The famous writer, winner of the Nobel Prize in literature, Orhan Pamuk, arrived at Sharjah International Book Fair and expressed his dissatisfaction with Erdogan’s policy, speaking also for the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, MK reported.
Pamuk’s political views and the persecution he suffered from local nationalists when he said in an interview that thirty thousand Kurds and one million Armenians were killed in Turkey were not ignored. The writer does not consider himself a brave man, but simply expresses what he thinks.
“You know, I live in that part of the world where many writers are imprisoned for their beliefs. So I’m a happy writer and telling the truth is all I can,” he said.
With these words the audience burst into applause. The Armenian Genocide of 1915 is the first genocide of the 20th century. Turkey rejects allegations of the mass extermination of more than one and a half million Armenians during the First World War and is extremely sensitive to criticism from the West on the issue of Armenian genocide.