Rethinking so called ‘Armenian genocide’ resolutions

Tuesday, 16 March 2010 12:29

Commenting on the recent passage of resolutions that recognize the killings of Armenians at the hands of the Ottoman Empire in 1915 as “genocide” by a US House committee and the Swedish Parliament, analysts have said Turkey should change its discourse with regard to the incidents of 1915 and claimed that the passage of these resolutions is related more to negative perceptions of Turkey than to history.

Yeni Şafak’s Yasin Aktay acknowledges that the Armenian “genocide” recognition campaign is marketed well and is supported by the impressions about “Turkey” or “Turkishness” held by the peoples of the countries in question. “We need to work separately on how this ‘Turkishness’ image has been formed. However, an image of a Turkey that discriminates against some young people in their university choice, does not allow covered women to study at university, is the scene of 17,000 unsolved murders in a decade, cannot even tolerate the existence of [slain Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant] Dink, who was a big lover of Turkey, is an issue of today, not of 1915,” explains Aktay. He notes that such an image of Turkishness inevitably influences the approach to the incidents of 1915, explaining that history is not an issue of the past but of today and that the perceptions about 1915 can be corrected not by going back to history but by addressing current perceptions.

Nevertheless, Aktay notes that the problem with the Armenian genocide resolutions cannot be attributed solely to the negative views on Turkey, adding that the issue is also related to the achievements Turkey has made in the international arena. “While these achievements please many countries, others are displeased and concerned. The passage of Armenian genocide resolutions by the parliaments of other countries one by one is related to the achievements of Turkey. We should not be surprised if more countries approve this resolution,” adds Aktay.

In his view, the Armenian “genocide” issue has nothing to do with history as nobody used to talk about anything like “Armenian genocide” until 1956. “The issue was brought forward by the Soviet Union as a project and supported by the US in the 1960s, hence becoming a tool to politically correct Turkey. From that day on, this issue has become one of the most important issues of Turkish politics. What was the expectation of the Soviet Union, what kind of an international balance could be established by the US supporting the ‘genocide,’ we need to think about this,” he says.

Markar Esayan, an Armenian columnist writing for the Taraf daily, proposes that the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government develop a new discourse in dealing with the Armenian allegations of genocide, while acknowledging that it is impossible for the government not to react in the wake of the passage of genocide resolutions by the parliaments of other countries. “The government can develop a new discourse on this issue just as it did in the cases of the Kurdish and Alevi problems as well as the unsolved murder cases. Turkey should act just the opposite of how it has acted thus far regarding the 1915 incidents,” he suggests.

Fatma Disli Zibak/Today's Zaman