Garo Paylan nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

January 24, 2020 By administrator

International women’s union of Hamshen has nominated Garo Paylan, Turkish legislator of Armenian descent, for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Saida Ohanyan, Head of HAMSHENIAN Union said that the organization sent a letter to the Nobel Committee with a proposal to nominate Paylan, who devoted his whole life to protecting the rights of Armenians and other indigenous people of the region.

He is one of the few who took responsibility for protecting humanitarian rights, the rights of indigenous peoples, religious and national minorities, the the statement said adding that his efforts continue despite constant threats and pressure on his activities by nationalist and extremist forces supported by the authorities.

The Association urges all people and organizations defending the rights of women and, in general, human rights to support and join the initiative.

Mexican lawmaker weighs in on Armenian Genocide recognition

January 20, 2020 By administrator

Mexican lawmaker Adolfo Torres Ramirez said on Monday, January 20 that “work is underway” in Mexico to recognize the Armenian Genocide.

Ramirez was meeting Armenian parliament speaker Ararat Mirzoyan in Yerevan.

He promised to make effort to help clear the situation in Artsakh (Nagorno Karabakh), stressing that peace is the only solution.

Mirzoyan expressed hope that the Mexican parliament will join a number of other legislative bodies in recognizing the Armenian Genocide.

The President of the National Assembly also stressed the importance of maintaining a balanced approach to the Karabakh conflict.

Hrant Dink: ‘Not Forgotten’: Protesters Seek Justice For Slain Turkish-Armenian Journalist

January 19, 2020 By administrator

By Fulya OZERKAN

Hundreds of people gathered on Sunday outside the former offices of Agos newspaper in Istanbul where Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was murdered 13 years ago, a killing which sent shockwaves across the country.

Dink was shot dead with two bullets to the head in broad daylight in central Istanbul on January 19, 2007, by a then 17-year-old jobless high-school dropout.

The 52-year-old Dink was editor-in-chief of Turkish-Armenian bilingual weekly Agos and a fierce advocate of reconciliation between Turks and Armenians.

His death became a wider scandal after it was discovered that security forces were aware of the murder plot, but failed to act.

“For Hrant, for justice,” the crowds chanted in Istanbul. “We have not forgotten and we will not let it be forgotten.” Top articles2/4READ MORE Law On Compulsory Receipts Sets Germans Grumbling

A giant picture of Dink was hanging outside the former building of Agos weekly, embellished with slogans reading: “It is not late to be ashamed” and “This case will not be over before we say it is over.”

Hakan, one of the supporters who joined the mourning, lamented that the murder had remained unsolved for 13 years.

“Hrant was killed here 13 years ago. For 13 years they haven’t shed light on his death,” he told AFP.

“We won’t stop following Hrant’s murderers. Whether they shed light on this or not, as Hrant’s brothers, we will continue to be here.”

Another supporter, Seyit Dogan, said: “There are courthouses in this country but there is nothing in the name of justice.”

Turkish police heightened security and blocked the street where the commemoration was being held to traffic.

After the ceremony, carnations were laid on the sidewalk where Dink was shot dead.

“Your hope and dreams are our legacy” was the headline of Agos on the 13th anniversary of Dink’s assasination. The newspaper also published letters from Turkish businessman Osman Kavala, well-known author Ahmet Altan and Kurdish politician Selahattin Demirtas — the three of them are in jail, in memory of the late journalist.

“Me and those who have been unfairly put behind bars have lost our freedom for a while; Hrant has lost his life because of what he wrote and what he said,” Kavala said in his letter.

“On our own and together, we will keep demanding justice for Hrant, for the murdered honorable people of this country and for everyone,” he said.

A respected intellectual and a philanthripist, Kavala charged with overthrowing the government is chairman of the Anatolian Culture Foundation, which seeks to bridge ethnic and regional divides through art, including with neighbouring Armenia, with which Turkey has no diplomatic ties.

Altan accused of ties to the 2016 attempted coup plotters, wrote: “Some people decided in secret rooms that he was ‘guilty’. The first biggest crime of Hrant was that he told Turkey an Armenian was a human and an Armenian was as acceptable as a Turk.”

Kavala, Demirtaş and Altan wrote for Hrant Dink from prison, Kavala, Demirtaş ve Altan, hapishaneden Hrant Dink için yazdı

January 18, 2020 By administrator

Turkish Crime Against Humanity

Osman Kavala, Selahattin Demirtaş and Ahmet Altan wrote a letter for Hrant Dink from the prison for the 13th year of his murder.

The newspaper Agos appeared in the 13th year of the murder of Hrant Dink with the headline “Inheritance of hope and dreams to us”.

Due to the anniversary of the death of Hrant Dink, the founder and editor-in-chief of the newspaper, Osman Kavala, the only defendant in the Gezi Resistance case, Osman Kavala, former Co-chairman of HDP, and arrested journalist Ahmet Altan, writing articles for the newspaper. took.

13 years in search of justice

The newspaper used the following expressions in her headline when she included the photograph of Hrant Dink taken by Sebati Karakurt:

“It has been 13 years since Hrant Dink, the founder and editor-in-chief of our newspaper, left us with a racist murder. These 13 years have passed, especially with the search for justice for the murder case. Unfortunately, there has been no significant development in 13 years, especially for those who plan this dark murder in the state.

“The trial of public officials could begin exactly nine years after the murder. Even if some relations are exposed in the case that has been going on for about four years and even if the smoke screen has been opened a little, a comprehensive investigation is still not carried out.

“But the words of Hrant Dink, his dreams are growing day by day. 13 years both in Turkey and abroad as more and more people are cut off the ear of Hrant’s words carefully, knows her world, visiting the drop-Spatial Memory hemhal is happening to him last year. Hrant’s hopes and dreams lead us all. ”

Kavala: ‘We will continue to demand justice’

Speaking to the readers of Agos from Silivri Prison, where he was detained for Hrant Dink, Osman Kavala said that he will not be with the people who came to commemorate the 19 January commemoration for the third time this year:

“This year, on January 19, I will not be with you, Hrant’s Friends, in front of Agos . I will remember Hrant by thinking about the photo of dear Hrant appearing together with the seagulls and watching the seagulls flying over me.

“Commemorating Hrant, how easily a person can do evil to his fellows, citizens, human brothers, this painful fact strikes our face.

“But thinking about Hrant gives us more power to stand up to what we’ve experienced and resist hope. I and those who were unjustly imprisoned have lost our freedom for a while; Hrant died of what he wrote and said.

“As long as we live, we will be able to demand justice and hope, alone and together. We will continue to demand justice, alone and together, for Hrant, for the dignified people of this country, and for all. I wish 2020 to be a year that strengthens our hopes. ”

Demirtaş: ‘Someone is worrying about you being an Armenian’

Selahattin Demirtaş, former Co-Chair of HDP, who was detained in Edirne F Type Prison, wrote a letter for Hrant Dink.

Demirtaş, who said in his letter, “We hear things that increase hope inside,” wrote Demirtaş, “There is resistance where there is persecution, and if there is resistance, there is hope.”

Speaking of a memory that he had with Hrant Dink in 2001, Demirtaş briefly told Dink’s story of coming to the conference in Diyarbakır with these words:

“Dear friend, I don’t know if you remember, you came to Diyarbakır in 2001 for a conference. The state of emergency continued, it had not been removed yet. The panel was very difficult to get conference permission. Nevertheless, the permission for that conference was broken. We barely convinced you.

“At that time, the population registration samples, residence notes and criminal records of all speakers had to be submitted to the police headquarters before the event. I was dealing with bureaucratic procedures. We called and asked you for these documents. You were a warrior first. You said, ‘Does that happen?’ We barely convinced you. We wanted you to be our guest in Diyarbakır and attend the conference because.

“As for the documents of all the speakers, we went to the Police Department to apply. The police chief looked at the documents and said, “Are you calling an Armenian too?”

“I always forgot to tell you after that day. Then I realized that someone does not see your humanity, he is worried about being an Armenian. ”

Altan: ‘The eyes of death’

Ahmet Altan is located in Silivri Prison inmate “A Murder, A Funeral” in the article published under the title role in the murder of Hrant Dink penned in Turkey’s undertaking.

“Hrant saw the face of death before he was killed,” said Altan, saying:

“In the court he was on trial, when some dark men in the state suddenly appeared and stared at him, he realized that it was the eyes of death. He wrote the mood of pigeon anxiety to explain that he saw death. One last scream of writing disappeared before he could find a voice that would answer his voice in a deaf space. There were reasons why that murder, which we learned from the news that came out later, was targeting Hrant. Someone decided that he was ‘guilty’ in secret rooms. Hrant’s first major ‘crime’ was to explain to the country that an Armenian is a human being, and the more a Turkish person admits, the more an Armenian is. ”

Osman Kavala, Selahattin Demirtaş ve Ahmet Altan, katledilişinin 13’üncü yılı dolayısıyla Hrant Dink için hapishaneden birer yazı kaleme aldı.

Agos gazetesi, Hrant Dink’in katledilişinin 13’üncü yılında “Umudun ve hayallerin bize miras” manşetiyle çıktı.

Gazetenin kurucusu ve yayın yönetmeni olan Hrant Dink’in ölüm yıldönümü dolayısıyla, Gezi Direnişi davasının tek tutuklu sanığı olan iş insanı ve insan hakları savunucusu Osman Kavala, HDP’nin önceki Eş Genel Başkanı Selahattin Demirtaş ve tutuklu gazeteci Ahmet Altan, gazete için birer yazı kaleme aldı.

Adalet arayışıyla geçen 13 yıl

Gazete, manşetinde Sebati Karakurt’un çektiği Hrant Dink fotoğrafına yer verirken şu ifadeleri kullandı:

“Gazetemizin kurucusu ve genel yayın yönetmeni Hrant Dink’in ırkçı bir cinayetle aramızdan ayrılışının üzerinden 13 yıl geçti. Bu 13 yıl bilhassa cinayet davasına dair adalet arayışıyla, talebiyle geçti, geçiyor. 13 yılda bu karanlık cinayeti bilhassa devlet içinde planlayanların açığa çıkması adına ne yazık ki çok önemli bir gelişme olmadı.

“Kamu görevlilerinin yargılanmasına cinayetten tam dokuz yıl sonra başlanabildi. Yaklaşık dört yıldır süren davada bazı ilişkiler açığa çıksa ve sis perdesi çok az da olsa aralansa da hala kapsamlı bir soruşturma yürütülmüyor, cinayete giden yolu açanlar, Dink’i hedef haline getirenler yargı önüne çıkmıyor, devlet hâlâ direniyor.

“Ancak Hrant Dink’in sözleri, hayalleri gün geçtikçe büyüyor. 13 yıldır hem Türkiye’de hem de yurtdışında daha fazla insan Hrant’ın sözlerine dikkatle kulak kesiliyor, onun dünyasını tanıyor, geçtiğimiz yıl açılan Hafıza Mekânı’nı gezerek onunla hemhal oluyor. Hrant’ın umudu ve hayalleri hepimize yol gösteriyor.”

Kavala: ‘Adalet talep etmeye devam edeceğiz’

Hrant Dink için tutuklu bulunduğu Silivri Cezaevi’nden Agos okurlarına seslenen Osman Kavala, bu yıl üçüncü defa 19 Ocak anmasına gelen insanlarla birlikte olmayacağını ifade ederek şunları söyledi:

“Bu yıl da, 19 Ocak’ta sizlerle, Hrant’ın Arkadaşlarıyla beraber, Agos’un önünde olamayacağım. Sevgili Hrant’ın martılarla birlikte göründüğü fotoğrafı düşünerek ve üzerimden uçarak giden martıları seyrederek Hrant’ı anacağım.

“Hrant’ı anmak, bir insanın hemcinslerine, yurttaşlarına, insan kardeşlerine ne kadar kolaylıkla kötülük yapabildiğini, acı veren bu gerçeği, yüzümüze çarpıyor.

“Ama, Hrant’ı düşünmek, yaşadıklarımıza katlanmak ve umut etmekte direnmek için daha fazla güç veriyor. Ben ve haksız yere cezaevinde bulunanlar bir süreliğine özgürlüğümüzü kaybettik; Hrant, yazdıklarından ve söylediklerinden ötürü hayatını kaybetti.

“Yaşadığımız sürece, tek başımıza ve birlikte, adalet istemek ve umutlu olmak imkanımız olacak. Tek başımıza ve birlikte, Hrant için, bu ülkenin öldürülen namuslu insanları için ve herkes için adalet talep etmeye devam edeceğiz. 2020 yılının umutlarımızı güçlendiren bir yıl olmasını diliyorum.”

Demirtaş: ‘Birileri Ermeni olmanı kendine dert ediyor’

Edirne F Tipi Cezaevi’nde tutuklu bulunan HDP’nin önceki dönem Eş Genel Başkanı Selahattin Demirtaş, Hrant Dink için bir mektup kaleme aldı.

Mektubunda “İçeride umudu büyüten şeyler de duyuyoruz” diyen Demirtaş “Zulmün olduğu yerde direniş de vardır, direniş varsa umut da vardır” diye yazdı.

Hrant Dink’le 2001’de yaşadığı bir anıdan bahseden Demirtaş, Dink’in Diyarbakır’da konferansa geliş hikâyesini özetle şu sözlerle anlattı:

“Değerli dostum, hatırlar mısın bilmiyorum 2001’de Diyarbakır’a gelmiştin bir konferans için. OHAL devam ediyordu, kaldırılmamıştı daha. Panel, konferans izni almak çok zordu. Yine de o konferans için izin koparılmıştı. Zar zor ikna etmiştik seni.

“O zamanlar, bütün konuşmacıların nüfus kayıt örneklerinin, ikametgah senetlerinin ve sabıka kayıtlarının etkinlikten önce emniyet müdürlüğüne verilmesi gerekiyordu. Bürokratik işlemlerle ben uğraşıyordum. Arayıp senden de bu evrakları istemiştik. Yadırgamıştın önce. ‘Öyle şey mi olur’ demiştin. Zar zor ikna etmiştik seni. Diyarbakır’da misafirimiz olmanı, konferansa katılmanı çok istiyorduk çünkü.

“Tüm konuşmacıların evrakları gelince de başvuru için Emniyete gitmiştik. Polis amiri evraklara şöyle bir bakıp ‘Bir Ermeni’yi de mi çağırıyorsun’ demişti.

“Ben sana söylemeyi hep unuttum o günden sonra. O zaman fark etmiştim ki birileri senin insanlığını görmüyor, Ermeni olmanı kendine dert ediyor.”

Altan: ‘Ölümün gözleri’

Silivri Cezaevi’de tutuklu bulunan Ahmet Altan ise “Bir Cinayet, Bir Cenaze” başlığıyla yayımlanan yazıda Hrant Dink’in öldürülüşünde Türkiye’nin üstlendiği rolü kaleme aldı.

“Hrant, daha öldürülmeden gördü ölümün yüzünü” diyen Altan, şu ifadelere yer verdi:

“Yargılandığı mahkemede, devletin içindeki bazı karanlık adamlar aniden ortaya çıkıp gözlerini ona diktiklerinde, kendisine bakanın ölümün gözleri olduğunu anlamıştı. Ruh halimin güvercin tedirginliği yazısını, ölümü gördüğünü anlatmak için yazmıştı. Son bir çığlık olan o yazı, sağır bir boşlukta sesine cevap verecek bir ses bulamadan kayboldu. Neredeyse devletin bütün katmanlarının haberdar olduğunu, daha sonra çıkan haberlerden öğrendiğimiz o cinayetin Hrant’ı hedef almasının nedenleri vardı. Birileri, gizli odalarda onun ‘suçlu’ olduğuna karar vermişti. Hrant’ın ilk büyük ‘suçu’ bir Ermeni’nin bir insan olduğunu, bir Türk ne kadar makbulse bir Ermeni’nin de o kadar makbul olduğunu bu ülkeye anlatmasıydı.”

Canadian-Armenian Genocide survivor dies at 105

January 17, 2020 By administrator

A Toronto woman believed to have been one of the last Canadians to have survived the Armenian genocide died on Thursday, four months shy of her 105th birthday. Eugenie Papazian (Kokorian-Yerganian) passed away on January 14, 2020,

Papazian was born in Turkey, in the Ionia district of Samsun by the Black Sea in 1915. She never knew her parents. Her father was taken to the army in 1915 and did not return home, while her mother died when she was still a newborn. She had a large family: two sisters, Arousiag and Azniv, three brothers, as well as three maternal aunts and uncles, whom she has not met or seen.

At the start of the 1915 deportations, the members of her extended family gathered and found refuge in the mountains, and then descended into the gorge, where she was born. Seeing how frail her mother was, many advised and almost forced her to leave Eugenie there on the road, in order to avoid hard times. Naturally, her mother could not agree. Others argued against abandoning her, considering it a sin committed against God’s will. Due in part to her beauty and golden hair, they named her Voski (Gold). After Eugenie’s birth, her mother, exhausted, died in a place her daughter would never know.

Armenian Genocide discussed at Turkey’s High Advisory Board meeting

January 15, 2020 By administrator

The Armenian Genocide was among several other items covered at a meeting of Turkey’s High Advisory Board chaired by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday, Turkey’s communications director said in a statement following the event.

Fahrettin Altun noted that “some circles” are seeking to use the genocide claims in a bid to “damage the harmony of the Turkish people”, according to Anadolu Agency.

He said the officials evaluated national and international opinions on the issue along with the correct diplomatic moves and attempts to “hinder acts of disinformation” on the issue.

“The members of the High Advisory Board once again emphasized its determination to maintain our solidarity and union and the protection of our country’s interests,” Altun said.

Baku pogrom a typical example of real genocide against Armenians – eyewitness

January 15, 2020 By administrator

Along with the first signs of the collapse of the USSR and the weakening of the central government, violence against the life and property of Armenians resumed in Azerbaijan, the policy of organized massacres launched with a new scale.

The situation of the large Armenian community of Baku was particularly terrible because it already faced mass atrocities two times in 1905 and 1918. After the Sumgait massacres the wave of violence also spread in Baku starting from 1988, forcing thousands of Armenians to leave their homes and escape. The Baku pogroms reached their culmination in January 1990: for more than a week, from January 13 to 19, by the permission and direct interference of the authorities of Soviet Azerbaijan. At least several hundreds of Armenians were killed in these massacres that lasted a week, thousands migrated to different parts of the world. Today there are hundreds of witnesses which clearly display the horror faced by Armenians.

Zhanna Kotsishevskaya also witnessed the massacres committed against Armenians in Baku. She was born in Baku and was working at the department of Higher Mathematics in the Institute of Petrolium and Chemistry. The building of this department was located in Lenin avenue, near the square of the same name, which became the center of mass protests and rallies of the Azerbaijani Popular Front party. “The starting point of all these events became the Sumgait pogrom…A few days after the tragedy became known, I entered a food market. At that moment a young man approached to the Azerbaijani saleswoman and started happily telling what a good lesson Armenians learnt in Sumgait”, Zhanna Kotsishevskaya says. According to her, there have also been cases in Baku when the member students of the Azerbaijani Popular Front invaded to the classroom, beat and even tried to throw an Armenian lecturer out of the window, but this was prevented only thanks to the cries and defense of the remaining students.

The witnesses of Zhanna Kotsishevskaya and others show that in that period Baku became a dangerous place for the Armenian population where parents didn’t know whether they would again see their child or not. And in general, no representative of the Armenian community could be sure whether he/she will return back to home safe or not. Attacks were being carried out on such schools and structures where Armenians either were studying or working.

“Shortly before the Soviet troops arrived in Baku and a curfew was declared, a group of Azerbaijani students entered the classroom where I was studying and started to threaten me saying “do not come to work tomorrow. Just try to come. We know where your children study. If you don’t do what we say, we will…”, and they showed with gestures that would kill my kids. But my students kicked them out of the classroom and started to make me calm down…”, Zhanna Kotsishevskaya says. She also tells that at the workplace of her mother warnings like “Armenians, hide”, were being made from time to time after which the Armenian doctors and nurses had to be hidden because the Popular Front was coming to check whether there are Armenians in this structure.

The existing facts and witnesses show that the massacres were planned: presence of Armenians who were registered has been clarified in advance with the lists of food stamps, the list of homes belonging to them and their addresses was prepared. Zhanna Kotsishevskaya also remembers the strange campaign launched in the city in late August 1989: housekeeping staffers were visiting homes to register the names of Armenians left in the city. “When one of them visited us, I asked why they are writing only the names of Armenians. He said it is directed for protecting them. I also asked “from whom to protect”, he didn’t answer. I didn’t bother and called the Central Committee of the Azerbaijani Communist Party. They told me they will clarify and will inform me. Of course, no one called then and didn’t say anything”, she says. The reasons of registering the names of Armenians became clear to her and many others later: after the concert of her son in a music school they visited her mother, but later were informed that attack took place on their apartment. “At that time my mother-in-law was at home. Maybe after preparing the lists of apartments of Armenians they started the attacks on their homes”.

Zhanna Kotsishevskaya also remembers the terrible events while seeing off her mother-in-law to Moscow at a station: people voluntarily calling themselves representatives of the Popular Front were everywhere and searching for Armenians. By finding Armenians they were only robbing them, taking the most valuable. “…We saw how a group of young people aged 16-20 were dragging an elderly woman in front of them, with a slipper on one of her leg, and the next without. That elderly woman was holding a kettle on her hand, and her face was covered with a sincere surpise: why? The attackers were beating here and chanting: “Go back to your Armenia”.

On January 13 or 14, 1990 Zhanna Kotsishevskaya was in their second home in Bayil. She brought the two Armenian kids of their neighbor to their home so that they will watch cartoons via a color TV which was rare at that time. During that time the massacres of homes of Armenians started in their yard. The attackers entered the house where these kids were living and started their actions: they dragged their grandmother to the yard, but then she died from wounds. “Kids were standing by the window and screaming, I was unable to drag them back”.

Zhanna Kotsishevskaya’s family managed to ask for help via different ties, leave Baku and reach the Caspian Sea. Here she has seen many Armenians, most in terrible situation, beaten, burned, raped…

“For me what had happened in Baku is a typical example of a real genocide committed against people of Armenian descent”, Zhanna Kotsishevskaya says.

The interview is available at the 2016 Baku Tragedy in Eyewitness Accounts: Volume One book which was carried out within the frames of the Ordinary Genocide project.

Turkish soldier who killed fellow Armenian serviceman Sevak Shahin Balikci sentenced to 17 years

January 13, 2020 By administrator

A Turkish court has announced the verdict over the murder of serviceman Sevak Shahin Balikci at a military unit in Turkey on April 24, 2011.

As reported Istanbul’s Agos Armenian Weekly, the Turkish Civil Court has ruled to sentence accused-on-trial Kvanc Agaoglu to 16 years and 8 months of imprisonment.

Kvanc Agaoglu was detained in the courtroom.

Earlier, the Military Court had sentenced Kvanc Agaoglu to only 4 years in prison and had released him from the courtroom.

After Sevak’s parents’ appeals, the case was transferred to the Civil Court, which launched a new examination.

On the morning of April 24, 2011, Sevak was murdered by his fellow serviceman Kvanc Agaoglu. In relation to the murder, the gendarmerie had declared that Agagolu had accidentally fired the shot while joking with Balikci. However, Sevak’s parents claim that their son was killed because he was Armenian.

Books of The Times: In This Corner, an Armenian Pro Wrestler. In That Corner, Genocidal History.

December 30, 2019 By administrator

By John Williams,

Chris McCormick’s new novel, “The Gimmicks,” contains what might seem like a few gimmicks of its own, including forays into the worlds of competitive backgammon and professional wrestling. But those subcultures, emphasized in the book’s eye-catching cover design and promotional copy, are not what fuel it. It’s really about history — personal and collective — and it’s rooted in horrors from more than a century ago that are still making news today.

McCormick’s novel begins in the early 1970s, nearly 60 years after the Armenian genocide conducted by the Ottoman Empire, during which one and a half million Armenians were killed. Ruben Petrosian is a teenager living in Soviet Armenia who is obsessed with the fact that Turkey has not yet acknowledged or apologized for the crimes.

“Alliances with Turkey were growing around the world, not shrinking,” McCormick writes, “and even sympathetic governments were willing to ignore its denial for the right price.” (Earlier this month, the United States Senate voted unanimously to officially acknowledge the genocide as such. The Trump administration balked, calling the crimes “mass atrocities” as opposed to orchestrated genocide.)

Ruben is a promising backgammon player — but not as promising as his friend and rival Mina. She finds Ruben dour, and his fixation on the Turks and history boring. (“I was going to say male,” she declares, “but boring works, too.”) She compares constant focus on the past to lemon trees: “Imagine if they never dropped the dead lemons from last year, or the year before that. Just went on carrying all their old shriveled lemons until the branches sagged so low that no new fruit could grow.”

After an orphan named Avo Gregoryan arrives to live with Ruben and his family, the two boys come to think of themselves as brothers, though they are really cousins of cousins. Ruben is scowling and bespectacled, with “the look of an old man cursed to live in a child’s body.” Avo, 6-foot-6, is “an enormous but entirely sweet-hearted boy.”

When Mina is chosen to compete at a backgammon tournament in Paris, Ruben schemes to be sent in her place, seeing the trip as a chance to escape his country and expand the scope of his political activities. “We’re better than hurting a girl, yes,” Ruben tells Avo while they conspire against Mina, “but we’re also better than spending our lives in a drunken village in the corner of a dying empire, aren’t we?”

From afar, Ruben convinces Avo, then 19, to move to Los Angeles and join members of the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (Asala), a group intent on securing “global acknowledgment, apologies and reparations” for the genocide. The operatives in California make plans for an airport bombing and the assassination of a genocide-denying professor. But Avo’s heart is not in it. Ruben’s fervor never catches in his gentler cousin, who daydreams about returning to Armenia and Mina.

Instead, Avo is recruited to become a wrestler (named The Brow Beater, for his prominent unibrow) by Terry “Angel Hair” Krill, a washed-up manager who narrates sections of the novel set in the late 1980s.

A thumbnail sketch inevitably makes this novel sound overcrowded and jumbled, but McCormick keeps things admirably nimble, moving the stories forward while shuttling back and forth through time and across perspectives. Raised in California and Armenian on his mother’s side, he leans on real history, like Asala and its tactics, for his novel’s bones.

At a time when plot and contrivance in literary fiction are not the most fashionable things, McCormick, in his early 30s, proves adept at old-fashioned skills that one hopes will never go entirely unpracticed. With a minimum amount of soapiness, he keeps the pages turning on his love triangles and nostalgic wrestlers and brothers at peace and war. And he allows his larger themes to resonate without pushing them on us too hard.

One of those themes is the tides of history, and whether one can ever really decide to avoid them. “I want no trouble. I only want to be provincial,” Mina writes at one point in a journal, willing herself to believe that “the past is the past is the past.” Others include the line between justice and petty vengeance, in matters both large and small; the power (or lack thereof) in apologies; and the appeals and hazards of “pretending so well that we forgot we were pretending.”

McCormick only loses his footing on occasion. Avo speaks some jarringly (for him) profound and “written” observations, like this one about America: “Everything that makes sense in that country is terrible, and everything that’s nonsense has a kind of grace to it.” And Ruben is not quite as vivid on the page as his cousin — his fundamentalism is believable up to a point, but not conveyed with quite enough psychological detail to sell his most brutal decisions.

The novel draws to a close around one last devastating event from history, the 1988 earthquake in Armenia that killed tens of thousands. “We lost everything,” Mina says of relocating to America after the disaster. “We’re being careful not to lose anything else in the moving, you understand?”

Follow John Williams on Twitter: @johnwilliamsnyt.

The Gimmicks
By Chris McCormick
354 pages. Harper/HarperCollins Publishers. $27.99.

Pres. Trump is not Worthy of Recognizing the Armenian Genocide

December 23, 2019 By administrator

By Harut Sassounian

After both Houses of Congress, one overwhelmingly and the other unanimously, adopted two Resolutions in recent weeks recognizing the Armenian Genocide, many were hoping that this would lead Pres. Trump to also recognize it in his upcoming April 24, 2020 statement, even though he is not obligated to do. After all, a total of 505 members of both Houses of Congress had supported both Resolutions with only 11 opposing them, which placed over 94% of the US Congress in favor.

However, Pres. Trump disappointed the vast majority of the world, except for Turkish and Azerbaijani denialists, by having the State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus announce last week that “the position of the administration has not changed. Our views are reflected in the president’s definitive statement on this issue from last April.”

The State Department’s announcement snubbing the two Resolutions was made after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to expel US troops from two airbases in Turkey and to ask the Turkish Parliament to adopt a Resolution recognizing the killings of Native Americans as genocide.

In the last three years, Pres. Trump has not used the term “Armenian Genocide” to refer to the intentional mass killings of Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire in 1915. Pres. Trump has thus followed the precedent of Presidents Obama, Bush Junior, Bill Clinton, and Bush Senior, all of whom had refrained from describing the Armenian mass killings as genocide. The only exception was Pres. Ronald Reagan who had issued a Presidential Proclamation on April 22, 1981, referring to the Armenian murders by the Ottoman Empire as genocide.

In his April 24, 2019 statement, Pres. Trump used various euphemisms to refer to the “Armenian Genocide” without using that term: “Beginning in 1915, one and a half million Armenians were deported, massacred, or marched to their deaths in the final years of the Ottoman Empire.” Pres. Trump added, “We welcome the efforts of Armenians and Turks to acknowledge and reckon with their painful history.” Furthermore, Pres. Trump used the Armenian term “Meds Yeghern” (Great Crime) to avoid using the words “Armenian Genocide.” Pres. Trump simply copied the same term used by Pres. Obama. Regrettably, Pres. Trump, who regularly rejects most of Pres. Obama’s policies, has decided to follow his predecessor’s rejection of using the term “Armenian Genocide.”

Some of Pres. Trump’s supporters were irritated that a few newspapers had referred to Pres. Trump by name as rejecting the term “Armenian Genocide.” Even though Pres. Trump had not made a personal announcement on this issue, the State Department, as part of the Trump administration, would not have made such a statement without the approval of its “Big Boss!” Besides, the State Department’s spokeswoman herself referred to Pres. Trump’s statement of last April. The only point in favor of Pres. Trump is that he had not made a campaign promise to recognize the Armenian Genocide, as opposed to his four predecessors. While he does not have the obligation to keep a campaign promise he had not made, he should not have been gagged by the dictator of Ankara and pursue his personal financial interests as John Bolton, the former National Security Advisor, has indicated.

Even though April 24, 2020 is still ahead of us, and given the unpredictable nature of Pres. Trump, one cannot be sure if he would use the term “Armenian Genocide” at that time, I for one have no expectation of him facing the truth and abandoning his private interests.

Last week, there was a major development that may weigh heavily on the prospects of Pres. Trump’s reelection. On December 19, 2019, Mark Galli, editor-in-chief of Christianity Today, an influential evangelical magazine, wrote an editorial titled: “Trump Should Be Removed from Office.” Christianity Today was founded by Rev. Billy Graham. This is an important editorial given the fact that the overwhelming majority of white evangelicals support Pres. Trump.

Here is how the editorial justifies the removal of Pres. Trump from office:

1) Pres. Trump’s attempt to coerce the Ukrainian leader to investigate his political opponent (Joe Biden) is “not only a violation of the Constitution; more importantly, it is profoundly immoral.”

2) “This president has dumbed down the idea of morality in his administration. He has hired and fired a number of people who are now convicted criminals. He himself has admitted to immoral actions in business and his relationship with women, about which he remains proud. His Twitter feed alone — with its habitual string of mischaracterizations, lies, and slanders — is a near perfect example of a human being who is morally lost and confused.”

3) “We believe the impeachment hearings have made it absolutely clear, in a way the Mueller investigation did not, that President Trump has abused his authority for personal gain and betrayed his constitutional oath. The impeachment hearings have illuminated the president’s moral deficiencies for all to see. This damages the institution of the presidency, damages the reputation of our country, and damages both the spirit and the future of our people. None of the president’s positives can balance the moral and political danger we face under a leader of such grossly immoral character.”

4) “Whether Mr. Trump should be removed from office by the Senate or by popular vote next election — that is a matter of prudential judgment. That he should be removed, we believe, is not a matter of partisan loyalties but loyalty to the Creator of the Ten Commandments.”

5) “To use an old cliché, it’s time to call a spade a spade, to say that no matter how many hands we win in this political poker game, we are playing with a stacked deck of gross immorality and ethical incompetence. And just when we think it’s time to push all our chips to the center of the table, that’s when the whole game will come crashing down. It will crash down on the reputation of evangelical religion and on the world’s understanding of the gospel. And it will come crashing down on a nation of men and women whose welfare is also our concern.”

Armenian Americans and their supporters should continue to shame anyone who does not recognize the Armenian Genocide, starting from Pres. Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and the 11 Republican members of the House of Representatives who voted against the Armenian Genocide Resolution on Oct. 29, 2019. They are: Greg Pence, Larry Bucshon, James Baird, and Susan Brooks of Indiana, Mike Rogers of Alabama, Andy Harris of Maryland, Virginia Fox and Mark Meadows of North Carolina, Tom Cole of Oklahoma, and Mac Thornberry and Kevin Brady of Texas.

No Armenian-American should vote for Pres. Trump in next year’s Presidential election nor for the 11 Republican members of Congress who voted against the Armenian Genocide Resolution!