Fresno Bee , CA
Jan 21 2007

Slain Turk shown in documentary

By Christina Vance / The Fresno Bee01/21/07 05:56:27

Photo: Carla Garapedian, director of the documentary "Screamers," is
scheduled to speak at 3 p.m. today at the student recreation center
at California State University, Fresno.

Knar Kahkejian braved chilly Saturday night weather to hand
photographs of a murdered man to Fresno moviegoers.

The Fresno teen never met Hrant Dink, but she didn’t need to know him
to care about his death. She is Armenian, and so was he.

Dink, a Turkish newspaper editor of Armenian descent who challenged
his nation’s version of the Armenian genocide of 1915, was shot to
death Friday as he left his Istanbul office. A teenage boy was
arrested Saturday in Turkey in connection with Dink’s slaying.

An interview with Dink was included in "Screamers," a documentary on
genocide playing at the Edwards Theater at River Park. The film
combines footage of mass killings of the last century with music from
hard rock band System of a Down, whose members are Armenian.

Carla Garapedian, the documentary’s director, also stood outside the
Fresno theater Saturday night. She was in Los Angeles earlier in the
day with others who were memorializing Dink. She described him as a
charismatic bear of a man who lived with constant threats against his
life.

"Of all the dissidents in Turkey right now, he was the one who was
preaching peace and reconciliation," she said.

Garapedian chatted with people about to see the movie, many of them
Armenians. The documentary will open in New York, Boston and Chicago
in coming days, but she said it came to Fresno at the request of the
city’s Armenian community.

Fresnan Vik Sapatjian is close friends with one of the band members,
but he was going to the film first as an Armenian who is opposed to
genocide.

He questioned how many deaths might have been prevented in the last
century had the world stopped what happened to his people.

"People are still killing each other in mass quantities," he said.

Vache Jierian, who attends Fresno City College, said his 95-year-old
great-grandmother survived the killings. To him, the images in the
film are personal. "We can all relate to that, since we have
ancestors who were part of that," he said.

But Jierian said he was handing out posters on Dink’s death to
educate non-Armenians.

He wanted people to understand genocides – past and ongoing.

Garapedian decided to make the documentary in 2004 when she was at a
System of a Down concert and realized how many of the fans already
knew about the Armenian genocide.

She hoped the concert footage would draw filmgoers who don’t know
about such killings.

"I think we should all be outraged, and we’re not," she said.

Knar, who attends Bullard High School, said she has been taught about
genocide since she was young.

She admitted it can get discouraging because so few people know
what’s going on in the world.

Said Knar: "A lot of people are so ignorant to it, and they don’t
want to learn."