Turkish foreign ministry reacts to Greek parliament’s Genocide bill

September 11, 2014 By administrator

September 11, 2014 – 16:07 AMT

Turkish foreign ministry reacted to Greek parliament’s adoption of a bill criminalizing denial of the Armenian Genocide and other crimes against humanity.

According to the statement by foreign ministry spokesman Tanju Bilgic, Turkey always closely followed discussions on the draft law and urged Greece to exercise care where the issue is concerned.

According to the statement, it was stressed during the discussions that the law and its formulations won’t become part of Turkey-related foreign policy. However, the adoption of the law is seen as suppression of the right for freedom of speech, and can become discriminatory for Turkish communities in the East Thrace, islands of Rhodes and Kos. Ankara further expressed concern that Greece-based Turkish nationals might be punished for violation of the law.

The Parliament of Greece on Tuesday, September 9 adopted a bill that criminalizes the denial of the Armenian Genocide and other crimes against humanity.

Greece becomes the third European country after Switzerland and Slovakia to adopt such a measure.

The bill known as “Fight against Xenophobia” envisions bringing criminal charges for denial of the genocides of not only Jews, but also Armenians and Pontus Greeks. The bill stipulates heavy fines and imprisonment terms for individuals who publicly deny genocides and other crimes against humanity that are recognized by the Greek Parliament and international courts.

The vote passed by 54 to 42 with three abstentions.

In early September, French MP Valerie Boyer introduced a new bill on criminalization of denial of genocides and crimes against humanity in the 20th century.

“With the centenary of the Armenian Genocide ahead of us, France has no laws to punish denial of genocides and crimes against humanity, with the exception of the Holocaust. Though officially recognizing both genocides, only the denial of Holocaust was made punishable by Paris,” the parliamentarian stressed, urging to rectify the situation.

According to the MP, criminalization of the genocide denial is gaining urgency amid relentless persecution of Christians in Iraq. In this context, Boyer suggested to introduce a new classification of the denial of genocide viewing it as a crime against humanity rather than abuse of free speech, thus protecting the memory of all genocides.

In 2012 and 2013 Boyer also initiated draft laws on criminalizing the Armenian Genocide denial.

On January 23, 2012, French Senate passed the bill criminalizing the Armenian Genocide. The bill envisaged imposing a 45,000 euro fine and a year in prison for anyone in France who denies this crime against humanity committed by the Ottoman Empire.

Later, the French Constitutional Council ruled that a bill adopted by the French Senate making it a crime to deny the Armenian Genocide was anti-constitutional.

In July, French President Francois Hollande confirmed plans for a new law criminalizing denial of the Armenian Genocide with representatives of the Armenian community.

Armenian Deputy Speaker: Turkey’s pressure did not have effect on Greece

September 10, 2014 By administrator

YEREVAN. – Armenia is grateful to Greece for adopting a law criminalizing denial of the genocide of Armenians and Greeks in Ottoman Turkey, Deputy Speaker Eduard Sharmazanov said.

Talking to reporters on Wednesday, Armenian Deputy Speaker said adoption of the law is not only a move condemning perpetration of the Armenian Genocide but is an instrument to prevent new crimes.

“During the NATO summit, president of Turkey met with Greek PM and expressed his discontent in regard to this bill, but his pressure did not have expected effect,” Sharmazanov noted.

Asked whether Greek parliament’s initiative will serve as an example for French lawmakers, he recalled that during the last visit to Armenia, French MPs assured the bill will be adopted.

The parliament of Greece on Tuesday adopted law criminalizing the Armenian Genocide denial, becoming the third parliament after Slovakia and Switzerland that introduced penalties against denial of genocides.

Report: ISIL using ammunition produced by Turkey

September 9, 2014 By administrator

This undated image posted by the Raqqa Media Center of the ISIL group on Aug. 27, 2014, which has been verified and is consistent with other AP reporting, shows masked gunmen of the ISIL group shooting seven men kneeling on the ground in front of them, in the aftermath of the group’s takeover of the Tabqa air base in Raqqa province, Syria. (Photo: AP)

Terrorist Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants fighting against Kurdish forces in Iraq have been using ammunition marked as coming from the Turkish Mechanical and Chemical Industry Corporation (MKE), according to the Taraf daily.

Taraf reported on Tuesday that the MKE-marked ammunition was found out after a recent fight between the ISIL militants and the Kurdish forces in Arbil, the capital of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq.

According to the report, the US experts who examined the ammunition were surprised to see the MKE mark on the ISIL ammunition. Following this discovery, US officials have begun to investigate how this ammunition ended up in the hands of ISIL militants.

The daily also claimed that the MKE-marked ammunition has caused problems for Turkey on international platforms such as at last week’s NATO summit in Wales and that Turkey was forced to defend its activities.

US President Barack Obama warned President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan that Turkey’s policies in the Middle East must be aligned with NATO and the US when the two met for an extensive talk on the sidelines of the NATO summit, according to Taraf.

Warning Erdoğan about Turkey’s current alignment, Obama reportedly told Erdoğan, “We would like to see you on the same page as NATO and the US.” Throughout the Erdoğan-Obama meeting, the Turkish delegation tried to defend Turkey’s position but at the end of the NATO summit, Turkey reluctantly joined the coalition against ISIL, the Taraf report claimed.

While US security experts have been trying to track down the source of the ammunition which was found on dead ISIL militants, the US military has launched airstrikes against ISIL targets. At the same time, several bombing attacks were launched in Arbil by ISIL militants and US experts have discovered that the bombs which were used in the Arbil attacks were also MKE-marked. In addition, some of the ISIL members who were involved in the bombing attacks were killed during clashes with the Kurdish forces were found to be carrying MKE-marked ammunition. According to Taraf, it’s not clear how the ammunition ended up in the hands of ISIL militants. The report speculated that it could be theft or smuggling or that the arms allegedly sent to Syrian opposition forces by Turkey somehow found their way to ISIL.

Taraf said that US officials are working on preparing a file on the ISIL issue which will be shared with Turkey later on.

Turkey has been pushing for the fall of the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad since 2011, initially predicting that the fall of the Assad regime would come in a short time. Despite this expectation not having been met, the government has failed to adjust its policies accordingly.

Furthermore, many foreign officials and Western media have started to voice concerns over Turkey’s alleged support of al-Qaeda splinter group ISIL and the al-Nusra Front. According to some press reports, Turkey allegedly sent a number of trucks carrying aid and possibly military equipment to the radical groups.

Western press outlets have also been reporting stories suggesting that Turkey has turned a blind eye to the foreign fighters who cross the Turkey-Syria border to join ISIL. Ankara categorically denies these claims.

The Obama administration has been working on building a coalition against the ISIL threat in the region for sometime. The US pushed for a 10-nation core-coalition against ISIL during the NATO summit in Wales. The coalition — which includes Turkey — will fight ISIL militarily and financially. Turkey is a reluctant partner in the coalition due to its critical hostage situation, as ISIL still holds 49 people who were kidnapped from Turkey’s Mosul Consulate General in June.

Senator poses 5 questions to US ambassador to Turkey nominee

September 9, 2014 By administrator

Senator Mark Kirk has submitted five pointed questions to US Ambassador to Turkey nominee John Bass in order to bring clarity to US policy on both the Armenian Genocide and the growing movement to secure Turkey’s return of stolen Christian churches and religious properties, reported the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA).

“We want to thank Senator Kirk for shining much-needed sunlight on Ambassador-designate Bass’s nomination.

“We look forward to sharing the responses to Senator Kirk’s questions as soon as they are made publicly available,” said ANCA Executive Director Aram Hamparian.

In his formal testimony, Ambassador Designate Bass had used words such as “shared history,” in terms of the Armenian Genocide, and praised then Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan’s April 23 open letter to Armenians.

Turkey the weakest link in anti-IS coalition?

September 9, 2014 By administrator

By Kadri Gursel

Columnist, Turkey Pulse

At a news conference on Sept. 3, Atilla Kart, a lawmaker for the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), revealed the code names and birthplaces of 90 Turks killed over the past two years in the ranks of jihadist groups in Syria. Kart, who referenced “academic research,” said IS recruited militants mostly from Adapazari and its environs in the northwest and the Konya region in central Turkey. In Istanbul, recruitment concentrated in conservative, impoverished suburbs such as Sultanbeyli, Bagcilar and Esenler. Kart said IS recruited militants also through a number of Turkish Islamic foundations, associations and religious learning centers, saying it would be inconceivable for the security forces to be unaware of them.

Indeed, IS-linked activities have expanded and become more visible in Turkey in recent months. On June 17, for instance, the Haberturk daily reported about an association using the IS emblem in Istanbul’s low-income Gungoren neighborhood. On July 29, the media carried images of hundreds of people from an IS-linked group performing an open-air Eid al-Fitr prayer near Istanbul.

With those realities on the ground, one might well argue that the contributions coalition member Turkey could make to regional security in light of its caveat-related position could not be limited to securing its Syrian border and stopping the jihadist traffic. Of course, we are not speaking here of a permission to use the southern Incirlik air base for strikes on IS. This option remains in the scope of caveats and seems highly unlikely.

However, as a country with a peculiar geographical position and Muslim identity, Turkey gets not only the right to caveats but also greater responsibilities. Beyond securing its borders, Turkey has the obligation to enact measures to prevent young Turks from joining IS, including primarily the surveillance and elimination of IS activity and recruitment networks inside Turkey.

No doubt, the AKP government’s policy and hawkish rhetoric vis-a-vis Syria since 2011 has had an indirect effect in encouraging young Turks from the most conservative social segments to join the “jihad.” It is high time for AKP leaders to realize that their sectarian policies and hard-line rhetoric vis-a-vis Syria and Iraq have produced a blowback with direct threats to Turkey’s security.

Finally, we come to the AKP government’s ideological constraint, which is best illustrated in its leaders’ continuous reluctance to label IS as “terrorist.” This attitude has nothing to do with tactical considerations to avoid angering an IS that holds 49 Turks hostage. Had it been so, it could have been considered a “political” weakness. But the AKP government and its media have never referred to IS as a terrorist group, calling it a “radical element.”

In an Aug. 8 television program, then-foreign minister and current Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu called the organization a “terrorized” rather than terrorist group. “[IS] can be seen as a radical, terrorized formation. However, there are Turks, Arabs and Kurds in its ranks. The structure there [in Iraq], the earlier displeasure and resentments have led to a widespread reaction on a large front,” he said. Davutoglu’s approach could be seen as an attempt to understand and rationalize IS. Nevertheless, it also shows that IS enjoys a remarkable “caveat” in the mindset of Turkey’s leadership.

Kadri Gursel

Columnist, Turkey Pulse

Kadri Gursel is a columnist for Al-Monitor‘s Turkey Pulse and has written a column for the Turkish daily Milliyet since 2007. He focuses primarily on Turkish foreign policy, international affairs and Turkey’s Kurdish question, as well as Turkey’s evolving

Julian Assange “Censorship in Turkey related to past on minorities silences”

September 9, 2014 By administrator

It is not surprising that Turkey, which has in the past used the censorship against Armenians and Kurds, is currently used against other groups and that this should be ordered to spread said Julian Assange founder WikiLeaks

Julian Assange was speaking on Friday via a video conference at the Internet Ungovernance Forum (IUF), an alternative to the UN forum Internet Governance Forum (IGF), held in Istanbul last week.

He recalled that the censure passed arguments against the Kurds and against calls for the recognition of the Armenian Genocide in 1915.

His speech resonance Stand face to the IUF, held in a country where more than 51 000 sites are currently blocked. Turkey also banned YouTube and Twitter in the past in an attempt by the Justice and Development Party (AKP) to silence anonymous groups denouncing the alleged government corruption.

The president of Turkey has repeatedly called social media, including Twitter, forces nuisance gathering agitators and alleged coup plotters. The IUF brought together academics, activists and others who ask “free internet, secure and open to the people.”

WikiLeaks founder appeared as a surprise guest to the IUF, which was held on September 4 and 5 at the last session of the event. He noted, in response to a question from the audience in Turkey, “It seems clear that the freedom of Turkish media is declining,” adding that Turkey currently has the largest number of journalists in prison.

In response to a question about the general supervision of the Internet, Assange said, “censorship and surveillance are two sides of the same coin,” and they rely on the same mechanisms. “The authority should come from the legitimate exercise of power, not censorship,” he has said.

Based on an article in the Turkish newspaper Zaman of September 7, 2014

Turkey should reconcile with its own past – Edward Nalbandian

September 6, 2014 By administrator

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian’s article was published in the French Le Figaro with slight abridgements

Below is the full version

In international relations there are, unfortunately, cases of missed opportunities. The statement of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, followed by the comments of other Turkish senior officials on the eve and after the commemoration of the 99th Anniversary of the Armenian Genocide are such cases. The fabricated notions of “common pain”, “just memory” and the appeal to the Turks and Armenians to “follow Erdogan’s lead” are misleading. Ahmet Davutoglu declares “that the main goal of Erdogan’s statement is prevention of worldwide efforts of the Genocide recognition”. Instead of concrete steps towards reconciliation one can find calls to complicity. I mean complicity against the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

It is hard to find a nation nostalgic towards its centuries-old suppression in its ancestral homeland. Any oppressed nation cannot share the nostalgia towards the Ottoman Empire. Like other empires, the Ottoman Empire was built upon and forcefully sustained through suppression of the basic rights and freedoms of many of its citizens.

Mr Davutoglu’s differentiation of the Western and Turkish perception of sufferings by Christians and Muslims is astonishing. The Armenian Genocide is not only part of Armenian or western memory and history, but also of the memory of the Muslim world. One of the earliest references to the Armenian Genocide belongs to Muslim witness Fayez El Ghossein, who in 1916 published his work entitled “The Massacres in Armenia.” Sharif and Emir of Mecca Husayn ibn Ali was one of the prominent Islamic leaders, who acted against the program of physical annihilation of the Armenians and called on his subjects to defend Armenians as they would defend themselves and their children. In 1919-1921 the large-scale extermination of Armenians were referred such Turkish public figures as Refi Cevat, Ahmet Refik Altinay. Many Muslim historians refer to the massacres of Armenians as genocide, while Arab historian Moussa Prince used the term “Armenocide”, considering it as “the most genocidal genocide.”

For the sake of “just memory” artificial political actions and calls are not needed, while those, who dare express their opinion freely are killed like Hrant Dink, or exiled like Orhan Pamuk, or taken to custody, like Ragıp Zarakolu.

Davutoglu is playing the same old tune of founding a commission of historians “in order to find the truth”. One of the most competent international institutions on genocide studies, the International Association of Genocide Scholars, in answer to the same proposal, made an appeal to the Turkish government to accept what had been proven long ago. Instead of repeating decade-old re-worded or rephrased appeals we need genuine and concrete steps. Ratification of the Zurich Protocols, normalization of Armenian-Turkish relations, opening of the borders could pave the way to the difficult path of reconciliation between our peoples. The sub-commission on historical dimension, as envisaged by those Protocols, could implement a dialogue with the aim to restore mutual confidence between the two nations. It would be impossible to do by putting under question the reality of the Armenian Genocide.

Led by an apparent desire to deny the fact of the genocide, as defined by the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Erdogan’s message yet again underlined that what happened in 1915 “was regardless of religion or ethnic origin.” It seems that the 1919 Turkish Military Tribunal’s Indictment, which proved by undeniable facts that the deportations and large-scale massacres of the Armenians were a state policy, and sentenced its main masterminds to death, has been forgotten in Ankara. It seems that Rafael Lemkin’s development of the concept of “genocide” has gone unnoticed in Ankara. I have to remind that 99 years ago on May 24, 1915 Russia, France and the Great Britain issued a special declaration by which they warned the perpetrators of the atrocities against the Armenian people of their personal responsibility for “these new crimes of Turkey against humanity and civilization.” It is beyond any doubt that the Armenian Genocide was organized with genocidal intent. Meanwhile an attempt is made by the Turkish officials to equate the losses of the war and the systematic annihilation of Armenians, as a result of which millions of my predecessors lost their lives, homes, lands, properties. There was an attempt to strip millions of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire of their right to life, as well as their past – more than 2000 cultural and religious monuments were destroyed and the survivors were driven off the lands they had inhabited for many centuries, before Turks came to this region. In 1915 one of the chief masterminds of the Armenian Genocide, then Interior Minister Mehmed Talaat Pasha confessed to Germany’s Consul General that “there is no Armenian question, because there are no more Armenians.” He was wrong, but the nature, magnitude and the consequences of that horrible crime are far beyond the definition of “suffering.”

In one of the interviews Erdogan rhetorically asked “if such a Genocide occurred would there have been any Armenians living in this country?” Today a large number of Jews live in Germany, but no one would dare put under question the reality of the Holocaust. Or, how can one speak of “relocation”, when 1.5 million of people died or were killed? Planned marching people to the dessert, starving them to death, killing most of them en route is not a relocation, it is a “death march,” it is a genocide.

The denial of the genocide, the atmosphere of impunity paved the way for the repetition of new crimes against humanity. Genocide denial is considered by scholars as the last phase of the crime of genocide. Even though there are still few who continue to deny, but this does not mean that there is a “dispute” about it. On the one hand, there is the fact of genocide that nobody doubts in the world, the pain of which every single Armenian family anywhere in the world bears until now, and on the other hand, there is an official and imposed denial of the genocide by the Turkish government. Turkey is in dispute with itself.

Is it possible to make the descendents of genocide survivors, spread all over the world, a part of the complicity of genocide denial? Is it possible to equate perpetrators and victims of genocide by such clichés as “common pain”? It is appalling to imagine that the perpetrators of Holocaust, of genocides in Cambodia, in Rwanda, and other crimes against humanity, can be equated with the victims. Is it even possible to consider genocide survivors’ descendants as “Turkish diaspora”, which some Turkish politicians are trying to do today?

As Rwanda Genocide survivor Esther Mujawayo recently mentioned at the UN Human Rights Council High Level Panel Discussion in Geneva dedicated to the Genocide Prevention Convention, “Today is the fourth generation of Armenians who are still waiting”. Not only Armenians, the whole international community for almost 100 years has been waiting for Turkey to recognize the Armenian Genocide. The genuineness of the desire for reconciliation must be proven through recognition and condemnation of the Armenian Genocide. The Turkish government must not refrain from genuine reconciliation. Thousands of Turkish citizens have opted for that path already.

Davutoglu mentions Armenian composer Komitas as an example of Armenians’ creative activities in the Ottoman Empire. ”Just memory” should have shed some light on the life of Komitas, who was a witness of the Genocide. He had seen all the sufferings, the horror that befell the Armenians and said that “nobody knows all the wounds of our tragedy… this distress will drive us mad!” And from 1916 onwards, for 20 years he spent his life in a psychiatric hospital.

On April 24, 2003 when we were unveiling the Komitas statue in Paris, I expressed hope that this memorial to the Armenian Genocide victims could symbolize the sufferings and memory of the victims of all genocides perpetrated in the 20th century, that it would become a mourning site for all those who consider tolerance and respect to human life and dignity as a continuous process, that there would bow not only the descendents of those who suffered physically and spiritually, but also the descendents of those who caused those sufferings. I believe that the route to reconciliation is not a path of denial, but that of conscious memory, because true reconciliation does not mean forgetting the past or feeding younger generations with the tales of denial. Turkey should reconcile with its own past to be able to build its future.

The President of Armenia has invited the Turkish President to visit Armenia on April 24, 2015, on the occasion of the commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. We hope it will not be a missed opportunity and Turkey’s President will be in Yerevan on that day.

Edward Nalbandian

Foreign Minister of Armenia

As Turkey turned blind eye, ISIS took advantage

September 4, 2014 By administrator

By Holly Williams CBSnews

ISTANBUL, Turkey – As ISIS has grown, it’s used neighboring Turkey, a key U.S. ally, as its staging ground.

For three years, the Turkish government has allowed fighters to stream across its borders into Syria, driven by its desire to topple Syria’s dictator, Bashar Al-Assad.

In 2012, CBS News interviewed Mahmoud, a bulldozer salesman from Atlanta, Georgia who returned to his homeland to join the battle against the Syrian regime

“We come in and out,” he said at the time. “The Turkish they are closing eyes, when we cross.”

Islamic extremists also took advantage of the Turkish turning a blind eye.

In December, CBS News filmed men crossing illegally into the war zone in broad daylight.

Many militants have been treated in Turkish hospitals, and set up safe houses in Turkish border towns.

And in a Turkish government refugee camp two years ago CBS News met Syrian men who said they regularly crossed back into Syria to fight, and wanted to establish an Islamic state.

The Turkish government says it’s never helped ISIS, and considers it to be a terrorist group.

But Hursit Gunes, a member of Turkey’s opposition, claims his government has allowed ISIS to flourish because it prefers the group to the Syrian regime.

He even accuses the Turkish authorities of ignoring the militants’ lucrative oil smuggling business on Turkey’s border.

“That money could be stopped,” said Gunes. “The money they get from smuggling could be stopped if the Turkish government and the neighbor countries had decided that they shouldn’t get a coin.”

A Turkish government official told CBS News 6,000 foreigners are now banned from Turkey because of fears they could slip across the border to fight with ISIS in Syria or Iraq. But he also said that Turkey has a 500-mile-long border with Syria, and it’s simply impossible to stop everyone who wants to join the cause of the Islamic extremists.

650 child abuse cases registered every month in Turkey

September 3, 2014 By administrator

Doğan News Agency

According to Child Watch Centers’ data which only comprises 13 provinces out of 81 in Turkey, 2,792 children suffered sexual abuse last year, while 263 were married despite being underage.

Some 650 cases of child abuse are being registered at the Forensic Medicine Institute (ATK) every month, according to figures provided by the Justice Ministry in response to a parliamentary question.

Some 916 cases were waiting to be inspected by forensic officials at the end of last year, the data also showed.

The response by Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ to main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) deputy Sezgin Tanrıkulu also said the number of lingering cases fell sharply from 3,271 in July 2012.

The reports on the mental health reports of victims are completed over a period of six months for children and one year for adults, it also said.

Data collected from Child Watch Centers in just 13 provinces last month showed that 2,792 children suffered sexual abuse last year, while 263 were married despite being underage.

September/03/2014

Libya calls back ambassador from Turkey

September 3, 2014 By administrator

ANKARA

Libya’s Parliament has called back its ambassador from Turkey.

Quoting an unnamed source, the Dubai-based broadcaster Al Arabiya reported Sept. 2 that the Libyan Foreign Ministry accused President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of interfering with Libya’s internal affairs after saying the relocation of Libya’s Parliament to Tobruk was “unacceptable.”

Sources from the Turkish Foreign Ministry have confirmed the Libyan ambassador is on his way back to the North African country; however, it is not clear whether he was recalled permanently as a diplomatic rebuke or for temporary consultations.

“There is no direct information on such a move that has been conveyed to our side, the Foreign Ministry, or by the Libyan officials,” a Turkish diplomat, speaking under the customary condition of anonymity, told Hürriyet Daily News on Sept. 3.

“There is an obvious disagreement between the previous Parliament and the new Parliament of Libya over the issue, while noting the previous Parliament is against calling the ambassador back to the country,” the source added.

Currently, Turkey has no ambassadors in Syria, Egypt and Israel, as bilateral relations between Ankara and the aforementioned countries have become strained over the past three years. In July, Turkey also removed all of its diplomatic personnel from Libya, citing security risks as the main reason for the move.

Öztürk Yılmaz, Turkey’s consul general in the Iraqi city of Mosul, was taken captive by militants belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) on June 10, along with 48 Turkish citizens.

September/03/2014