A first day rich in emotions as in meetings

The Union-Union of Alevis in France, chaired by Erdal Kiliçkaya as well as members of the European Alevis Federation, who came from Austria and Germany, began this morning their two-day official visit to Armenia. As Michel Marian, a “common dream” collective, and Gorune Aprikian recount, the genesis of this visit goes back to their common desire to always work for more dialogue with the democratic elements of Turkey and the many actions and meetings they have been able to have these last years with the Alévis de France.

This first day allowed the official delegation to meet the Deputy Speaker of the Armenian Parliament and Republican Party spokesman Eduard Sharmazanov, accompanied by deputies representing the Kurdish and Assyrian minorities of Armenia. During this exchange, Eduard Sharmazanov recalled that the Armenians themselves had become, following the genocide, minorities throughout the world, and that it was their duty to always work alongside all those who “all days, like us, face the denial of the Turkish state. “ With a strong minority of at least fifteen million members in Turkey, the Alevi people are both a people with strong roots planted in the Anatolian lands, neighbors of Armenians for centuries, and a particular faith, which came at the origin of a a specific interpretation of Shi’ite Islam, but incorporating above all many non-Islamic elements, above all a stamp of tolerance and open-mindedness.

After this official meeting, the delegation went to the Genocide Memorial to bow down to the eternal flame and visit the Museum. The Alevi of France and Europe came here with a strong will – that of highlighting the common suffering endured alongside the Armenians. The terrible massacres of Dersim that struck them in 1938 are still the subject of a strong denial of the current Turkish state and the Alevis have suffered and are still subject to persecution and multiple discrimination in Turkey. Above all, in the beautiful text written by Erdal Kiliçkaya and printed in the official brochure of the Federation, the Alevi of France and Europe, who did not participate in the genocide, ask in fact “forgiveness” – but a specific forgiveness , that of not being able to do more in 1915 to come to the rescue of the Armenian brothers and sisters persecuted and driven from their lands … An additional testimony, if it were necessary, of the proximity between Alevis and Armenians further reinforced by this visit to Armenia itself.

With the support of the international association of parliamentarians of Armenia chaired by Aragats Akhoyan, also president of the foundation “Veradarts” (return), the delegation will continue tomorrow its exchanges with the Armenian civil society. As Michel Marian and Gorune Aprikian point out, the idea is to make this Alevi minority better known both to the Armenians of France and those of Armenia, knowing that in France and in Europe, the Alevi are at least two million. As a young girl from the student delegation in Bordeaux points out, the Alevi identity in Europe and in France must also be recomposed, debate and perspective familiar to the Armenians, between its real modernity and its attachment to its culture.

Laurence Ritter