FACING UP TO HISTORY

Mar 11th 2010
From The Economist print edition

Both Turkey and the Armenian diaspora should look for ways of rewriting a familiar script

Not for the first time, Armenians sense a moment of vindication in their struggle for the acknowledgment of the tragedy that befell their forebears during the First World War. Turkey is angry. And America’s administration is straining to limit the damage.

The latest Turkish-American rift over the Armenian question—after a congressional committee voted on March 4th to recognise the killings of 1915 as genocide—looks wider than some previous ones. It coincides with a general scratchiness between America and its ally. Turkey is reluctant to slap sanctions on Iran. Anti-Americanism is running high among Turks. Some suspect that Barack Obama retains his view (expressed as a senator in 2008) that “the Armenian genocide is not an allegation…but rather a widely documented fact.”

Still, the chances are that after a deep sulk, Turkey will send its ambassador back to Washington, and the administration will persuade legislators to avoid a vote in the full House, for fear of wrecking an important relationship—and worsening the fading prospects for reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. A tired diplomatic ritual will play out once again.

A happier ending?

Can any actor in this sorry drama do anything to improve the script? One day a Turkish leader will be statesman enough to see that national dignity is better served by acknowledging the sins committed on Anatolian soil than by suppressing debate and punishing truth-tellers. Such a leader could decouple relations with Armenia from Ottoman history. (In any case, their argument today is more about the aftermath of the war over Nagorno-Karabakh in the 1990s than over 1915.)

Some people in Turkey realise this. As one Turkish columnist has noted, for Turkey to be so touchy about the minutiae of a congressional vote betrays weakness, not strength. And nothing would silence Turkey’s detractors more than a genuine, no-holds-barred effort to probe the events of 1915. The result of the Armenian deportations is indisputably and horrifically clear: hundreds of thousands, probably more than a million, died. But there is room for scholarly inquiry into the working of the murky state machinery that led to that outcome—to determine whether the tragedy was principally the result of murderous design or culpable neglect. By inviting all scholars to peruse its archives (something it has done only patchily), Turkey could disarm its critics.

For Armenians, securing recognition of their ancestors’ fate is a sacred cause. They can hardly be expected to set aside their bitter memories because (as the heads of five big firms have complained) American arms exports are at risk. Nor will Armenians accept the argument that assessing the slaughter of 1915 is the work of scholars not of political authorities, executive or legislative. As State Department records show, the American government of the time analysed those events and it had no doubt that “extermination” was the aim.

But if Armenians want to boost the chances that the authorities in Ankara will eventually allow a searching look at one of the 20th century’s darkest episodes, they might think harder about their congressional campaign. More than at any time since the modern republic was founded in 1923, Turkish society is questioning received truths (see article and article). That is mainly thanks to writers, journalists and citizens who risk their skins to campaign for a more honest approach to history. Among the finest of these was Hrant Dink, an ethnic Armenian editor who was murdered in 2007. He worked for a broad reconciliation between the Turks and Armenians, including the recovery of historical truth, but not confined to it.

In his view, and that of other Turkish citizens who work for historical justice, pressure from Congress could make the truth more elusive by stiffening the backs of nationalists. Even among Turks who believe that the slaughter of 1915 qualifies as genocide, there is a sense that mentioning the g-word in a congressional resolution works against them.

If Turkey were a totalitarian state, there would be no case for Armenian self-restraint. But precisely because Turkey is an (albeit imperfect) democracy, the emphasis should be on giving Turks the best possible chance to face up to their own past. Instead of telling Turks what to think, Armenians should urge the authorities to promote inquiry within Turkey, starting with an end to measures such as article 301 (which criminalises “insults to the Turkish nation”). The idea of a stronger, healthier Turkish democracy may puzzle some Armenians; but it is the best way to bring about the honesty for which they yearn.

THE COST OF RECONSTURCTION
Mar 11th 2010 | ISTANBUL Amberin Zaman
From The Economist print edition

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.