OTTOMAN GOVERNMENT WAS TO ERADICATE THE CHRISTIAN POPULATION FROM ANATOLIA AND OTTOMAN ARCHIVES SHOW THIS TO US: TANER AKCAM
Arminfo
2008-10-27 11:05:00
ArmInfoThe various archives on the Ottoman Empire contain information
that is supportive and complementary to one another and explain the
same historical phenomenon from different perspectives. The main
target of the Ottoman Government at the time was to eradicate the
Christian population from Anatolia and available Ottoman documents
from Ottoman archives show this to us, Taner Akcam, Turkish historian,
Professor of Clark University, told ArmInfo.
‘I have recently published another book in Turkey and the title is
"The Armenian Issue is Resolved: Policies towards Armenians During
the War Years, Based on Ottoman Documents" The central thesis of
the book is that the available Ottoman governments documents in
the Ottoman Archive in Istanbul clearly show us that the Union and
Progress party developed and implemented plans during the World War
I which deliberately targeted the total destruction of the Armenian
people. By doing so, I refute the commonly accepted thesis by the
public and the academic world, that Ottoman archival materials in
Istanbul contradict the German, American, Austrian and other foreign
archival records and that their respective contents present different
information. As I showed in my book this perception is wrong and there
is in fact no contradiction between the materials found in the Ottoman
archives with that in Western archives. The various archives contain
information that is supportive and complementary to one another and
explain the same historical phenomenon from different perspectives. The
main target of the Ottoman Government at the time was to eradicate
the Christian population from Anatolia and available Ottoman documents
from Ottoman archives show this to us>, the Turkish historian said.