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“I once again declare that the independence of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic should be recognized,” said member of the European Parliament, Frank Engel during a briefing after his speech at the Second Global Forum against the Crime of Genocide.
He said that Artsakh is an independent country and the international community should recognize it as such.
“I’m going now to meet the President of Armenia and express my position,” Engel said.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s 1,150-room mega-palace and its residents should immediately be evicted, an architects’ NGO has said in a statement after the country’s critical June 7 general elections.
The Ankara Chamber of Architects said the election results, which resulted in the loss of a parliamentary majority for the Justice and the Development Party (AKP), have proven the illegality of the controversial palace, demanding it be vacated immediately.
“Our nation has shown their refusal with the election results that the palace was illegal at heart, as it was built in violation of the law and the will of [Mustafa Kemal] Atatürk on the Atatürk Forest Farm [AOÇ] and a luxurious, gaudy life is led inside. The most serious decision against the ‘illegal palace,’ which was twice in illegal status according to judicial decisions, was the election results. The residents of the ‘illegal palace’ should immediately be evicted,” the head of the chamber, Tezcan Karakuş Candan, said.
Candan also addressed Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç, saying he should keep his word about previous claims against Ankara Mayor Melih Gökçek, accusing the latter of “having sold Ankara to the Gülen Movement plot-by-plot.”
“We are following the issue; everyone should keep their word. We promised our nation. We said this cause will not end until those who attempt to choke us by narrowing our living space and stealing our children’s future will be accounted for in front of the law and we are doing what is necessary. Thus, Bülent Arınç should keep his word and announce the places sold plot-by-plot, which he said he would announce on June 8,” added Candan.
The case into whether the will of Atatürk was broken in building the palace will be concluded in Ankara on June 9.
By Aryeh Neier
Times of Oman
One hundred years ago, on April 24, 1915, officials of the Ottoman Empire rounded up some 250 Armenian leaders and intellectuals in Constantinople and prepared them for deportation. It was the beginning of a historic massacre, in which as many as 1.5 million of the two million Armenians living in the empire were killed.
In the weeks leading up to the tragedy’s centenary, the debate over whether the killings amounted to genocide has predictably flared anew. Pope Francis and the European Parliament are among those who have lent their voices to those who say they did — drawing the condemnation of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and others in his government.
Reactions like Erdogan’s are unfortunate. Turkey has long portrayed the massacre of the Armenians as uncoordinated and unfortunate acts resulting from the chaos of World War I and the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. It would be wise to reconsider this position.
The stance taken by Erdogan and others fosters anti-Turkish sentiment in Europe and elsewhere, by encouraging the impression that modern Turkey’s leaders and people, though not responsible for the crimes themselves, are guilty of denying them.
Whether or not the use of the word “genocide” is appropriate, Turkey should recognise that it is not alone among great states with a history of committing great crimes. For nearly a century after the United States was founded, slavery remained legal; untold numbers of Africans and their descendants suffered in bondage or died horrifying deaths.
For another century, legalised racial segregation was maintained in much of the country. Many aspects of the nineteenth-century slaughter of the indigenous population in the US were genocidal in nature.
During World War II, Japanese troops may have murdered as many as ten million civilians in China, Korea, and elsewhere. And, of course, Germany engaged in genocide against the Jews and the Roma during World War II, as well as slaughtering many millions of ethnic Slavs.
Millions of Russians and others died in the Soviet Gulag system during Joseph Stalin’s rule. Millions more died of starvation in Ukraine as a result of his policies. Great numbers of ethnic minorities — “the punished peoples” — died during forced deportations from Western Russia.
In China, Mao Zedong’s Great Leap Forward is estimated to have killed 36 million people, many of them by starvation. Their suffering was covered up by the communist regime, making it impossible to organise relief efforts. Mao subsequently launched the Cultural Revolution, which devastated China and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths.
When India was partitioned following independence in 1947, perhaps as many as a million Muslim and Hindu civilians were murdered on religious grounds. And in 1971, Pakistani troops and allied militias massacred up to three million Bangladeshi civilians to suppress the Bengali drive for independence.
These countries have taken different approaches in facing up to the crimes of their past. On the far end of the spectrum is Germany. Memorials to the genocide and other war crimes have been given prominent placement in Berlin, the country’s capital, ensuring that residents of the city and visitors alike are constantly reminded of the atrocities committed by the Nazis.
Other countries have done far less to acknowledge the shameful aspects of their history, and many could do much more. But none responds as vehemently as Turkey does when the word “genocide” is used to describe what happened a century ago.
The angry reaction — combined with the government’s diplomatic reprisals against those who use the word — has the perverse effect of stigmatising present-day Turks as deniers of one of the great crimes of the twentieth century.
Turkey would be far better off facing up to the crimes of the past, as Germany has done. Germany’s horrific history is well known, but today few countries are as widely admired. Germany also has excellent relations with the countries whose people suffered most under the Nazis.
The Holocaust is internationally recognised as belonging to a different era and being in no way representative of the country’s current leaders or its people.
The best way for a country to rehabilitate its reputation is to accept the truth about past atrocities and the responsibility, both symbolic and material, that it owes to the victims and their survivors. Only then can it draw a thick line between past and present.
Source: Panorama.am
Ahead of April 24, the Armenian Day of Remembrance, the State of Israel should follow the pope’s lead and recognize the premeditated massacre for what it was – genocide, The Jerusalem Post writes.
Official Israeli recognition of what happened – essentially the destruction of a civilization built up over four millennia – is important for a number of reasons, the news outlet says.
As Francis pointed out, failing to honor the memory of those Armenians systematically murdered because of who they were amounts to concealing and denying evil. Denial allows this evil to fester, like a wound that remains untreated.
Beyond the moral obligation to acknowledge and denounce genocide, which applies equally to all humanity, Israel has a special duty, the article says.
Founded in the shadow of the Holocaust, the State of Israel is a living testament to the failure of the international community to prevent genocide. It was in large part out of international recognition of this failure that legitimacy for a uniquely Jewish state with its own armed forces and sovereignty was born. Israel has an obligation to live up to that legacy by using its political sovereignty to prevent genocide not just against Jews but against any group, the article says.
As a minority religious group living in a predominantly Muslim Middle East, the Jewish people are the natural allies of the region’s Christians. The Armenian Genocide is a chilling reminder of the dangers that Christians, Jews and other religious and ethnic minorities face in this part of the world. The chances of a future genocide are greater in the Middle East than anywhere. Those who deny genocide tend to be those who want to see one happen again. Pope Francis has publicly recognized the Armenian Genocide. Now it is Israel’s turn, the article concludes.
