AMAL CLOONEY TO CHALLENGE APPEAL OF DOGU PERINCEK, TURKISH POLITICIAN WHO CLAIMS ARMENIAN GENOCIDE NEVER TOOK PLACE
KpopStarz
Jan 13 2015
Amal Clooney, humanitarian lawyer and wife of George Clooney, is
about to become part of another high profile case. According to
The Telegraph, Clooney will be part of a legal team representing
Armenia in a case involving denial of the Armenian genocide by a
Turkish politician.
For those who do not know much about the genocide itself, ArmenPress
reports that it occurred in 1915 during World War I, and that up
to 1.5 million Armenians were slaughtered by Ottoman Turks. On the
other hand, The Daily Sabah reports that Turkey accepts mass deaths of
Armenians during their forced deportation during the war, but claims
the death toll was much lower and attributes mass deaths to diseases
and isolated cases of attacks.
The politician in question is Dogu Perincek, a member of the Left-wing
Turkish Workers’ Party. In 2008, Perincek called the genocide “an
international lie,” and was found guilty by a Swiss court of denying
that it ever took place.
He then appealed to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg,
which ruled in December 2013 that Switzerland had violated his right
to free expression.
Armenia is challenging the appeal, and argues that denying the
genocide should be a crime, just as negating the Holocaust of six
million Jews is a punishable offence in many countries. The case
will be heard by the Strasbourg court’s 17-member Grand Chamber,
with the first hearing scheduled for January 28.
A strong legal team will be on Armenia’s side this time, consisting
of Clooney and her associate, Geoffrey Robertson. Robertson is
especially important to this case, as he is the author of the book,
“An Inconvenient Genocide: Who Now Remembers the Armenians?”
The Huffington Post reports that two Armenian government
representatives – Gevorg Kostanyan and Emil Babayan – will also be
joining them.