‘PROBLEM IS NOT BETWEEN ARMENIAN AND TURKISH PEOPLE’ – II

Journal of Turkish Weekly, Turkey
Dec 10 2006

Mr. Wally Sarkeesian’s Second Open Letter to Dr. Sedat Laciner on
Armenian Issue

"Dear Sedat,

Thanks for your reply.

I welcome the opportunity to visit you and Turkey to see the country
and those things you mention, I would also love the opportunity to
see where my father was born being that it is now located in Turkey.

I will take your word on the Armenian literature that is available
in Turkey but I would love to read some of them outside of Istanbul
in Anatolian region?

I would like to begin this dialog by asking you some questions of my
own and then I will respond to your questions.

1- I am curious at what age you were taught about the Armenian
Massacre. All the research that I have done demonstrates that the
curriculum in the public schools do not mention the Armenian issue.

It is not until you become an adult and are subjected to alternative
publications.

2- As you are aware Orhan Pamuk, the Nobel Prize winner admitted the
massacre of one million Armenians. How come the Turkish government is
not privy to these facts? Do you think he is falsifying the information

3- Just look at information from Turkish Weekly archives. The
articles in the archives claim that there were Armenians Senators,
Ministers and Civil Servants during the Ottoman Empire. What happened
to them? Is there any Senators, Ministers or civil servants in today’s
Turkish government?

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4- Do you believe that over 50 governments around the world
including 38 states of the US recognized Armenian Genocide without
any foundational proof? Is it simply just a rubber stamp without any
fact? Why would they do that?

5- I would also like to extend to you a similar offer of travels.

Please travel to any country of the world where there is an Armenian
community I will be happy to join you. Go to the Armenian churches
or community center and I guarantee you that you will find that 95%
of there roots stem back to land now claimed by Turkey. They will all
speak of stories from there relatives about the massacre. I guarantee
this so much that if this is false I will pay for all your expenses.

Just for your information after over 90 year of the massacre today
still most Armenian in the Diaspora they refer to each other by the
city where there parents or grand parents where born not where they
where borne even though some for example if Hagop was born in Iraq
and his father was borne in VAN they call him VANEZY Hagop not Iraqzy
Hagop from Iraq. Just to tell you how much Armenian in the Diaspora
is attached to there ancestral land…

6- The last questions I have for you is, do you really believe that
Armenians in the Diaspora are fabricating the genocide? I recognize
that you admit that there were Armenians massacred at the hands of
the Turks but you still deny the atrocity is genocide. Please let me
provide you with Article 2 of the Geneva Convention, straight from
the website of the United Nations. This should clarify the dispute
as the statement is VERY clear.

Article 2

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts
committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated
to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

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Now about the 70,000 Armenians working in Turkey compare that to
the million of Turks working in the EU, does this mean Turkey is a
bad country or the Turkish population is dwindling? Why have they
left Turkey?

About the Armenia population declining; I have no idea where you are
getting this information. In fact last September was the first time
I visited Armenia and I expected to see a third world country. I was
pleasantly surprised to see the monumental progress they have made in
last 15 year despite a major earthquake, and a war with Azerbaijan,
shortage of fuel as well as the hostile environment at the two borders
Turkey and Azerbaijan. In the last 5 years Armenia’s economy has grown
12% every year and Yerevan is becoming a little Paris with tourists
from all over the world. I even had hard time finding a hotel because
they were all booked. I plead with you to stop providing misleading
information about Armenian statistics. Yes, when USSR collapsed they
lost most of there manufacturing industry.

Armenian had to come out of the wreckage and build a country pretty
much from scratch. Please do not worry about Armenia’s population with
the last 15 years as a testament to Armenian people capabilities;
they will build the entire economic infrastructure. If there is one
good thing about Armenians it is that they are great entrepreneurs.

About Karabagh: When the USSR occupied Armenia, Azerbaijan and other
countries it was to keep the Moslems happy. They too carved Armenia
and gave it to the Azeri to keep the Moslems populations in USSR
happy. When the USSR collapse occurred, the Armenians in Karabagh did
not want to be part of Azerbaijan just like the people in KOSOVO they
declared there independence, it was the Azeri who sent there mighty
military, tanks and all to crash down the Karabagh Armenians.

Unexpectedly to the Azeri, the 100,000 brave Karabagh Armenians not
only repelled the Azeri’s military force but with simple shot guns
they also occupied extra Azeri territory as a buffer zone. It was not
the Armenians who began the war in the first place and so please let
us stick to Armenian and Turkish issue.

You also claim the Armenians in Diaspora are boycotting Turkish
products and I have not found that to be true, in fact I have a bowl
of Turkish dried figs on my kitchen table.

>>From my recent visit to Armenia, as well as my consistent monitoring
of the Armenian press, I have not seen any objections to the Turkey
becoming a member of EU. In fact, if I am not mistaken, the Armenian
President has publicly stated that he supports Turkey’s entrance into
the EU but I am not 100% sure.

To answer your last statement, firstly, through all our discourse I
have never mentioned that the Turkish people hate Armenians neither
Armenian people hate Turks in contrary even during the massacre Turkish
people helped there fellow Armenian. They are unhappy with the Turkish
government but not the Turkish people. Also, you mentioned that the
Turkish people are making great efforts to be friends again with the
Armenian people like Orhan Pamuk. It is the Turkish government that
has caused such hostilities between the two nations. Karabagh would
have been the best opportunity for Turkey to have played a positive
leadership roll but instead they simply dismissed the situation and
closed its borders.

Turkey could have played a good neighbor roll and solved the issue
of Karabagh instate they close the borders build gas pipeline from
Azerbaijan by passing Armenia through Georgia, and now building
rollway in same way by passing Armenia, do you really think these
are the great efforts by Turkish government to establish a good
friendship despite objections by all EU members and US show me one
of these great effort have Turkish government done?

I strongly believe that we must keep the communication and dialogue
open between people like your self and Armenian Diaspora like my self
and others however; we cannot do it by just throwing dirt back and
fort in to each other face and mixing one issue with other you are
making this is though it is a Franco Turkish issue… Any dialog and
or discussion must lead to some where…

One thing I can assure you as an individual Armenian in Diaspora this
issue will never go away whether present Turkish government or future
government they have to deal with it you just cannot go on boycotting
other countries.

I look foreword one day meeting you face to face and hopes your next
articles will be more toward bringing these two people together then
dividing them it start with good people like your self who has great
tools to achieve it…

Have a nice day…."

Wally Sarkeesian The US