Tehlirian’s Specter Returns: Germany’s Lower House Artfully Acknowledges and Regrets Armenian Genocide

 Ludér Tavit Sahagian

Following 101 years of dithering and nearly two decades of intense German civil society advocacy and petitioning, Germany’s lower house, the Bundestag, finally joined the national parliaments of nearly thirty countries on June 2, 2016 by acknowledging the veracity of the (ongoing) Armenian Genocide and regretting the German Kaiser Reich’s complicit role in the Genocide.

Over a hundred German-Armenian community members and other truth-and-justice seekers had gathered to welcome the landmark decision of German lawmakers both outdoors under the late spring sun and inside the parliamentary chamber. Turkey impulsively recalled its ambassador to Germany in protest and has threatened Germany with an “action plan” against it.

Two Genocides, Two Peoples, and One Grievance: Armenians in Dhaka

Adnan Morshed

Turkey seems to have a burlesque history of genocide denial. On June 2, the German Parliament voted to recognise the 1915 killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks as "genocide." Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's reaction was predictable: “Germany has no right to comment on genocide.” Ankara recalled its ambassador from Berlin.

Sounds familiar? Ankara's recent withdrawal of its ambassador to Bangladesh following the execution of an indicted “war criminal” reveals the Erdogan regime's grotesquely negligent attitude toward the genocide in Bangladesh during 1971. 

Germany Recognizes the Armenian Genocide

Germany will officially recognize the killing of hundreds of thousands of Armenians by the Turkish Ottoman regime 100 years ago as genocide. Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition will vote on April 24 to label the murders as genocide as defined by the United Nations in 1948.

Germany’s ruling parties plan in their resolution to “find a formulation which states the fact that a genocide took place in Turkey,” Franz Josef Jung, deputy faction leader of Merkel’s Christian Democrats, said in a statement on April 20. The fate of the Armenians “exemplifies the history of mass extermination, ethnic cleansing, expulsion and genocide that characterizes the 20th century in such a terrible way,” Jung added.

Denial of the Armenian Genocide Is Brutalizing the World

Stefan Ihrig

 

I have this imaginary Armenian kid sister. Well, actually, she is your kid sister, too -- in the same way we all have this imaginary 8-year-old in Syria who has been afraid for her life for the past few years. We are all humans after all.

My imaginary Armenian kid sister is 4 and a 1/2; talks too much; is easily distracted; for reasons beyond me, does not like raisin cookies; and, for reasons even further beyond me, died in early 1916. Nobody put a pistol to her head and executed her. Her parents were killed, and she simply had no food, no care and no proper shelter. She just wasted away. I cannot get over her death and her suffering, even though I want to, and I need to. I need to remember her and honor her memory, her life and her death. And I also have that Syrian kid to worry about -- or to purposely ignore. 

Armenian Genocide - German Guilt?

Richard Fuchs

In the German Reichstag on September 29, 1916, the diplomat Gottlieb von Jagow had to give parliament an account of the terrible events in Turkey, then the Ottoman Empire.

It was about mass displacement and executions taking place in the eastern region of Anatolia. The German Empire was a colonial power there at the time and also an ally of the Ottoman government, which had previously initiated a mass persecution of Christian Armenians before the onset of World War I. "We did everything we could," stated Jagow in defense of Germany's passivity.

This silent acquiescence toward the mass murders has been the subject of the International Historians Congress in Berlin.

Much Ado About a Little Book

 Muriel Mirak-Weissbach

That little book by Dr. Hagop Martin Deranian continues to provoke debate, now even in Germany. The slim volume, President Calvin Coolidge and the Armenian Orphan Rug, released last fall by the Armenian Cultural Foundation, unleashed broad discussion in the US, because the story it tells raises questions about the 1915 Genocide, questions which a pro-Turkish lobby finds increasingly uncomfortable as the centenary draws near. The story is about an oriental rug woven by Armenian orphan girls in Ghazir, Lebanon (then Syria) as a gift for then-President Coolidge back in 1925, a token of gratitude for the assistance lent by the American government and people to the orphans of the Genocide. Controversy arose when requests came to the White House to release the rug for public showing. (See Armenian Mirror-Spectator, March 1, 2014.)

Perincek vs. Switzerland: Freedom of Expression Distorted

 Mihran Dabag

In a Dec. 17, 2013 judgment on the case of Perincek vs. Switzerland, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) denounced the conviction of Turkish nationalist Dogu Perincek by the Swiss courts.

In 2005, during several events in Switzerland, Perincek had described the genocide of the Armenians as an “international lie,” thereby violating Swiss anti-racism legislation (Article 261 of the Swiss Penal Code). However, the ECHR viewed the remarks as protected by the fundamental right to freedom of expression, which it deemed was breached by the judgment of the Swiss courts. It would appear that the goal associated with this specific expression of opinion and the political context in which it occurred played no role.

Immanuel Kant once pointed out that “opinion is a consciously insufficient judgment.” And thus the following question begs to be asked: What is the political agenda behind a consciously “insufficient judgment” of false historical factual assertions in the case of human rights and international law violations?

Not Pure Teaching

Sebastian Erb and Bernd Kramer

Translated by Vartan Matiossian

The government of Azerbaijan funds a professor at the Humboldt University in Berlin who will make advertisement for the country. Does the University make PR for a criminal state? 

Turkey's Wrong Turn

Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was in Brussels last week seeking to repair relations with Europe, but the first place to look for a solution is within himself. Once hailed as the leader of a model Muslim democracy, he has created a political disaster at home, transforming Turkey into an authoritarian state that poses dangers not just for itself but for its allies in NATO, including the United States.

New Book Provides Shocking Evidence of German Co-Responsibility in Armenian Genocide

The German ambassador in Constantinople, Count Paul Wolff-Metternich, wrote to the Imperial Chancellor, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, in Berlin on December 7, 1915:
"… Our displeasure over the persecution of the Armenians should be clearly expressed in our press and an end be put to our gushing over the Turks. Whatever they are accomplishing is due to our doing; those are our officers, our cannons, our money… In order to achieve any success in the Armenian question, we will have to inspire fear in the Turkish government regarding the consequences. If, for military considerations, we do not dare to confront it with a firmer stance, then we will have no choice but… to stand back and watch how our ally continues to massacre."

Levon Thomassian's "Summer of '42"

Benjamin F. Alexander

Throughout the twentieth century, nearly every episode of Armenian history had a Dashnak [A.R.F.] and an anti-Dashnak version. The life of Drastamat Kanayan, more commonly known as General Dro, was no exception, especially where his actions in Germany during World War II were concerned. As was revealed publicly right after the war ended, Dro and several other Dashnak notables, with no known formal party sanction, made overtures to the Nazi high command and formed an Armenian Legion to assist the German regime. Other Armenians were also involved with the Nazis. What did they do, and why did they do it? Ambiguities have lingered.