Author: Kalantarian Kevo

ABOUT 20% OF ARMENIA’S POPULATION HAVE RHEUMATIC DISEASES

Noyan Tapan
Oct 17 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 17, NOYAN TAPAN. The national symposium of
rheumatologists with the participation of experts from Moscow,
Kiev, Saint Petersburg will be held for the first time in Armenia on
October 19, NT correspondent was informed by Armine Haroyan, the head
of the chair of rheumatology of the RA National Institute of Health
Care. According to her, new methods of treatment of rheumatic diseases
will be discussed at the symposium. About 200 experts, including
specialists of primary health care, will participate in the symposium.

A. Haroyan said that about 20% of Armenia’s population suffer
from rheumatic – locomotor system’s diseases, including deforming
arthrosis and articular inflammation. In her words, the number of
rheumatic diseases is increasing in Armenia year by year, which is
due to correct diagnosing. "Early diagnosis of rheumatic diseases
is extremely important as in case of not being properly treated,
such diseases become chronic," she underlined.

TURKEY LURKING

Jawa Report, TX
Oct 16 2007

Funny, I don’t recall reading about any resolutions passed in the
House about the Soviet engineered famine in the Ukraine during WWII.

Nor do I recall reading about any resolutions passed in the House
about the Armenian Genocide when Turks were fighting alongside our
boys in Korea.

Was there a House resolution condemning the Rwandan genocide? If so,
I must have missed it at the time. Maybe there will be one when Rwanda
is a crucial supply base for our troops in Iraq.

The Ottoman Empire slaughtered over a million Armenians, yes, we
know. But the Ottoman Empire moulders on the ash heap of history.

While it’s true that Turkey denied us access to a northern front in
the initial invasion, and allowed the Sunni terrorists er insurgents
to mount a defense, that’s been more than balanced by the success of
the surge. Those who were fighting us then are fighting Al Qaeda now.

The Democratics in the House are on the verge of doing something
Saddam could only have dreamed of. Cutting off a vital supply line
to the troops.

An army with it’s supply line cut off is doomed to disaster.

Go ahead, Democratics, show us how much you support the troops by
passing this meaningless resolution against a regime that no longer
exists. Deny them the vital necessities they need to assure victory.

Because if this passes, I surely won’t dare to question your
patriotism.

189774.php

WORLD SOCCER CHIEFS VOW TO PREVENT ARMENIA-AZERBAIJAN MATCHES
By Ruben Meloyan

Radio Liberty, Czech Rep.
Oct 16 2007

International soccer’s two top executives pledged on Tuesday to
ensure that Armenian and Azerbaijani teams are spared the need to
play against each other in official competitions.

Visiting Yerevan, Sepp Blatter, president of FIFA, football’s worldwide
governing organization, and Michel Platini of UEFA, a similar body for
Europe, argued that the unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh conflict makes
it extremely difficult to organize such games. They pointed to the
recent failure by Armenia and Azerbaijan to agree on the venue for
planned matches between their national teams.

The two teams were due to face each after being drawn into Group
A of the qualifying competition for the 2008 European football
championship. The Armenian Football Federation, backed by the Yerevan
government, insisted that the potentially tense matches, scheduled
for September 2007, be played in Baku and Yerevan. Its Azerbaijani
counterpart was categorically against this, saying that it can not
guarantee the security of Armenian players and coaching staff on its
territory and pushing for a neutral venue.

The two sides failed to find a mutually acceptable solution after
a series of negotiations, leading UEFA to cancel the two fixtures
in June.

Platini defended the extraordinary decision, saying that Armenia
and Azerbaijan should not have been drawn into the same group in the
first place. "It was so easy for the [UEFA] Executive Committee to
find a way of ensuring that Armenia and Azerbaijan don’t play in the
same group," he said.

Platini said that UEFA will now keep apart the two national teams
as well as other Armenian and Azerbaijani soccer clubs. The football
body has also asked FIFA to follow suit, he added.

"This may not be the best solution," the French football legend told
reporters. "But we looked into the matter for a long time, and this
what experts advised us to do."

Blatter agreed, saying that FIFA will make sure that Armenia and
Azerbaijan are placed in different groups during their upcoming
qualifying campaigns for the 2010 soccer World Cup in Germany. The
draw for the World Bank qualifiers will take place in Durban, South
Africa next month.

Blatter and Platini arrived in Yerevan as part of their joint tour of
the three South Caucasus nations. The two men met President Robert
Kocharian, Prime Minister Serzh Sarkisian and AFF Chairman Ruben
Hayrapetian to discuss government efforts to promote the game in
Armenia. They will proceed to Azerbaijan later this week.

WHY DOES A CLOSE U.S. ALLY DENY ITS GENOCIDE?
By Adrian Morgan

Family Security Matters, NJ
?id=1385001
Oct 16 2007

(Part Two of Three)

The Atrocities of August 1894

"A number of able-bodied young Armenians were captured, bound,
covered with brushwood and burned alive. A number of Armenians,
variously estimated, but less than a hundred, surrendered themselves
and pled for mercy. Many of them were shot down on the spot and the
remainder were dispatched with sword and bayonet."

"A lot of women, variously estimated from 60 to 160 in number, were
shut up in a church, and the soldiers were ‘let loose’ among them.

Many of them were outraged to death and the remainder dispatched with
sword and bayonet. A lot of young women were collected as spoils
of war, Two stories are told. 1. That they were carried off to the
harems of their Moslem captors. 2. That they were offered Islam and
the harems of their Moslem captors; refusing, they were slaughtered.

Children were placed in a row, one behind another, and a bullet fired
down the line, apparently to see how many could be dispatched with
one bullet. Infants and small children were piled one on the other
and their heads struck off. Houses were surrounded by soldiers, set
on fire, and the inmates forced back into the flames at the point of
the bayonet as they tried to escape."

"In another village fifty choice women were set aside and urged to
change their faith and become hanums in Turkish harems, but they
indignantly refused to deny Christ, preferring the fate of their
fathers and husbands. People were crowded into houses which were
then set on fire. In one instance a little boy ran out of the flames,
but was caught on a bayonet and thrown back"

The above are accounts of massacres of Armenian villagers. These took
place in the district of Sassoun (Sassun) in southeastern Anatolia near
Lake Van, in August 1894. They had taken place following false rumors
of an uprising which developed in the spring. The Sassoun massacres
were duplicated in the neighboring districts of Bitlis and Mush.

In March 1895 an inquiry committee was held in London, with details
reported in the Daily Telegraph newspaper. An Armenian priest and his
son were ordered to sign a document, claiming that the massacre at
Sassoun had been carried out only by Kurds, and clearing the Turkish
authorities of all blame. When they refused, heated iron triangles
were placed around their necks. The pair was too ill to testify before
the committee.

Kurds had been involved in the Sassoun massacre, but the strategy
was concocted and put into effect by Turkish soldiers. In adjacent
Mush district, "a witness hiding in the oak scrub saw soldiers gouge
out the eyes of two priests, who in horrible agony implored their
tormentors to kill them. But the soldiers compelled them to dance
while screaming in pain, and presently bayoneted them."

An account of the Bitlis massacre, published in 1895, stated (page 63):

"As soon as the Pasha of Bitlis sent word to Constantinople that
the Armenians were in revolt, without waiting for proof, the Turkish
troops were sent to the scene with orders to suppress the revolt –
orders which they knew they must interpret as meaning the extermination
of whole villages if they would please the Sultan.

After wholesale butchery, Zeki Pasha reported that, ‘not finding any
rebellion, we cleared the country so that none should occur in the
future.’ This stroke of policy was afterward praised in the Court as
an act of patriotism."

The massacres of 1894 would be repeated, becoming more ferocious and
claiming the lives of more people, over the next two years.

The Ottomans

The regions within Turkey’s current borders have seen various cultures
and civilizations arise and become replaced by others. The "Turks"
are only the latest of a long line of invaders who moved into the
region. 9,000 years ago Neolithic farming peoples at Catal Huyuk
formed a complex community. Almost 3,000 years ago Assyrians entered
the region, and the Hittites developed a civilization in Anatolia
until around 900 BC. Later, Medes (probable ancestors of the Kurds),
Persians, Phrygians, Lydians, Armenians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines
flourished in the region.

The Turkish-speaking people (Western Turks) arrived in Anatolia
in large numbers in the 11th century AD, and their consolidation
of power would hasten the end of the Byzantine Empire based at
Constantinople. The language of the Western Turks gradually replaced
the indigenous Indo-European languages of the region. The nomadic
Turkic peoples originated in the Altai mountain regions in Central
Asia, but from the 5th century AD onwards they had engaged in mass
migrations. Turkic peoples are found in China (Uighirs) and and
Siberia (Yakut). The Western Turks founded the Ottoman dynasty at the
Western end of (modern) Turkey. From 1299 until its demise in 1924,
this dynasty was known as the Ottoman Empire.

In 301 AD, Armenia had been the first nation in the world to officially
adopt Christianity. As a distinct culture with an Indo-European
language, Armenia had thrived in the mountains of Asia Minor from the
6th century BC. In the 16th century, Armenia lost its independence
and was swallowed up by the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman aims were
expansionist and warlike, and hostile to independent Christian
nations. Sultan Bayezid I, nicknamed Yilderim or "Lightning," who
ruled from 1389 to 1402, famously promised to feed his horse from
the altar of St. Peter’s in Rome.

At its height in 1683, the Ottoman Empire controlled territories
stretching to the Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea in the East, the land
surrounding the Red Sea (including Mecca and Medina and Yemen) in the
south, and the North African coast as far as Algeria in the West. In
the north, it controlled the Crimea and all the land westwards nearly
as far as Vienna. An attempt to invade Vienna itself was defeated
by John Sobieski, king of Poland, on September 12, 1683. With more
conflicts Hungary was freed from Ottoman rule, confirmed in the treaty
of Karlowitz in 1699.

In the latter half of the 19th century, the Ottoman Empire was
a diminished force. European imperialism had broken its hold on
territories in North Africa, and European regions had declared their
independence. Under Sultan Mahmud II (ruled 1808 – 1839), reforms and
attempts to socially and economically modernize the Empire had been
made, but these did not stem the decline. Greece successfully fought
for and achieved independence in 1829, with its territorial borders
formalized in a treaty in 1832. Several Balkan regions declared their
independence in 1875, and on April 24, 1877, Alexander II of Russia
declared war on Turkey.

Abdul-Hamid II and the Hamidian Massacres

In 1876, 34-year-old Abdul-Hamid II became the Sultan. Soon after
taking power, he issued the first Imperial constitution on December
23, 1876. This constitution had been originally drafted by the
grand vizier, Midhat Pasha. It allowed equal judicial rights for all
citizens, and initiated a two-house parliament. Abdul-Hamid preferred
to rule as a despot and when the Russo-Turkish war started he dismissed
Pasha in February 1877, and in 1878 he abolished the constitution.

The Russian conflict ended with Turkey acknowledging defeat. As a
result, on March 3, 1878 the Empire officially lost the territories
of Serbia, Montenegro and Romania in the Treaty of San Stefano.

Bosnia-Herzegovina was granted autonomy and Bulgaria was placed under
Russian protection under this treaty. The Treaty of Berlin, signed on
July 13, 1878 by the Turks, Russians and European powers, lessened
the Turks’ financial debt to the victors and saw Bosnia-Herzegovina
given to the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Immediately before Abdul-Hamid’s reign, the Armenians had lived
peaceably under Ottoman rule. As Christians, they were second-class
citizens and had to pay the "jizya" tax, but they were not regarded as
subject to persecutions. In 1856 an edict called the Hatti Humayoun,
issued by Sultan Abdul Medjid in 1856, guaranteed Christians rights
never seen before under the Ottomans. Armenians wanted to be granted
more freedoms under the Treaty of Berlin, which saw Batum (modern
Armenia and parts of Georgia) ceded to Russia.

Article 61 of the treaty guaranteed Armenians protection from attacks
by Kurds and Circassians (who lived in the south-east of Turkey).

Article 62 of the treaty demanded that people of all religions could
work and travel freely throughout Turkey.

With these conditions not fulfilled, a radical group known as the
Huntchagists emerged among the various Armenian populations, who lived
in scattered locations in Turkey, with its apparent headquarters
in Athens. In 1893 a U.S. missionary condemned this revolutionary
movement. Cyrus Hamlin quoted an Armenian who said of their motives
(p. 242): "These Huntchagist bands, organized all over the empire,
will watch their opportunities to kill Turks and Kurds, set fire to
their villages and then make their escape into the mountains. The
enraged Moslems will then rise and fall upon the defenseless Armenians
and slaughter them with such barbarities that Russia will enter in the
name of humanity and Christian civilization and take possession." The
Huntchagists aimed to attack U.S.

Protestant missionary centers in central Turkey.

The American missionaries were allowed in central Turkey since 1844,
and they were to prove reliable witnesses to the deteriorating
situation in Turkey, and also the first massacres of Armenians. The
Huntchagist movement disintegrated after 1896, but Hamlin’s testimony
was cited in a letter to the New York Times of August 23, 1895. This
letter tried to discredit the genuine massacre which took place
at Sassoun, even though Hamlin had specifically blamed the Ottoman
government for carrying out the Sassoun atrocities.

In 1896, Reverend Edwin Munsell Bliss published a book called
Turkey and the Armenian Atrocities. He acknowledged the destructive
elements of the Huntchagists, (page 336) and later noted that
some revolutionaries, whether Huntchagists or not, sought to draw
attention to their aims of a separate state. On January 5, 1893,
placards were erected in Marsovan and Yuzgat, and indiscriminate
arrests followed. Disturbances ensued in Yuzgat, Gemerek, Cesarea,
and elsewhere, and the Turkish authorities reacted punitively,
rounding up and torturing suspects. The polarization of communities
had begun in earnest.

Rumors of a Hutchagist presence led to the Sassoun massacre, the first
of the major atrocities against Armenian villagers. An investigative
report into these massacres claimed (page 14) that Armenian Christians
were being subjected to forcible conversions to Islam. In January,
1896 the local Ottoman authorities in Kharpout and Diarbekir told
"converted" villagers that they should not admit to being Muslim if
questioned. Conversions were happening in the provinces in Siras,
Kharpout, Diarbekir, Betlis and Van. Priests and pastors lived in
hiding, lest they be attacked for interfering with the forcible
conversion of villagers. In 28 villages in the district of Kharpout,
there had been no Christian worship since November of 1895.

"Another indirect method of destroying the Christian communities in the
provinces lay in the systematic debauching of Christian women as though
to destroy their self-respect and undermine their religious ethic. At
Tamzara in the district of Shaska Kara Hussar, in the province of
Livas, all the men were killed in the massacres early in November,
of a prosperous Armenian population of fifteen hundred only about
three hundred starving, half naked women and children remained.

Trustworthy information said that the most horrible feature of their
situation was that passing Mohammedan soldiery or civilian travelers
attacked them and outraged them in their homes without hesitation
or restraint."

On October 1, 1895 200 Armenians tried to make a protest in
Constantinople, and were ordered by police to disperse. Panic broke
out, and fearing an uprising, mosques encouraged reprisals. The
following night, at least 70 Armenians were killed in the capital. At
Trebizond (Trabzon) on the Black Sea coast in the east, a local Pasha
was attacked, and soldiers were sent on regular foot patrols around
the city. On October 8th, these soldiers began shooting Armenian men,
and shops were looted. On October 30, 1895 at Erzerum, soldiers and
Turkish civilians had started firing at Armenians. After attacks that
lasted two days, many of the bodies were mutilated and stripped. One
man’s forearms had been cut off, his upper arms and chest skinned. A
British consul wrote that 1,200 people had been killed, and 512
wounded. The bodies were buried en masse in trenches (pictured above).

On November 11, 1895 the village of Husenik near the eastern city of
Harput was attacked by soldiers, some of whom dressed as Kurds. 200
Armenian villagers were killed. These marched on the city where
around 100 Armenians were killed. Shortly after, the city of Arabkir
was attacked, with 2,000 Armenians killed. Attacks also took place
on numerous small villages. In many of these villages the women were
carried off. At the town of Diarbekir, 2,000 were killed, at Chunkush
680 Armenians were slaughtered.

British missionary Helen B. Harris wrote on April 24, 1896 from
the American College in Aintab: "There were about 300 killed here,
November 16, 1895, and numbers mutilated, hands and right arms cut off,
and eyes gouged out, to render the poor people helpless. Dr. Fuller
says when they first got among these, the day after, the massacre, it
was awful hearing them crying for death to end their sufferings." On
November 18, 1895, a massacre of thousands took place at Marash. On
December 28th, another massacre of Armenians took place at Urfa with
at least 3,000 lives lost.

There were more massacres at that time, and in many cases Armenian
men were forced to convert or die. In Birejik in January 1896, about
96 men converted to Islam, and an equal number were killed. When one
elderly man refused to convert to Islam, live coals were placed on his
body. As he lay in pain, a Bible was held over him, and his tormentors
asked him to read the passages of salvation that he had trusted in.

In the summer of 1896 one event took place which would instigate a
catastrophic crackdown on the Armenian population of Turkey. The main
office of the Ottoman Bank in Constantinople was raided by a group of
26 Armenian revolutionaries on August 26th. Nine members of the group
were killed in the initial raid, including their leader Babgien Siuni,
and guards were shot. The remaining raiders, members of the Dashtun
party, took 140 bank workers hostage.

The raiders intended to draw international attention to the plight of
Armenians in Turkey, but before the situation came to a resolution,
recriminations against Armenians began, with 7,000 people killed
by angry Turkish citizenry in Constantinople. The Patriarch of
Constantinople, Maghakia Ormanian, excommunicated the bank raiders, but
this did not quell general Turkish anger at the Armenian communities.

The massacres at the end of the 19th century, which were carried
out with the connivance and approval of Sultan Abdul-Hamid II, are
collectively known as the Hamidian massacres. In 1896, Abdul-Hamid
was chastened by international condemnations, and his orders to
attack and forcibly convert Armenians stopped. The attacks lessened,
but only for a while. Soon, another campaign of massacres would take
place. This campaign was instigated not by Abdul-Hamid but by a new
breed of Turkish political activists, who would go on to commit the
genocide of 1915. These activists were known as the Young Turks.

# #

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Adrian Morgan is a
British based writer and artist who has written for Western Resistance
since its inception. He also writes for Spero News. He has previously
contributed to various publications, including the Guardian and New
Scientist and is a former Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Society.

read full author bio here

If you are a reporter or producer who is interested in receiving
more information about this writer or this article, please email your
request to [email protected].

Note — The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author
and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy
of The Family Security Foundation, Inc.

PRESS RELEASE
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia
Contact: Information Desk
Tel: (374-10) 52-35-31
Email: [email protected]
Web:

STATEMENT BY
H.E. VARTAN OSKANIAN
MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS
At the SECOND CONVENTION OF EUROPEAN ARMENIANS
Brussels, October 15, 2007

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

On behalf of the people and government of Armenia, and as a descendant of
genocide survivors, I would like to express our appreciation for the efforts
of those who passed this resolution 20 years ago. It has been an interesting
coincidence that this anniversary comes at a time when the US Congress, too,
is considering a resolution and there is much talk about the value — or
danger — of third parties engaging in what are said to be old historic
issues. In that context, I want to thank those who recognized the immense
moral and political value of rejecting genocidal behaviors and criminal
policies which are not in anyone¹s national interest nor in humanity¹s
international interest.

Let me say at the outset that the Republic of Armenia, the Government of
Armenia, the Armenian people around the world would gladly have done without
this distinction. It goes without saying that we would have preferred NOT to
be the victims of Genocide, we would have wanted NOT to be sufferers who
are often blamed for their own fate, but after having such a fate visited
upon us, we would certainly have NOT wanted to have been swept aside by the
pages of history, and today we do NOT want to be accused of having national
aspirations which are at odds with international interests.

But the international community has the capacity for more than one message.
The international community can indeed carry on its business, develop
coalitions, fight off threats and dangers, including the threat of genocide,
and none of this should come at the expense of recognizing and condemning
genocide anywhere, anytime – in Darfur in the 21st century, or in the
Ottoman Empire in the 20th century.

Dear Friends,

The value of the 1987 resolution is that it did more than recognize and
condemn the Genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. Believing as it did
that the Armenian issue and the question of minorities in Turkey must be
re-situated within the framework of relations between Turkey and the
European Community, the European Parliament extensively and thoughtfully
laid out all the facets of this complex issue including recognition of the
rights of the Armenian minority which still lives in Turkey, and recognition
of the need to move Armenians and Turks towards understanding and
reconciliation.

This resolution also revealed political common sense. The message of the
resolution was: a country aspiring to join Europe must look like Europe, act
like Europe, imagine and see like Europe. It must view history for what it
is – the product of political and social tensions of the time – and it must
accept its own role in that history, learn from it and move forward, as
Europe has done.

Turkey ignored that message. Worse, just half a decade later, when
independence came to all the Soviet republics, including Armenia, Turkey
ignored a huge opportunity for a new start. Turkey refused to establish
diplomatic relations with Armenia, and two years later closed the border,
hoping perhaps that Armenia¹s vulnerability and fragile statehood would
force it to renounce its past and with it, any possible claims for
compensation.

The country that could have been, should have been, the regional leader, the
bridge between Europe and Asia, the bridge across the Black Sea, the bridge
between the past and the future, that country abdicated its responsibility,
because of unfounded fears.

What is it that Turkey is afraid of? We have asked that question often, and
particularly so this last week. We don¹t know. We are certainly not the only
neighbors in the world who have had, and who continue to have, a troubled
relationship. Troubled memories, a tortured past, recriminations, unsettled
accounts and the enduring wounds of victimhood plague the national
consciousness of peoples on many borders.

Let¹s hear the Turks out. Their fears, their concerns, their excuses, their
accusations, have been ringing loudly all week.

First, they insist that labeling the events of 1915 as genocide is an insult
to the Turkish people. It seems to me that a mature society that believes in
free speech is beyond insults. But be that as it may, it can safely be said
that the Turkish state created its own image, its identity, its modern
history based on something less than reality. They boast of 1000 years of
statehood, but they choose to assume only the glory of the Seljuk and
Ottoman periods and not the burdens. Their textbooks lack the context that
explains what befell the Ottoman Empire¹s many minorities, the Greeks,
Kurds, Jews and Armenians among them. Now, with that gap in public
knowledge, they are afraid that the their own people will be insulted by the
truth. But they are not the only country or the only people which has had to
come to terms with the undesirable contradictions at the base of their
statebuilding process. The United States, France, Russia, Germany all have
had to deal with the consequences of the an unconscionable past. And all
have survived and flourished. Turkey cannot be afraid of being insulted,
afraid of being asked questions, afraid of looking in the mirror.

Second, Turkey insists that Armenians are trapped in the past. Actually it
seems to us that the opposite is true. We do not forget the past, we do
honor the victims and the survivors, but we don¹t make the past, the
recognition of the past, a precondition for normalizing relations today and
moving forward tomorrow. Turkey does. Turkey somehow expects that Armenians
will renounce the past in order to appease Turkey and arrive at open
borders. So who is living in the past? Who is making the present and the
future conditional on the past? Who is allowing the dreaded past to
confound, complicate and generally determine our collective future?

Third, Turkey fears that what will follow recognition will be even more
costly and more damning. Turkey must de-link history from politics.

It is a political reality that both Turkey and Armenia exist today in the
international community with their current borders. It is a political
reality that we are neighbors and we will live alongside each other. It is a
political reality that Armenia is not a security threat to Turkey. And
finally, it is a reality that it is today¹s Armenia that calls for the
establishment of diplomatic relations with today¹s Turkey.

Turkey¹s idea to resolve these issues about the past is to form a historical
commission which it says is the best way to resolve our historical
differences. Our answer is threefold.
First, really, let¹s face it: outside of Turkey, the question is not a
historical one – the International Association of Genocide Scholars, the
International Center for Transitional Justice, Raphael Lemkin, archives in
countries the world over have established the historical veracity of the
Genocide. Second, the penal code restrictions and their discriminatory
application, especially to minorities, and especially to Armenians and those
who dare to explore Armenian issues, has become frightening, and would
certainly prohibit an open, healthy discussion about what have come to be
called the events of 1915. Look, after the world inside and outside Turkey
stood up to protest the murder of Hrant Dink last January, the son of the
slain Hrant Dink has now also been convicted, again under Article 301, again
for publishing an interview of his father¹s, the same interview for which
Hrant was convicted, and which created the atmostphere of intolerance that
resulted in his assassination, an assassination that has yet to be
persuasively and persistently concluded. The threat hanging over the head of
Hrant Dink¹s associates and successors cannot be ignored. Third, there are
no diplomatic relations between the two countries and the border is closed
between us and a discourse under those conditions would be hard to imagine.

However, if Turkey indeed wants to discuss 1915, Armenia will be ready to do
so at a governmental level, if relations between our two countries have a
semblance of normalcy. At a minimum, with open borders. You see, we have
experienced a decade-long series of efforts by Ankara to engage Armenia in a
process, for the sake of showing the world that there is some ongoing
process, and that third parties need not engage. The most insignificant,
inconsequential meetings are held up as signs of progress. Let me be clear:
short of movement on the border, there is no other measure of forward
movement in our relations. Any other call will not be taken seriously.

Armenia believes there is simply no reason to keep the border closed. Closed
borders are not normal. Countries not at war with each other do not maintain
closed borders. There is nothing in the current history of Armenia and
Turkey that warrants closed borders. It is the unsettled memories of the
past against which it has slammed shut the door between us.

Armenia believes that Armenia and Turkey must confront those memories and
histories. Armenia believes that there is no history in a vacuum, making it,
assessing it and overcoming its obstacles the two sides have to do together.
Armenia believes that Turkey must open the borders so that our people will
interact to create new experiences to replace the old memories.

Armenians believe that today¹s Turks do not bear the guilt of the
perpetrators, unless they choose to defend them and identify with them.

Armenia believes that Armenians and Turks, together with the rest of the
modern world, can reject the actions and denounce the crimes of the Ottoman
Empire. Turkey and Armenia together must exorcise the demons of the past.
Turkey itself must summon the deep force of humanity and goodness and must
renounce the deed, its intent, its consequences. And we, the descendants of
the victims must exhibit the dignity, capacity and willingness to move on.

Dear Friends,

If anyone thinks that genocide is only a matter for the past, that it is
indeed to be forgotten, they are not only wrong, but they do not understand
the security implications for living alongside a strong, unrepentant
neighbor, and the safety implications for those living within that society
that has not come to terms with its past.

I fear the ignorance that prompts those in positions of influence to label
irrelevant the attempts of responsible leaders to bring some semblance of
normalcy, morality and responsibility to relations between neighbors.

I fear the reactions of a world power that counts on an ally whose
allegiance is conditional.

I fear there will never come a time that is the right time for the world to
tell the government of Turkey, or any government for that matter – remember
Darfur – that it has a responsibility to acknowledge such crimes.

Dear Friends,

Genocide is the ultimate crime against humanity. It is the extreme abuse of
power. The human rights challenge facing all of us is to be able to
recognize that a government has the capacity for such immorality and
inhumanity, and that particular governments have indeed committed genocide.
The political challenge is to call things by their name, to acknowledge that
genocide is not just mass murder, not just massacre and deportation, but the
betrayal of the responsibility of custody by the very people entrusted with
insuring the security of their own population. Thus it requires a different
kind of response, a different level of reaction, an unorthodox solution
commensurate to the extraordinary crime.

Twenty years after the European Parliament¹s call for condemnation and
reconciliation, with even greater urgency, we repeat the call. The burden is
on us all.

When next the Parliament discusses this issue, we can only assume that
Europe will expect that a Turkey which is serious about EU membership, which
is indeed able to juggle the complex relationships that EU membership
entails, will have to come to terms with its past, and to open borders with
its neigbors.

As you see, third parties still have a huge role to play.

Parliaments and congresses must continue to insist that there be morality at
the starting line and the goal line of all our foreign policies and foreign
relations. It is essential that administrations and executive bodies not
bend the rules, nor turn a blind eye or lower standards. Instead, let the
international community consistently extend its hand, its example, its own
history of transcending, in order for us all, to move on to making new
history.

Thank you.

DAMAGE CONTROL
Bulent Kenes

Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Oct 15 2007

Whatever has happened has happened. The acceptance of the Armenian
genocide claims in the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the US House
of Representatives has strained relations as had been envisaged. The
unfair Armenian resolution hurts the sense of justice, having
coincided with a period when the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party
(PKK) has stepped up its attacks, martyring our soldiers every day —
that is, its having coincided with a period when anger and sentiment
have heightened, magnifying the resolution’s potential to strain
relations between the two countries.

The US administration must have realized, albeit belatedly, the danger
the present course of events are generating, because it has increased
its diplomatic efforts to contain the destruction to be inflicted
on the relations of the two countries by the Armenian resolution,
which is nearly certain to pass on the floor of the House, where the
Democrats are in the majority. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
sent Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Dan Fried and
Defense Minister Robert Gates sent Undersecretary of Defense Eric
Edelman to Turkey very hurriedly. It is also known that Rice called
her Turkish counterparts to placate Turkey.

The political culture of the Unites States is really strange, and to
be frank, it is far from sincere. It is possible to provide evidence
for this strangeness with its two-faced attitudes on the terrorist
PKK and the Armenian genocide claims.

Turkey has, for years on end been insistently calling for the wiping
out of the existence of the PKK in northern Iraq, using all diplomatic
channels. However, neither Washington nor Baghdad or the tribal chiefs
in northern Iraq who are in Washington’s orbit have provided the
support and response it wants. Moreover, the promises made in response
to Turkey’s pressure and the mechanisms made to this end don’t go
beyond time wasting and distraction. Every moment we procrastinate
because of the United States serves the beasts based in the Kandil
Mountains. These monsters are provided all their logistical needs in
comfort and restore their strength for the attacks they will carry out
in the future, crossing the border whenever they please and spilling
the blood of Turkish youths, whether they are soldiers or civilians.

And when Turkey attempts to do what Baghdad, Washington and the Kurdish
leaders have been shying away from doing, when the blood spilt by
terrorism and the pain it causes reach intolerable heights, all hell
is lets loose. Everyone "who has a mouth" says something about the
drawbacks of a cross-border operation. Of course there are potential
risks involved in an operation into a country under occupation, where
the issue of who is fighting whom has become completely mixed up,
where the balance between powers hasn’t been established and where
dynamics haven’t settled yet. But is it not unrealistic to expect a
country to take into account potential risks when the current risks
stemming from its inaction are at their height?

This week the government will submit to Parliament a motion for a
cross-border operation. The motion is expected to be supported by all
the parties except the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP.)
However, even the passage of the motion wouldn’t necessarily mean
a cross-border incursion. It is necessary to understand that in the
event the reasons for which Turkey will enter Iraq are eradicated,
there will be no need for such an operation, despite the existence of
a passed motion. Besides Washington and Baghdad, there are also many
things that could be done by the regional Kurdish administration in
order to prevent a cross-border operation.

What I mean by this is not, of course, that it could put pressure on
Turkey to prevent a likely cross-border operation. Just the opposite:
They should expel the PKK from the Kandil Mountains to eradicate the
reasons for a cross-border operation; disarm the terrorist group;
and arrest its leaders and hand them over to Turkey. Otherwise,
neither the potential risks it would have to face in Iraq nor the risk
of severed ties with the US, nor even the repercussions that would
send oil prices rocketing sky-high could stop a Turkey whose limits
of patience are so badly pushed. Apparently, the US administration
has been following a "damage control" strategy in recent days. They
must know that the best way to follow this strategy is eradicating
the reasons for a cross-border operation.

In the meantime, I’m very suspicious as to whether the US
administration, which doesn’t want to fulfill the responsibilities
incumbent on it as a strategic partner, will be able to reach the
degree it wants to achieve its damage control when it is too late.

The same applies to the Armenian genocide resolution case. It’s
impossible to believe that the US administration and the Jewish
lobby have been doing their utmost to prevent this unfair and unjust
resolution.

We should now suspect the friendship and the strategic partnership of a
country that attempts to try Turkish history and convict a whole nation
with ill-founded claims. It is nothing but this suspicion that eats
away at the minds of the Turkish people and causes anti-Americanism
to reach unforeseen heights in this country.

What else should happen and what else needs to be lost in Turkish-US
relations in order to grasp that the most successful of damage
control strategies is stopping the course of events that will lead
to destruction from the onset?

SECOND CONVENTION OF EUROPEAN ARMENIANS DUE IN BRUSSELS OCT. 15-16

PanARMENIAN.Net
15.10.2007 14:11 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ October 15-16, the European Armenian Federation
(EAFJD) recalls the second Convention of European Armenians dated
to 20th anniversary of European Parliament’s recognition of the
Armenian Genocide.

The Convention will bring together representatives from 29 countries –
among which 19 countries from the EU including new member states.

The participants will discuss how to maintain, consolidate and
emancipate the Diaspora, how to partake to Armenia’s development and
strengthening, how to deal with Turkey’s threats and Genocide denial.

Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian, European Commissioner for
Justice, Freedom and Security Franco Frattini, Cilician Catholicos
Aram I, members of European Parliament, EU Special Representative for
the South Caucasus Peter Semneby and OSCE Minsk Group French Co-chair
Bernard Fassier are expected to address the Convention.

GEORGIAN PRIME MINISTER VISITS YEREVAN

A1+
[03:29 pm] 15 October, 2007

The Georgian delegation headed by Prime Minister Zurab Noghaideli
arrived in Yerevan today on a two-day working visit.

In the framework of the visit Georgia’s Prime Minister will participate
in the 6th sitting of the Armenian-Georgian Intergovernment Economic
Cooperation Commission. Mr. Noghadideli will have meetings with RA
President Robert Kocharian and Prime Minister Serge Sargsian. He will
visit Tsitsernakaberd and lay flowers on the memorial to the Armenian
Genocide victims. The Georgian Prime Minister will also attend the
Pantheon after Komitas to lay flowers on RA former Prime Minister
Andranik Margasrian’s tomb.

ABC News
Oct 14 2007

Funnies: How the Babies Became Republicans
‘This Week’s’ Look at the Best in Late Night Political Comedy

Real Time
Bill Maher: Al Gore won the Nobel Prize, or as President Bush
announced it, "Sweden is with the terrorists."

Late Night
Conan O’Brien: One of President Bush’s closest advisers said that
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee is going to have
trouble getting elected because his last name is "Huckabee." That’s
what he said, yeah. He said the only way it could be worse is if his
name was George W. Huckabee.

Real Time
Maher: Now the people who are really getting tough with the Middle
East is the House Foreign Relations Committee. … They voted
yesterday to condemn as an act of genocide the killings of Armenians
in Turkey in 1915. Yeah, see this is exactly why voters gave control
to the Democrats, to send a stern message to the Ottoman Empire.

The Tonight Show
Jay Leno: And Hillary Clinton announced this week that she has
dropped her plan to give $5,000 to every baby born in America. …
Apparently, what happened was they did a test where they gave $5,000
to 100 babies and the kids immediately became Republicans.

Late Show
David Letterman: Now here is what I don’t understand: Rudolph
Giuliani had three wives and he’s not the Mormon candidate — is that
right?

Jimmy Kimmel Live
Jimmy Kimmel: You probably heard already: Al Gore won the Nobel Peace
Prize. … He won the Emmy, the Oscar and the Nobel Prize. The only
thing he didn’t win was president, really. In three years, the guy
went from Urkel to Fonzi.

?id=3726809

Commercialappeal.com , TN
Oct 14 2007

Bridging the Armenian-Turkish disconnect

By Zack McMillin
Sunday, October 14, 2007

When I read letters to the editor from those who are enraged that
Memphis in May has chosen Turkey as its honored country for 2008, I
think of Hrant Dink.

AP

On Oct. 1, protesters carrying a banner reading "We are all witness,
we want justice" massed near an Istanbul courthouse, as the trial of
suspects in the murder of ethnic Armenian journalist Hrant Dink
resumed.

When I hear that a group of Memphians wants to call U.S. Rep.
Steve Cohen a hypocrite for not supporting a House resolution that
would assert Turkey committed genocide against Armenians, I think of
a February afternoon in Istanbul.

On Halaskargazi, a broad boulevard on the European side of the
Bosporus, I stood with two dozen other journalists from around the
world outside an almost hidden entrance, one obscured by a security
door and squeezed between shops selling sunglasses and CDs.

We were waiting to enter the offices of Agos, the Armenian newspaper
where Hrant Dink had served as editor.

>From the CD shop drifted a melody from the Turkish song, "Sari Gelin
(Yellow and Bright)." This was Dink’s favorite song, and it came upon
us that Dink had died at the place where we were now standing, gunned
down because, many people believe, a group of Turkish nationalists
thought that killing an outspoken Armenian would divide and
demoralize Turkey.

That it did not serves as a testament to the Turkish people. The
response to the tragedy embodies the spirit I discovered in the Turks
who became my friends while I spent eight months in 2006 and 2007 as
a Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan.

The scene outside Agos the night of Dink’s murder on Jan. 19
transformed from one of tragedy into one of hope. Thousands of Turks
descended upon the neighborhood and held a vigil to honor Dink, whose
brave stance on what Turks call the "Armenian question" provided an
example — for fellow Turks, fellow Armenians and fellow journalists.

Ozge Erkut, who worked at CNN Turk, lives in the neighborhood and
recalled the tears she saw from so many.

"Lots of Muslims and lots of Jews were there, not just Armenians,"
she said. "Many of the people who were crying did not know him."

There is no denying that, in Turkey, there are people and groups
devoted to fomenting hate and intolerance. But, in the aftermath of
Dink’s murder, the world saw what I had also discovered in my new
Turkish friends — people with huge hearts, open minds and a desire
to engage with the world.

Some estimated that as many as 200,000 people followed Dink’s family
and friends in the funeral procession through the streets and across
the bridges of the beautiful, ancient city. They held signs and
chanted, "We are all Hrant Dink."

In a memorial issue published by Agos, a cover mixed the image of a
smiling Hrant Dink with seabirds and the simple headline: "Umuda
uctu." To hope he flew.

Dink, 52, had drawn hate and death threats for challenging Turkey to
acknowledge that, whatever the complicated circumstances, there
remained little doubt that an Armenian genocide occurred during the
dissolution of the Ottoman Empire in World War I. Dink had also been
prosecuted for writings that the government asserted "denigrated
Turkishness," violating a law that ought to offend citizens of any
nation committed to secular progress.

Yet it is important to remember that Dink had also challenged
Armenians from around the world to abandon their own hatred and
intolerance.

"Do away with your fixation on hostility against Turks," he once
wrote. "This is a poison."

What Dink sought most, according to his friends and colleagues, was
to create dialogue and to open minds. When lawmakers in France
introduced a bill that would make it a crime to deny that Turkey
committed genocide against Armenians, Dink vowed to travel to France
and be among the first to break the law.

Such a law, he said, "will be hurting not only the European Union,
but Armenians across the world. It will also damage the normalizing
of relations between Armenia and Turkey. What the peoples of these
two countries need is dialogue, and all these laws do is harm such
dialogue."

Those we met who knew and loved Hrant Dink stressed his devotion to,
above all, investigations of truth — not political declarations
exalting or condemning one side or the other of emotional,
complicated issues.

"We want discussion," one of his closest friends told us. "If you
push the importance of one word, genocide, it is no more discussion.
The important thing is the history, not the word."

It is shocking to learn from so many Turks that they were taught
nothing about the slaughter and dislocation of Armenians in World War
I. But it says much about the character of the many Turks I came to
know that they respond not with hate but with concern and a desire to
learn more.

Fatma Mge Gek, a native Turk and Michigan professor, wrote a eulogy
that emphasized her friend’s ability "to overcome that
ever-consuming, destructive, dangerous anger — and to fill himself
instead with so much love and hope for humanity."

As I think about politicians making resolutions about history, I
think of the conversation Gek had with Dink the year before a Turkish
nationalist succeeded in killing a man — but failed to assassinate
hope.

"Keep the dialogue between the Armenian and Turkish scholars going,"
Dink told her over coffee in Ann Arbor in the spring of 2006. "That
is the most significant endeavor we have for the solution of this
problem, and no matter what happens, do not let things get
politicized."

http://www.commercialappe al.com/news/2007/oct/14/bridging-the-armenian-turk ish-disconnect/