Commemoration event at Bilgi University- Istanbul

[Joseph]

APRIL 24: Armenian Genocide Commemoration in Turkey
Blogian on 23 Apr 2008
Here is the press release for the only (open) Armenian Genocide awareness event in Turkey this year received in e-mail:

HUMAN RIGHTS ASSOCIATION ISTANBUL BRANCH
PRESS RELEASE




Today, 24th of April, is recognised worldwide as the date signifying the Armenian Genocide. Only in Turkey it indicates a taboo. The Turkish state mobilises all its resources to deny the meaning of this date.



At diplomatic platforms Turkish officials and their advocates claim that they recognise the “big tragedy” and they only object to its being named as a “Genocide”. That’s not true. At every occasion in Turkey not only the Armenian Genocide, but also the great agony of the Armenian people is denied and attempts are made to justify the genocide.



It was only last month that during a Symposium on the Armenian-Turkish relations the denialist official theses were voiced one after another, offending the Armenians in Turkey and elsewhere and insulting the memory of their grandparents. Lies were told in the name of “science”, like “Armenians have always sold their masters”, “deportation was a means of crisis management”, “death toll of deportation is comparable to the death toll of flu epidemic in England that time”, “there is no other people as noble as the Turkish nation in the world, it is impossible for them to commit a genocide” and many more, humiliating a people who was one of the most advanced in science, art, literature, and in all other aspects.



Denial is an constituent part of the genocide itself and results in the continuation of the genocide. Denial of genocide is a human rights violation in itself. It deprives individuals the right to mourn for their ancestors, for the ethnic cleansing of a nation, the annihilation of people of all ages, all professions, all social sections, women, men, children, babies, grandparents alike just because they were Armenians regardless of their political background or conviction. Perhaps the most important of all, it is the refusal of making a solemn, formal commitment and say “NEVER AGAIN”.



Turkey has made hardly any progress in the field of co-existence, democracy, human rights and putting an end to militarism since the time of the Union and Progress Committee. Annihilation and denial had been and continues today to be the only means to solve the problem. Villages evacuated and put on fire and forced displacements are still the manifestation of the same habit of “social engineering”. There has always been bloodshed in the homeland of Armenians after 1915. Unsolved murders, disappearances under custody, rapes and arrests en masse during the 1990’s were no surprise, given the ongoing state tradition lacking any culture of repentance for past crimes against humanity.



Similarly the removal of a public prosecutor and banning him from profession just for taking the courage to mention an accusation against the military, a very recent incident, is the manifestation of an old habit of punishing anybody who dares to voice any objection to the army. And today’s ongoing military build up of some 250,000 troops in the southeast of Turkey is the proof of a mindset who is unable to develop any solution to the Kurdish question other than armed suppresion.



Turkey will not be able to take even one step forward without putting an end to the continuity of the Progress and Union manner of ruling. No human rights violation can be stopped in Turkey and there will be no hope of breaking the vicious circle of Kurdish uprisings and their bloody suppression unless the Turkish state agree to create an environment where public homage is paid to genocide victims, where the sufferings of their grandchildren is shared and the genocide is recognised.



Today we, as the human rights defenders, would like to address all Armenians in Turkey and elsewhere in the world and tell them “we want to share the pain in your hearts and bow down before the memory of your lost ones. They are also our losses. Our struggle for human rights in Turkey, is at the same time our mourning for our common losses and a homage paid to the genocide victims”.


And here is the program:





Human Rights Association

Istanbul Branch

WHAT HAPPENED ON 24th APRIL 1915 IN ISTANBUL?

PANELISTS

EREN KESKİN
24th April 1915 from Human Rights Perspective
RAGIP ZARAKOLU

24th April – A milestone setting an example for the annilihation of intellectuals
ARA SARAFIAN

Why Armenians Commemorate 24 April 1915 to Signify the Beginning of the Armenian Genocide: a Critical Examination.”
ERDOĞAN AYDIN

Historical Consciousness and Confronting the History
Thursday, 24thtApril 2008

02:00 p.m.

BİLGİ UNIVERSITY

DOLAPDERE CAMPUS

[Joseph]

http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=102831

Killings of Armenians in Ottoman Empire 'genocide,' says American historian

Friday, April 25, 2008


ISTANBUL – Turkish Daily News

Thousands of social facilities, churches and schools that once belonged to Armenians cannot be seen in Anatolia today, providing more convincing evidence than written documents that the World War I-era killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire constitute "genocide," an American historian said yesterday.

“Although there were around two million Armenian people living in Anatolia during the Ottoman Empire before 1915, today it is not possible to find any historical or social mark reminding them,” said Ara Sarafian, head of Gomidas Institute in London, an organization that carries out research on Armenian history.

Sarafian was speaking at a conference titled “What happened on April 24, 1915?” held in Istanbul by the Istanbul branch of the Human Rights Association (İHD).

Several intellectuals discussed the "genocide" claims of Armenians and argued that Turkey has to face its history without ignoring or denying the truth.

“All of us, who kept quiet and did not resist to the killings of Armenians are guilty, no matter what you call what was done toward the Armenian people living in the Ottoman Empire; genocide or injustice,” said Eren Keskin, a lawyer.

“April 24 is a symbol for the Armenian community all around the world since many Armenian intellectuals were exiled to the central Anatolian provinces of Çorum and Çankırı where only some of them could survive. They were murdered by the gangs supported by the Ottoman Teşkilat-ı Mahsusa [Special Organization, created in 1913 under the imperial War Department],” said Ragıp Zarakolu, a prominent intellectual and writer. Zarakolu said this date is the first time in Turkish history where intellectuals were arrested collectively.

“I was arrested in the middle of the night. I was lucky that I survived, unlike many of my Armenian colleagues who were arrested in 1915,” he said, noting that discussions on the issue should not be based on number of Armenians killed since they were all individuals and intellectuals who had unique lives. “It is not the numbers but what Turkey lost intellectually and socially after having exiled and murdered Armenians that is significant to remember,” he said.

The mainstream ideology as well as its alternatives should be questioned in Turkey in order to prevent such discrimination, said Keskin, noting that both all ideologies are based on militarist and male-dominated organizations. Keskin said the Turkish Republic was built on an ideology that excludes all identities except Turkish and Sunni.

[Joseph]

http://www.bianet.org/english/kategori/english/106564/24-april-1915-events-debated-by-armenian-and-turkish-intellectulas

"24 April 1915 Events" Debated by Armenian and Turkish Intellectulas
“What happened on April 24, 1915?”. Ara Sarafian of the Gomidas Institute Sarafian, debates with Turkish colleagues Keskin, Aydın and Zarakolu. It's high time to face the past, intellectuals urge.
Bia news servıce
27-04-2008
Speaking at the panel “What happened on April 24, 1915?”, organized by the Human Rights Association (İHD), Ara Sarafian, a historian at the Gomidas Institute, who specializes in the late Ottoman period, told that “April 24 was the political act of the Committee of the Union and Progress. April 24 opened the way for the liquidation of the Armenians in Anatolia.”

The publisher Ragıp Zarakolu, the lawyer Eren Keskin and the writer Erdoğan Aydın participated in the panel held at İstanbul Bilgi University yesterday. While more than three hundred people watched the panel, there were many police officers around the university.

April 24 stands for the few days in 1915, during which 220 Armenian intellectuals in Istanbul were arrested and today this day is acknowledged as the “genocide commemoration day” by all the Armenians around the world.

“The same mentality persists”
Giving the opening speech, the IHD branch president Gülseren Yoleri stated that the genocide claims were still neither discussed nor accepted and the same was the case regarding the Kurdish problem.

“They could not live in their own land, nor die in it. They made enemies out of Kurds, Turks, Armenians, Greeks, the neighbors.”

Stating “the mentality of the Committee of the Union and Progress continues”, Keskin added that “If we do not discuss the Committee of the Union and Progress, the Special Organization (Teşkilat-i Mahsusa), Şemdinli incident, 6-7 September pogrom of 1955 against Greeks in Turkey and the latest Ergenekon incident, we will not get very far.”

“We have failed to come to terms”

Saying “I think that there is a generation that represents an enlightened conscience, like the hundreds of thousands who walked behind Hrant”, Aydın likewise added that “Since we did not come to the terms with what Armenians, Assyrians, Syrians went through, the Kurdish problem, the May First celebrations, the Alevi problems persist as individual paranoids.”

Zarakolu also stated “April 24 also forms a model for the arrests of the intellectuals.”

“There is a visible and an invisible state: there is the Special Organization and the Ottoman civil servant who could not adjust to this new method.”

Reading an article Hrant Dink wrote about April 24, Zarakolu added that “This society can emphatize, provided that nobody overshadows it.”

Sarafian: There were 2 million Armenians in 1913
Sarafian talked about the historical documents regarding the genocide claims.

“According to the 1913 census of the Istanbul patriarchate, there were 2 million Armenians within the borders of the Ottoman Empire. The great majority of Armenians lived in the country with Turks and Kurds, intermingling with Muslims. Most Armenians lived in Istanbul and in the East. Those Armenians not in the war zone were exiled as well.”

“40 thousand Armenians lived in Harput, divided into 50 settlement regions. Not a single village was left after 1915. Harput plain was not a war zone. The local Armenians were very passive and they could do nothing against genocide.”

“On April 24, 1915, Armenians from various professions in Istanbul such as intellectuals, politicians, artists, and teachers were sent to Ayaş and Çankırı. In Ayaş, 55 out of 70 people were slained. About the fate of the 150 Armenians who were sent to Çankırı, no definite information has been discovered.


* This news was compiled from Atılım, Milliyet and Radikal.