A TURK IN YEREVAN: ZAMAN PAPER’S PHOTO EDITOR IN ARMENIA TO COVER APRIL 24 EVENTS
GENOCIDE | 23.04.15 | 12:54
NAZIK ARMENAKYAN
ArmeniaNow
Selahattin Sevi
By GAYANE MKRTCHYAN
ArmeniaNow reporter
Selahattin Sevi, the editor of photo department of the Turkish Zaman
daily, arrived in Armenia to cover how Armenians commemorate on April
24 their forebears who fell victim to mass killings and deportations
in Ottoman Turkey a century ago.
100 years after the killings Turkey still denies that it was a
systematic effort of the Ottoman government to exterminate Armenians
as a people.
The Turkish photographer, who had been in Armenia many times before,
says that the Centennial is commemorated not as a grief but as more
of a remembrance day.
“On the 95th anniversary I was in Beirut; it was a grief day there, and
now I can see that the stress is put on the claims. I am interested in
attending the numerous exhibitions and concerts organized in Yerevan on
these days. The Centennial has gained a cultural coloring. I thought
that the society might have protested that, for instance, System of
a Down is holding a concert, but, on the other hand, the band has
features that contain political message in it and the concert is in
the context,” Sevi told ArmeniaNow.
The Turkish photographer is surprised: a small country like Armenia
with numerous social-economic problems spends quite a lot of money
to commemorate the Centennial with large-scale events. He singles out
his participation at the social-political forum Against the Crime of
Genocide where he could have interviews with people who are not easy
to be found, such as Kate Nahapetian, Government Affairs Director of
the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA).
The theme of the Genocide for Sevi is on the agenda, as much as all
the rest of most important events happening in the world.
“There were many human movements and losses during the first half of
the previous century; Armenians bore the most damage as a result,”
Sevi said, avoiding the use of the word genocide.
In Armenia he never met Genocide survivors, instead he met those
years ago in the city of Anjar in Lebanon, which in 1939 was founded
by Armenians who had left their Armenian villages in Musa-Ler.
“As you speak to them you understand what actually happened,” he
said and added that what they knew of the Armenian Genocide was
from their history textbook where it was introduced in a completely
different context.
Selahattin Sevi was in Armenia first in 2001. Together with a group
of Diaspora Armenians he traveled to Kesaria, Kars and then to Armenia.
“It took us a long time to cover the 15 minutes’ traveling distance
from Kars to Armenia [the border today is closed and travelers have to
go through Georgia]. Then we visited Echmiadzin. We met the Patriarch,
whom we constantly wanted to ask questions.
We took a group photo in front of the Cathedral after which he said we
could ask questions, but before he wanted to ask us a question, “Do we
recognize the Genocide or not?” The question was shocking for me then.
Years later I can say that back then the rough political position
was more vivid, a lot has changed now,” the Turkish photographer says.
Addressing the issue of “people-to-people diplomacy” between the two
countries the journalist says that Turkish-Armenian journalist and
scholar Hrant Dink’s tragic death in 2007 had a critical significance
for Turkey.
“Hrant’s murder… we saw a human flood on his burial; that was the
most correct answer; in Turkey there is a social layer which does not
tolerate injustice, illegality and is ready to fight for all that. And
especially after Dink’s murder the democratic diplomacy was activated,”
he said.
According to him, this very type of diplomacy has a big significance
when the pressure on the government is from below.
Selahattin Sevi states three preconditions without which success is
impossible – media, democracy and a conscious society.