THE COST OF RECONSTRUCTION

Economist
March 11 2010

It takes many hands to reconcile two peoples so divided by history

FOR centuries, a stone bridge spanning the emerald green waters of
the Akhurian River connected the southern Caucasus to the Anatolian
plains: a strategic pivot on the Silk Road, running through the ancient
Armenian kingdom of Ani. Today the bridge would have linked tiny,
landlocked Armenia to Turkey. But war and natural disasters have
reduced it to a pair of stubs–a sad commentary on the relations
between the two states.

This grim image prompted an Ankara-based think-tank, called Tepav,
to devise a plan to rebuild the bridge and in so doing to reopen
the long-sealed land border by stealth. "The idea is to promote
reconciliation through cross-border tourism," explains Tepav’s
director, Guven Sak. Turkey’s doveish president, Abdullah Gul, has
embraced the plan. The Armenian authorities and diaspora Armenians
with deep pockets are also interested. If all went to plan, the
bridge’s restoration would only be the start of a broader effort to
repair hundreds of other Armenian architectural treasures scattered
across Turkey.

This semi-official stamp on a relationship in the absence of
diplomatic ties (foreseen in an accord signed last October, but yet to
materialise) would be a first. Yet academics, artists and journalists
are striking peace on their own terms. Hardly a day passes without
Turks and Armenians hobnobbing at a reconciliation event.

It is a tricky business because true reconciliation means
confronting the ghosts of the past. For decades Turkey denied the
mass extermination of the Ottoman Armenians in 1915. Under Turkey’s
draconian penal code, anyone who dares to describe the Armenian
tragedy as a genocide can end up in jail or even dead. In 2007 an
ultra-nationalist teenager murdered Hrant Dink, an Armenian-Turkish
editor who often wrote about the genocide. Although Ogun Samast pulled
the trigger it is widely assumed that rogue security officials from
the "deep state" gave him the gun.

Dink’s death was a turning point. More than 100,000 Turks of all
stripes showed up at his funeral bearing placards that read: "We are
all Armenians." Indeed if the murder was intended to stifle debate
it had the reverse effect. A growing number of Turks are uttering the
g-word. Ugur Umit Ungor, a young Turkish academic is one of them. His
research aims to show how many Young Turk cadres involved in the
massacres continued to thrive after the republic was founded in 1923.

Others allude to history in more subtle ways. Take Mehmet Binay,
a Turkish film director. His documentary "Whispering Memories"
tells the story of ethnic Armenians in a village called Geben, who
embraced Islam (presumably to avoid death at the hands of Ottoman
forces). Sobs were heard during a recent screening of the film in
Yerevan, Armenia’s capital.

Although today’s inhabitants of Geben hesitate to call themselves
Armenians, a growing number of "crypto-Armenians" (people forced
to change identity) do just that. Their stories were collected and
recently published by Fethiye Cetin, a Turkish human-rights lawyer,
whose grandmother revealed her own Armenian roots shortly before
her death.

Meanwhile, an army of humble if accidental Armenian ambassadors
are helping to melt the ice. Turkey says that as many as 70,000
illegal Armenian migrant workers, mostly women, eke out a living as
servants and nannies in Istanbul. A recent study by Alin Ozinian,
an Armenian-Turkish researcher shows that such women arrive full of
fear of "the Turk" only to return with stories of kindness. If the
land borders were to be reopened some day, their wages would not have
to be spent on long, pricey bus rides through Georgia.

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