Macomb Daily
Apr 25, 2005
Justice denied until genocide acknowledged
Mitch Kehetian
Growing up in southwest Detroit, I shared a common bond with many of
my school pals: Our ethnic roots went back to Armenia, a parcel of land
best known for Mt. Ararat, where many believers say Noah’s Ark came to
rest after the great flood.
We also shared a bond of family tragedies. Our aunts, uncles and
grandparents perished in Turkey’s 1915 genocidal measure to settle the
Armenian claim to autonomy by ridding the Ottoman Empire’s eastern
provinces of Armenians.
By the time the killing ceased, it was estimated that more than 1
million Armenians had died by the close of World War I.
But the survivors found new life in new lands, and built new
churches and community centers to retain an ethnicity that dates their
roots to 500 B.C.
As the years passed, I read more and more about my massacred
relatives and learned why I had only one grandparent, and only a few
aunts and uncles.
In my teens I began to mount a personal campaign to tell the plight
of my ancestors, and to develop a response to the questions, `Why do you
Armenians carry a grudge over something that took place in 1915? Why
can’t you forgive and forget?’
I still get that question, and my stock answer remains the same.
The past governments of Turkey, and today’s ruling government deny
the action against Armenians was genocide. They contend it never
happened, and that the Armenians triggered clashes with the Turkish
government by seeking autonomy.
In essence, the government in Ankara says the Armenians got up on
April 24, 1915, to leave their historical homeland and wandered off to
their graves in the desolate deserts of Syria.
When the Turkish government condemns what happened in 1915, then I
can learn to forgive and forget. Until then, justice remains denied.
In 1968, I journeyed to the historic homeland of my ancestors. Even
now I remain chilled by the failure by the present-day Turkish
government’s attitude about condemning past rulers for committing a
crime against humanity.
In my journey of despair, made possible by the help of U.S. Rep.
Lucien Nedzi and Secretary of State Brandon Rodgers, I experienced what
no person should be forced to endure and then be told `it never
happened.’
On my return, my then publisher, Ben Nathanson of the East Side
Newspapers, asked my impression.
I told him it was as though I had walked through a cemetery, but I
couldn’t find grave markers to tell me the Armenians lived there for
thousands of years. All I found were the ruins of their churches and
homes.
Ben urged that I not give up in the fight for justice. My publisher
was of Jewish faith and championed the rights of all suppressed peoples.
Through the years, Presidents Reagan, Ford, Clinton and George W.
Bush have addressed the massacres.
In his April 24, 2002, statement on the Armenian genocide, Bush
said, `Today we commemorate an appalling tragedy of the 20th century,
the massacre of as many as 1.5 million Armenians through forced exile
and murder at the end of the Ottoman Empire.’
But Turkey says it wasn’t genocide. It was the result of internal
fighting in its eastern provinces.
When you can eradicate 1.5 million people through forced exile from
their ancestral homeland, it’s genocide. It happened then, and it’s
happening now in Sudan.
Until acknowledged, the `appalling tragedy of the 20th century,’
will stain the present Turkish government sitting in Ankara.
Mitch Kehetian is Editorial Page editor of The Macomb Daily.
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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress