Time to look to future, not past

Bahrain Tribune, Bahrain
June 16 2005

All wars eventually come to an end. What remains are the painful
atrocity, the shocking massacres and the terrible sacrifices. And also
the attempts to exploit the memory of the war to impose a specific
view and to perpetuate an interpretation of facts.

There is no doubt that dozens of thousands of Armenians were killed
in 1915 and that atrocious massacres had taken place. The question
that has been lingering is whether to call it a genocide or part of
a terrible war.

Either way, it happened 90 years ago and as such it should be dealt
with as if it is something that has just taken place because opening
the wounds of the past will amount to reshaping the world as we
know, geographically, socially and politically. Which could amount
to total chaos.

Can we imagine for fleeting seconds what the world could possibly
look like if we apply the war reparation and compensation to all the
countries that had the misfortune of being occupied? All Third World
countries have suffered from savage colonisation. Examples of abuses
abound in Latin America, Asia, Africa and the Arab world.

Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia should press for compensations from
France; the Libyans should ask the Italians to pay for war damages
and the Egyptians should ask both the French and the British to
compensate them.

The logic can be extended further and we can see France annexing
Belgium because it was twice attacked by the Germans from the buffer
state. This would be exactly the logic employed by Israel which has
been seeking buffer areas to avoid direct borders with its neighbours.

While it is always difficult to imagine the scale of atrocities that
people suffer during wars, fostering reconciliation has little chance
when all kinds of pressure are exerted on a country.

The Turkey-Armenia issue has plagued relations between the two
countries and has threatened lately to escalate into international
diplomatic and economic confrontations as the Armenian lobbies are
working overtime to ensure that the world sides with them. Some
governments yielded to the pressure, mainly for domestic reasons,
and endorsed the Armenian viewpoint, further compounding the miasma.

Today, some German lawmakers, eager to embarrass the Shroeder
government and to keep Turkey outside Europe at any cost, are
seeking to show that the Armenians were right and that Ottoman
Empire did commit a genocide. Naturally, the lawmakers will have
a very selective memory, will blame it all on the Ottomans, will
overlook the Kurds~R role in the killing of the Armenians and will
use pompously loaded expressions such as ~Sforgiveness for historical
guilt~T and ~San honest historical review is needed and represents
the most important basis for reconciliation~T. Exactly like some
other European governments had said.

It is a shame that instead of working together for a common good,
some governments and deputies have chosen to take up one side and
impose on the world because it suits their objectives.

Whether the framework will lead to disastrous consequences because it
is sowing seeds of discord and mistrust between Muslims and Christians,
whether it is fuelling feelings of hatred between civilisations,
whether it is insulting all the other countries that at one time or
another suffered the humiliations of occupation is not important. It
becomes important only when things get out of hand, but then it is
too late.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress