jewelry, fur coats, dresses
and other valuables into the ghetto, even though this would have been
punishable by death.

SPIEGEL: Did you trade these goods on the black market?

Hilsenrath: Yes. We would sneak out of the ghetto at night and trade
the goods for food with farmers living in the area. We then sold the
food to the people in the ghetto. This was how the group from Siret
survived.

SPIEGEL: Was your whole family in the ghetto?

Hilsenrath: No. My father went into hiding in France. I actually grew
up in (the eastern German town of) Halle and then, in 1938, I went
with my mother and brother to my grandparents in Bukovina because
Germany had become too dangerous for us. The whole atmosphere was
impossible. My school in Halle was a real Nazi school. Every day I
had to fight with the other pupils, who gave me horrible nicknames.
The teachers bullied me.

SPIEGEL: Was it any better in Siret?

AFP
After World War II, Hilsenrath spent time on a kibbutz in Israel.
Hilsenrath: Yes. I was happy there. It was a miracle. They spoke
German in Bukovina and I felt really at home. I had lots of friends
and loved the Jewish music I heard there. There were also lots of
gypsies and gypsy music. It was an atmosphere which I really fitted
in to. Admittedly it was dirty: the people and the muddy streets. But
there was a real feeling of warmth and comfort. I really liked it
there.

SPIEGEL: Also maybe because your grandparents were somewhat better
off than most of the people in the shtetl?

Hilsenrath: Yes, they were well off.

SPIEGEL: When did you have to leave Siret?

Hilsenrath: In 1941, when the war broke out. All the Jews from our
town were transported to Central Romania. First to Craiova, then back
to the area around Siret, to a town called Radautz. We stayed there
for two months and scraped by living from hand to mouth. Then all of
a sudden posters sprang up all over town, saying that all the Jews
from Bukovina would be deported to the east, on order of (then
Romanian leader) Marshall Antonescu. We had to be at the station at
six the next morning. Anyone who was found still at home would be
shot. We were crowded into cattle trucks and for two days we traveled
through Czernowitz and Bessarabia to a small town called Ataki, which
is on the Dnister River. The ruined Ukrainian city Mogilyov-Podolski
was on the other side of the river. We were brought to the ghetto
there on rafts. We stayed until March 1944, when the Russians came.

SPIEGEL: Ranek, the main figure in your novel “Night a Novel”, has
very different experiences of the ghetto than yours. He is one of the
poorest people in the ghetto and at the end doesn’t survive. Why did
you decide to make him the hero of the story?

Hilsenrath: I wanted to describe the ghetto’s lowest social level.

SPIEGEL: Why?

Hilsenrath: I don’t know. Maybe because I had a guilty conscience.

SPIEGEL: Did you really feel guilty because things weren’t as bad for
you as for others?

Hilsenrath: I felt guilty because I survived.

SPIEGEL: While you were living in the ghetto people were constantly
being deported. Did you ever guess what was happening to these
people?

Hilsenrath: Rumor had it that they were being taken to the river Bug,
further out to the east. The SS were stationed on the other side of
the river and shot the Jews being sent across. The Romanians did that
quite a lot. We knew about all that but we didn’t think that things
might be worse.

SPIEGEL: So you didn’t live in constant fear of death?

Hilsenrath: As far as I was concerned, as a 15 year-old, it was all a
great adventure. We heard about things that were happening in Poland,
but we didn’t know any real details. We lived from day to day.

SPIEGEL: Were you allowed to go back to Siret when the Russians took
the ghetto?

AFP
Hundreds of thousands of Armenians were murdered in the Ottoman
Empire at the beginning of the 20th century. It is a chapter that
Turkey prefers to ignore.
Hilsenrath: No. When the Russians came, all men over 18 had to join
the army. It was just before my 18th birthday so I got away as fast
as I could and made my way by foot to Bessarabia.

SPIEGEL: Just as you describe in you novel “The Adventures of Ruben
Jablonski?”

Hilsenrath: Yes. I made it to Czernowitz. But there, the Russians
pulled me out of bed at night and arrested me. Then, we were all to
be sent to a coal-pit in Donbass (in present-day eastern Ukraine). At
roll call I met a cousin of mine from Poland. He was good at Russian
and also quite skilful at forging papers. He made me two years
younger, went to the Russian commandant and said: “The boy is only
16. You cannot deport him.” They let me go. The next day, I went to
Romania, which had been liberated by then. I walked 40 kilometers
from Czernowitz to Siret. Bit by bit, my entire family gathered
there. After six months, a delegation of Zionists from Bucharest
turned up looking for young people to go to Palestine. And I said
“Okay.”

SPIEGEL: Because you were looking for adventure or because you were a
Zionist?

Hilsenrath: Both, for sure. The Zionists had arranged for a train
that was to run from Bucharest via Bulgaria and Turkey to Palestine.
In Bulgaria, however, the Russians arrested us alleging that we were
illegal aliens. We were locked into an internment camp for two months
before Ben Gurion himself came to Sofia and got us out. The trip took
two months.

SPIEGEL: When did you arrive?

Hilsenrath: In January 1945 we received our proper papers, a British
stamp, and we were free. The Zionists then divided us up and sent us
to different kibbutzim. I ended up in a kibbutz in Galilee. It was
quite a good life but I was bored. I didn’t like working in the
fields every day. In the end I went Jerusalem to see the person in
charge of the Youth Aliya (an organization which brought youth from
Europe to Israel) and asked, “Can’t you send me to a place where
there are people from Bukovina?” And he said: “Okay, I know a Kibbutz
where Bukovinians live.”

SPIEGEL: You were homesick in other words?

Hilsenrath: Yes. But they kicked me out of the new Kibbutz after two
months because I didn’t want to go to Hebrew-classes every day after
work. Back then, I already spent all my free time writing novels.

SPIEGEL: In German?

Hilsenrath: Yes, in German.

SPIEGEL: Didn’t you feel any need to learn Hebrew?

Hilsenrath: Not at all. The Kibbutz bought me a bus ticket to Haifa
and I went. I took a variety of different jobs, worked as dishwasher,
and came down with a bad case of Malaria.

SPIEGEL: Obviously, you did not develop any kind of bond with
Palestine?

Hilsenrath: The Israeli mentality was totally different to mine. They
just didn’t understand people like me. They couldn’t understand why I
had been in a ghetto. We were totally different.

SPIEGEL: And then you grabbed the first chance you had and emigrated
to France?

Hilsenrath: I first had to wait for two years before even getting a
passport …

SPIEGEL: … and then you were reunited with your family?

Hilsenrath: Yes. My mother and brother had already illegally
emigrated from Bulgaria to France via Hungary and Austria.

SPIEGEL: You hadn’t seen your father for nine years. Did he
immediately approve of your goal of becoming a “writer”?

Hilsenrath: No! My father was totally against it. He wanted me to be
a furrier, just like him. But as you can see, I did not listen to
him.

SPIEGEL: It was only on the next leg of your journey, in America,
that you completed your novel “Night a Novel” and the book that would
become your most famous, “The Nazi & the Barber a Tale of Vengeance”.

Hilsenrath: I had already written two-thirds of it in Germany. I told
my American publisher back then “I can only do it in a
German-speaking environment.”

SPIEGEL: “The Nazi & the Barber a Tale of Vengeance” was published in
Germany in 1977 with a six-year delay. Why? The novel had already
been a bestseller in America.

Hilsenrath: The publishing houses here said that the German people
just weren’t ready for it yet. They said that such a serious subject
couldn’t be dealt with satirically. They didn’t like the language,
they didn’t like the open sexuality.

SPIEGEL: It was finally published by a small publishing house and
became a big hit. But even (literary giant) Heinrich Boell, who
reviewed your novel, wrote that he had to overcome a “threshold of
disgust.” Were you hurt by that?

Hilsenrath: No. I was amused. I mean, sensitive readers do have
problems with my books. A friend of mine worked with (German radio
station) Bayerische Rundfunk then. After I sent her “The fairy tale
of the last thought”, she called me a bit later and was totally
horrified. She had just read the part about the 97-year-old man that
sleeps with a Kurdish nine-year old girl and said she could not go on
reading the book. That’s how it is with my books.

SPIEGEL: You have sold around five million copies worldwide. Despite
that, your name has never been as familiar as Boell, Lenz or Grass.
Do you have an explanation?

Hilsenrath: No. Fame and me just don’t go together. It’s not always a
fair process.

SPIEGEL: In the coming days, your novel “The Story of the Last
Thought” is reappearing as part of your annotated complete works. In
it, you deal with the genocide against the Armenians, a topic that is
now, 90 years after it occurred, suddenly attracting attention again.
Would you write the book today just as you did in 1989?

Hilsenrath: Yes I would. I even think it’s my best novel. The “Story”
is pure poetry. The entire book is poetry filled with black humor.

SPIEGEL: Did the distance help — in that this time you weren’t
writing about your own history?

Hilsenrath: The Armenian genocide was also a Holocaust, but it wasn’t
my Holocaust. To be honest, when I began the book, I didn’t want to
write yet another Holocaust book. But then I stumbled across the
Armenians. I found original sources and even traveled to San
Francisco for research purposes. I’ve even been made a member —
honorary of course — of the Armenian Writers Association.

SPIEGEL: The Armenian genocide is not nearly as present in the
popular conscience as the Holocaust…

Hilsenrath: One could say not at all.

SPIEGEL: Can one risk a comparison between the two slaughters?

Hilsenrath: The Armenians were the Jews of the Ottoman Empire,
although there were also Jews living there — but the Armenians were
considered a cursed race and were seen as businesspeople and as
greedy. Which wasn’t true; most of the Armenians were farmers.

SPIEGEL: For a genocide to take place, both victims and perpetrators
are required.

Hilsenrath: But the Turks have completely repressed this chapter of
their history. It is forbidden; they aren’t even allowed to mention
it — probably out of fear that the Armenians would then demand
reparations.

SPIEGEL: Under these conditions, can you imagine Turkey becoming part
of the European Union?

Hilsenrath: I have to admit that I’m kind of afraid of Islam. On the
other hand though, maybe it would also be a chance for Turkey to
exert a positive influence on the rest of the Islamic world.

SPIEGEL: Thank you very much for this interview.

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