Perception of Turkey: Good, Bad and Poor Armenians

Aline Ozinian

It was talked about for a long time. The “dirty” population you call the Armenian diaspora were forced from their homes, their land, and were once called the Anatolian Armenians.(*)

It was said that there was nostalgia, that the Turkish words left behind by their grandparents were still in their lives, that they had not forgotten their homeland. It was said that this diaspora was not from Armenia, but rather that these people were the subjects of the Ottomans. Do not divide Armenians into groups like poor Armenians, bad diaspora members or miserable Turkish Armenians. It was said do not develop politics in accordance with this, for they are not a monolith. But apparently no strides at all were taken in the end.

Ocalan Urges Turkey to Recognize Genocide

Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed leader of the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) has penned a letter to the Turkish-Armenian weekly Agos, calling on the Armenian community to support the demands of Kurds in Turkey.
“The Kurdish people’s fight for freedom and the cure for the Armenian people’s sorrows have overlapped in the fight to [be able to] live in this land as citizens who share the same rights,” Abdullah Öcalan said in the letter, published on January 30.

Turkey: An Action Movie without a ‘Good Guy’

Ayse Gunaysu

In Turkey today, a very high-tempo, high-tension action scene is unfolding, with a life-or-death fight at the top of the state apparatus. A volcano of corruption is erupting once more, releasing all the filth from below the surface. We’re seeing the sons of cabinet members being taken from their homes, alongside prominent businessmen, and put into custody; the mass removal of middle- to high-ranking security officers; and comprehensive changes in the juridical organization. But there are no prospects for a better Turkey, because both parties of this fierce fight belong to the “bad guy” club—the ruling AK Party and the informal but all-mighty clandestine organization of the “Gulen community.”

The audience is deprived of the expectation of a reward for watching these horrors play out. There is no hope for the emergence of a good guy, who will punish the bad and set things right. There is no need to wait for it, because there is no good guy at all in this action film. None of the already-few forces of democracy in Turkey have the slightest role to play in the plot.