ARMENIANS IN LEBANON PROTEST TURKISH FORCE
Peninsula On-line, Qatar
Sept 8 2006
BURJ HAMMUD, Lebanon ~U Lebanon’s Armenians, who have not forgotten
the massacres their people suffered under Ottoman rule, demonstrated
yesterday against Turkish troops set to take part in a UN peacekeeping
mission.
Waving Lebanese flags and banners denouncing Turkey as a murderous
state, several hundred gathered in the Beirut suburb of Burj Hammud,
heavily populated by Armenians, and appealed to the United Nations to
reconsider Turkey’s participation in an expanded UN force in Lebanon.
"Genocide, massacre, deportation: Turkey’s definition of peace,"
read one banner. "No to the participation of Turkish forces among UN
troops coming to Lebanon," read another.
"We had 1.5 million of our people slaughtered under the Turks and
you expect us to welcome them?" asked Arous Ghougassian, the owner
of a home furnishing business.
"I can assure you that I won’t sell them anything if they come into
my shop," she said.
Hagop, an employee at the Basterma Mano food store, raised his fists
in anger when asked about the Turkish UN force.
"Look at my arms, I get goose bumps when you refer to them," he said.
"If they dare come into our neighbourhoods we’ll deal with them."
Garo Hovsipian, a shopkeeper, said he could not put to rest the
massacre of his uncle and grandparents by the Turks in 1915.
"I somehow become a fanatic when I hear the word Turkey," he said,
drawing on a cigar. "It brings back memories of my ancestors, our
history, the massacres.
"Still if I encounter any soldiers I will treat them as guests because
we are more civilised than them."
Lebanon’s minority Armenian community, which numbers about 140,000
people, has objected to Turkey taking part in the UN force because
of mass killings of Armenians by Turks in 1915.
"Turkey, which carried out horrible crimes against humanity, cannot
take part in any peace process until it recognizes the massacre of
the Armenian people," Jacques Choukhadarian, a former MP and minister,
told yesterday’s gathering.
Representatives of the community have sent letters to UN Secretary
General Kofi Annan and to Western embassies in Beirut urging them
to reject Turkish participation in the UN Interim Force in Lebanon
(Unifil) set to number 15,000 troops from various countries.
Religious leaders has also issued a statement calling the Turkish
participation in Unifil "morally unacceptable".
The Turkish parliament voted after fierce debate at an extraordinary
session Tuesday to authorize the government to send troops to take part
in the UN force to monitor the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.
Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul has said the number of soldiers
is not likely to exceed 1,000.
Under the old Ottoman empire, an estimated 1.5 million Armenians are
said to have been killed or died after being forcibly driven from
their homes in Turkey between 1915 and 1917.
Ankara rejects all accusations of genocide, estimating the number of
Armenian deaths at 300,000 and arguing they were not a consequence
of deliberate extermination but a combination of war, disease, famine
and ethnic conflict.