DOUGHTY STREET CHAMBERS PUBLISHED A LEGAL OPINION BY GEOFFREY ROBERTSON ON ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

PanARMENIAN.Net
03.11.2009 17:39 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Today, the law firm Doughty Street Chambers
published a legal opinion by Geoffrey Robertson, QC, regarding the
UK Government’s long established view that there is insufficient
evidence to consider the events of 1915 as genocide. Based on a
thorough investigation of the written advice provided by the Foreign
and Commonwealth Office to Ministers since 1997, the opinion concludes
that the "advice [upon which the government’s opinion is based]
reflects neither the law on genocide nor the demonstrable facts of the
massacres in 1915-1916, and has been calculated to mislead Parliament
into believing that there has been an assessment of evidence and an
exercise of judgment on that evidence.

"In fact, the FCO’s guidance papers and the government position they
underpin have been formulated, so internal policy memoranda reveal,
in a hitherto successful effort not to upset the "neuralgic" Turkish
government. One internal 1999 memorandum further elaborates that that
"HMG [the government] is open to criticism in terms of the ethical
dimension. But given the importance of our relations (political,
strategic and commercial) with Turkey, and that recognizing the
genocide would provide no practical benefit to the UK or the
few survivors of the killings alive today, nor would it help a
rapprochement between Armenia and Turkey, the current line is the
only feasible option".

Turkey’s decades-long campaign to silence research on, commemoration
of and the political affirmation of the Armenian genocide in
Europe and elsewhere has been a subject of controversy in recent
years. No government in Europe, other than the British government,
has actively supported Turkey’s denial of the Armenian genocide. In
a typical statement made in 2008 in the House of Lords, Lord Malloch
Brown, speaking on behalf of the government, said that "neither this
government, nor previous governments have judged that the evidence
is sufficiently unequivocal to persuade us that these events should
be categorized as genocide".

In fact, successive FCO documents show that hardly any research has
been done, that existing authoritative documents are systematically
on the subject, including UN reports and the British Government’s
own reports are ignored while the same three US-based non-Turkish
denialists are regularly marshaled as evidence of a "debate" within
the academic community. The British government’s position has led,
in particular, to the bitterly ironic exclusion of the Armenian
Genocide from the official "Genocide Memorial Day" commemorations
organized by the British government from 2001 and to the boycott of
the commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the Armenian genocide
in by all members of the British government.

The British government has also shown no interest in pressing for
freedom of expression in Turkey on this mater, or for encouraging
Turkey to come to terms with its past, in spite of the country’s EU
accession prospects and friendly relationship with the Britain. This
legal opinion also refers to the agreement signed on October 14
between the Republics of Turkey and Armenia to establish relations,
which it terms a "welcome development". It mentions the protocol’s
provision to "implement a dialogue on the historical dimension"
of the two countries’ relations.

The opinion concludes by regretting that "there is no recognition
at all [on the part of the government] of the importance of nations
acknowledging their past crimes against humanity or of supporting the
descendents of victims who still, almost a century later, have to live
with the consequences", suggesting that the contemporary relevance of
the recognition of a past crime is self- evident to a prominent expert
in international justice. The legal opinion appears as a searing
indictment of the cynicism of the policy of a government willing
to bend the facts to fit a cynical policy. The British government,
arguably Turkey’s closed ally in Europe, was ideally placed to help
Turkey address a fundamental ethical issue in the context of its
European accession process, but chose complicity instead.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress