Amberin Zaman
Turkish prosecutors are seeking to lift the
parliamentary immunity of an ethnic Armenian lawmaker in order to
prosecute and potentially jail him, marking a further escalation of the
government’s assault on free expression.
Prosecutors in Ankara
have invoked Article 301, which criminalizes insulting the Turkish
nation, and Article 299, which penalizes insulting the Turkish
president, against Garo Paylan of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), the largest pro-Kurdish bloc in the Turkish parliament.
Nine HDP lawmakers, including the party’s presidential candidate
Selahattin Demirtas, are currently in jail facing a cocktail of terror
charges together with hundreds of other party officials. But the
accusations against Paylan stand out. The government has prosecuted tens
of thousands of alleged operatives of the religious cult led by
Fethullah Gulen, the Pennsylvania-based Sunni preacher who is accused of
masterminding the failed July 2016 coup. Countless others said to be
associated with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, including HDP
officials, have been rounded up in the thousands on similar terror
charges. But prosecutors had largely steered clear of Article 301, which
was commonly used in the past against those who dared to call the orgy
of bloodletting in 1915 a genocide.
Article 301's targets include renowned Turkish novelist Orhan
Pamuk and ethnic Armenian news editor Hrant Dink, who was gunned down
outside
the office of his AGOS newspaper in January 2007 by an ultranationalist
youth said to be acting under the orders of rogue security officials.
His murder proved a turning point, opening up nationwide debate on the
genocide at a time when Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party
(AKP) was still in reformist gear and ready to sign a now frozen peace
deal with neighboring Armenia. On the centennial of the genocide in
2015, Erdogan sent a message to the tiny Armenian community: “We share
the Armenians’ pain with sincerity. The doors of our hearts are open to
the deceased Ottoman Armenians’ grandchildren.” This year’s message was
not quite as magnanimous, with Erdogan warning some 70,000
Armenian-Turks to spurn those “who are trying to ignite hatred and
hostility by distorting [our] shared past,” presumably by labeling the
1915 tragedy a genocide.
So what has changed? Yetvart Danzikiyan, the managing editor of
AGOS, believes that Erdogan’s partnership with Bahceli, struck in the
run-up to the April 2017 referendum on swapping the existing
parliamentary system for an executive presidency, is a big factor. "Ever
since the AKP established its coalition [with Bahceli] and a suitably
nationalist stance, it has reverted to the state's old reflexes and
habits on the Armenian question," he told Al-Monitor. Erdogan banked on
nationalist support to push through the constitutional changes that
will formalize his sweeping powers. The new rules are set to kick in
after snap presidential and parliamentary polls that are due to be held
on June 24.
Paylan agrees with this assessment. “The charges against me are not a
surprise; the climate has changed and there were several clear signs of
this,” Paylan told Al-Monitor. “I spoke about the genocide many times
in the past, but AKP members in the parliament didn’t blink. It was only
Bahceli’s people who protested,” he recalled. Then in January 2017,
Paylan, who has been a deputy since 2015, was temporarily banned from
parliamentary sessions for broaching the subject of the wholesale
killings not only of ethnic Armenians but of Assyrians, Greeks and Jews
who were “lost” and “driven from these lands in large massacres [and]
genocides."
Undeterred, Paylan pressed for formal recognition
of the genocide and the establishment of a commission to investigate
the events leading up to it in a bill he submitted last month. It was
rejected.
The government’s waning tolerance was on full display April 24, the
day Armenians worldwide mark the anniversary of the deaths of their
forefathers. Turkish police detained activists gathered in Istanbul’s
Sultanahmet for unfurling banners that read “genocide.”
The move against Paylan has sparked rebukes from the European Union.
Kati Piri, the Turkey rapporteur of the European Parliament called the
case "unacceptable." She told Al-Monitor, "This latest incident is a new
front in the attack against fundamental rights in Turkey. If even
elected parliamentarians cannot express their opinions, where does this
leave ordinary citizens?"
Paylan believes the arrest of prominent businessman and philanthropist Osman Kavala
are linked to his long-running support for a broad range of civil
society initiatives aimed at promoting peace between Turkey and Armenia.
Kavala, who commands global respect for his commitment to human rights,
conflict resolution and promotion of the arts, has been behind bars for
198 days. A staunch secularist who spoke up against Gulenist
infiltration of the justice system, Kavala has yet to be indicted amid
farcical claims that he was involved in the coup.
All of this is unfolding as neighboring Armenia embarks on a new path
of reform pledged by its new Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian, who swept
to power in the mass demonstrations that engulfed the former Soviet
republic last month. Pashinian said he was ready to establish diplomatic
relations with Turkey without any preconditions while pushing for
recognition of the Armenian genocide at a global level. Turkish Prime
Minister Binali Yildirim said he was willing to consider the offer but
suggested Turkey would only do so if Armenia shelved the genocide recognition campaign.
The two countries were on the brink of reopening their sealed borders and establishing diplomatic ties under a 2009 deal brokered by Switzerland
and backed by the United States. But it fell apart when Erdogan, who
was then prime minister, insisted that Armenia withdraw from the
Nagorno-Karabakh enclave it wrested from Turkey’s close ally Azerbaijan
in a short and nasty war in the early 1990s. The HDP has pledged to
revive the Zurich protocols without any preconditions as part of its
campaign manifesto.
Khatchig Mouradian, a lecturer at Columbia University who has done
extensive research on the Ottoman Armenians, rues another missed moment.
“Following the transformations ushered in by the Velvet Revolution in
Armenia, Ankara had a golden opportunity to reciprocate positive signals
from Yerevan regarding the normalization of relations,” Mouradian told
Al-Monitor. “Instead it invokes Article 301, which bears the stains of
Hrant Dink’s blood, to go after Garo Paylan.”
Paylan insisted none of this will stop him from his quest for justice. “They are trying to silence me. They will fail,” he said.
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