Armenian Letters 3 : Justice Does Not Fade With Time

MARAL DER OHANESIAN's LETTER TO JTW EDITOR

In his research, Prof. George H. Stanton (The President of Genocide Watch Organization and Vice President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars), described “Twelve Ways To Deny A Genocide” as the tactics used by the perpetrators or their accomplices to deny the crime of crimes (as some call it), that is Genocide.

Out of twelve tactics of Genocide denial, in the message you sent to me, alone , you have used 7 of these excuses:


1. Question and minimize the statistics

You wrote: “we cannot accept any genocide allegation when we paid more than the Armenians lost. We lost more than 5 million Turkish people during the collapse of the Empire.”

The British Ambassador to Constantinople , Sir Harding Lauter, wrote to the British Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1910 that there only 6 million out of the 30 million population of the Ottoman Empire were Turks.
So, how can I believe that you got your statistics right, when you say that you lost 5 million Turks during the collapse of the Empire ?

2. Rationalize the deaths as the result of tribal conflict

You wrote: “Many were massacred in the East. I know that thousands of Turkish villagers were massacred by the armed Armenian gangs during the First World War and aftermath. No Turk denies that many Armenians were massacred by the Turkish and Kurdish gangs.” Then you wrote: “It was a communal clash. Both sides suffered... I respect the Armenians and Turks killed in the clashes.”

You made it look like a communal clash, something that is not. Armenians were massacred by government orders, carried out by soldiers of the Ottoman army, local police, tax collectors & the special organizations (Teskilati Mahsusa).

3. Blame out of control forces for committing the killings

You wrote: “Many were massacred in the East. I know that thousands of Turkish villagers were massacred by the armed Armenian gangs during the First World War and aftermath. No Turk denies that many Armenians were massacred by the Turkish and Kurdish gangs.”

By using the word “gangs,”you actually denied the Ottoman government’s responsibility for the killings and blamed it on the gangs.

4. Justify the denial in favor of current economic interests

You wrote : “Particularly when needs 's friendship I think you and the other Armenians cannot trust 's sincerity about Turkish-Armenian friendship. It is unfortunate for and I think. especially lose time under these circumstances.... You are speaking about mass graves, in fact I prefer to speak about highways between Turkey and Armenia, regional economic integration in Caucasus etc....Turkish people preferred to forget the memories and focused on to establish a strong state.”

5. Claim that what is going on doesn’t fit the definition of Genocide

You wrote: “No Turk denies that many Armenians were massacred by the Turkish and Kurdish gangs. The problem is that Turkish people does not accept that the killings was a genocide.”

I will remind you later about the definition of Genocide, according to International Law.

6. Blame the victims

You wrote: “ I know that thousands of Turkish villagers were massacred by the armed Armenian gangs during the First World War and aftermath.... Many civilians were massacred by the Greeks, Bulgarians, Armenians, Russians, etc. Most of them were civilian and women-children-old people.... Thousands of Turkish and Kurdish villagers were massacred around Van for instance.”

7. Say that peace and reconciliation are more important than blaming people for Genocide

You wrote: “However the discussion on the past does not allow us to discuss today in the Armenian case. Particularly when needs 's friendship. I think you and the other Armenians cannot trust 's sincerity about Turkish-Armenian friendship. It is unfortunate for and I think. especially lose time under these circumstances.... Turkish people preferred to forget the memories and focused on to establish a strong state. I think not the Armenians but the Turks were right. Armenians are still speaking about hostility, revenge and killing. But the time passed.... You are speaking about mass graves, in fact I prefer to speak about highways between and , regional economic integration in Caucasus , etc.”

Now Dr. Laciner, let me tell you something very interesting here. Prof. Stanton’s research was on the Genocide in Darfur , but it can be applied to the on-going Turkish denial of the facts of the Armenian Genocide. All Genocide denials have the same pattern, and I don’t think that you’d be surprised if you know that there are people who are actually studying these patterns.

Moreover, the international genocide scholars, have described the Genocide as a process of eight distinctive stages: The final stage of EVERY Genocide is Denial. So, if they deny a Genocide, it would be more proof of the fact of Genocide itself. There is no criminal who voluntarily admits his crime, and the same goes for the Crime of Crimes.


Getting back to your message, I would like to add a few comments:

*You wrote: “No, it is not right. I saw many English, Turkish and French belongings from the Gallipoli War in the museums.”

Excuse me, but there is a huge difference between belongings kept in museum exhibits, which are collected at the time of WWI, or shortly thereafter, and belongings that are buried in the humidity of 90 year old graves. I don’t see the relevance.

*Your wrote: “In fact about 1 million Armenians immigrated from to Europe and Northern America ”

And there are more than 3 million Turks ONLY in , in addition to few more millions in Europe & America. What does that have to do with anything?
How does that disprove/prove the facts of the Armenian Genocide. Let’s not deviate from the subject which is the “Armenian Genocide.”

*You wrote: “If Armenians are serious about their claims, they would have invested to . But they did not.”

I’m sorry, it seems that you know nothing about the relations between the Armenians in the Diaspora and . I encourage you to take a closer look at the numbers and statistics before you say that the Armenians of the Diaspora haven’t invested in . And if you want, I will give you an example of the key words for that search. Try “Kirk Kerkorian.”

*You wrote: “I am sorry but I do not keep all the reports about Armenians.”

I doubt that someone who makes a headline of "Armenian Participant Sarkisian: Turkey Is Much Different Compared To What I Heard" from what a beauty contest participant had said about she thought that Turkish women wear headscarves and use black veils, doesn’t keep all the reports about Armenians, especially those kinds of reports. Moreover I tried to search both the Turkish History House (Turk Tarih Kurumu), and the Ataturk University websites for any reports about this issue, I unfortunately found nothing, no reports not even any news about it.


Now the most interesting part of your message.

You wrote: “Now all Eastern provinces, including Ani is open to all Armenians. And thousands of Armenians come and visit the region. You or any Armenian could buy territory in the region, or settle permanently. There is no problem. If Anatolia is important for the Armenians, they should make investment there.”

Come and “visit” ?! And “buy” ?!

So let me get this straight, you kicked me out of “my” house, sent me into the desert without food or water, force me to march for months on my feet, killed my family members, orphaned me, while you are plundering “MY” house and property, granting it as a gift to your elite people or sold it and with “my” properties’ money you built "your strong state." And I was exiled to a foreign country whose people speak a language that I do not know, stayed a few years in the orphanage, worked hard to earn a living during my entire childhood, then grew up to be a man, worked even harder to save some money to be able to finally buy a house and made a new family. And now, you are kindly trying to sell me “MY” house to make some more profit of me. But where would you spend that money? Maybe you are planning to make another DVD to deny my facts, may be you are planning to buy another academic to write for you a book to cover up your crime against me, maybe …Who knows!

Now how would you like it , if I show you my legal ownership papers to that house? Would you give it back to me or would you insist on selling it to me?

And you are now asking me: “For what? Why you want Eastern Anatolia ?”

Well that would be up to me , to do whatever I want with it, I may build a skyscraper or burn it down, after all, it’s my house.

And finally you wrote: “Thank you for your honest offer. But you should accept that we are not speaking about fact both of us accepted, but the beliefs or faith. It is very difficult to me to change an Armenian’s faith.”

Well, that’s not right. It’s not your belief or my belief. It’s not what you think or I think. It’s all about historical facts and reliable sources of the facts.

Therefore I encourage you to pay a visit to the Official German archives to obtain your facts. was the Ottomans’ “ally” in WWI. It is the “strongest” ally of and its main supporter to join the EU has acknowledged the fact of the Armenian Genocide based on its National Archives, and even apologized for its role in it -- turning a blind eye to the massacres of Armenians -- and called on to acknowledge the facts too. It’s more of a search for justice than what you describe as an “obsession with history,” because “Justice” doesn’t fade with time.

I understood from what you have said above, that you are not ready to give up on the “so-called” “alleged” “disputed” words and descriptions that you still using while mentioning the Armenian Genocide. You are not ready to remove them, not ecause the Armenians’ approach is “shut up and accept,” but because you are not ready to listen, to understand, or maybe because you are personally benefiting from using such expressions.

If that's the case, there would be no point at all for our dialog. when you are not yet ready to listen or to give up your denial to the historic fact of the Armenian Genocide.




Regards,

Maral Der Ohanesian





Note : I would like to add to your information the definition of Genocide. You won’t need any effort to realize that the massacres, the abduction of Armenian orphans who were forcefully Turkified, or even just the deportation and death caravans of Armenians, are classified under the international law as "Genocide."

The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide New York , 1948

Objectives

This convention declares genocide a crime under international law. It defines what genocide is, and condemns this crime whether it's committed in peacetime or wartime.


Key Provisions

The convention defines genocide as any act committed with the idea of destroying in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial or religious group. This includes such acts as:

· Killing members of the group
· Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
· Deliberately inflicting conditions calculated to physically destroy the group (the whole group or even part of the group)
· Forcefully transferring children of the group to another group

The convention declares that there is no immunity from being prosecuted for committing genocide: those found guilty of genocide will be punished for their crime, regardless of whether they are or were legally constituted ruler, public officials, or private individuals.

According to this convention, anyone charged with genocide will be put on trial by either:
· a competent court of the country where the act was committed; or
· an international court that has jurisdiction over the people and crimes concerned.




27 September 2005

Article Also Found Here
Visit My Current Blog!