Roth: Resolution of Cyprus Question is very important

"Noting that there had been lobbying efforts in the German assembly to bring so-called Armenian genocide onto the agenda, Roth said she could not know how much those efforts would be effective but Armenian issue might come to the agenda of the assembly." This issue always hunts Turkey!

The New York Times Company

Turks Breach Wall of Silence on Armenians

March 5, 2004
By BELINDA COOPER

MINNEAPOLIS—Taner Akcam doesn't seem like either a hero or a traitor, though he's been called both. A slight, soft-spoken man who chooses his words with care, Mr. Akcam, a Turkish sociologist and historian currently teaching at the University of Minnesota , writes about events that happened nearly a century ago in an empire that no longer exists: the mass killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire during World War I. But in a world where history and identity are closely intertwined, where the past infects today's politics, his work, along with that of like-minded Turkish scholars, is breaking new ground.

Mr. Akcam, 50, is one of a handful of scholars who are challenging their homeland's insistent declarations that the organized slaughter of Armenians did not occur; and he is the first Turkish specialist to use the word "genocide" publicly in this context.

That is a radical step when one considers that Turkey has threatened to sever relations with countries over this single word. In 2000, for example, Ankara derailed an American congressional resolution calling the 1915 killings "genocide" by threatening to cut access to military bases in the country." We accept that tragic events occurred at the time involving all the subjects of the Ottoman Empire," said Tuluy Tanc, minister counselor at the Turkish Embassy in Washington, "but it is the firm Turkish belief that there was no genocide but self-defense of the Ottoman Empire ."

Scholars like Mr. Akcam call this a misrepresentation that must be confronted. "We have to deal with history, like the Germans after the war," said Fikret Adanir, a Turkish historian who has lived in Germany for many years. "It's important for the health of the democracy, for civil society."

Most scholars outside Turkey agree that the killings are among the first 20th-century instances of "genocide," defined under the 1948 Genocide Convention as acts "committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group."

During World War I the government of the disintegrating Ottoman Empire , fearing Armenian nationalist activity, organized mass deportations of Armenians from its eastern territories.

In what some consider the model for the Holocaust, men, women and children were sent into the desert to starve, herded into barns and churches that were set afire, tortured to death or drowned. The numbers who died are disputed: the Armenians give a figure of 1.5 million, the Turks several hundred thousand.

In the official Turkish story the Armenians were casualties of civil conflict they instigated by allying themselves with Russian forces working to break up the Ottoman Empire . In any case atrocities were documented in contemporary press reports, survivor testimony and dispatches by European diplomats, missionaries and military officers. Abortive trials of Ottoman leaders after World War I left an extensive record and some confessions of responsibility.

A legal analysis commissioned last year by the International Center for Transitional Justice in New York concluded that sufficient evidence existed to term the killings a "genocide" under international law.

Yet unlike Germany in the decades since the Holocaust, Turkey has consistently denied that the killings were intended or that the government at the time had any moral or legal responsibility. In the years since its founding in 1923 the Turkish Republic has drawn what the Turkish historian Halil Berktay calls a "curtain of silence" around this history at home and used its influence as a cold war ally to pressure foreign governments to suppress opposing views.

Mr. Akcam is among the most outspoken of the Turkish scholars who have defied this silence. A student leader of the leftist opposition to Turkey 's repressive government in the 1970's, Mr. Akcam spent a year in prison for "spreading communist propaganda" before escaping to Germany . There, influenced in part by Germany 's continuing struggle to understand its history, he began to confront his own country's past. While researching the post-World War I trials of Turkish leaders, he began working with Vahakn Dadrian, a pre-eminent Armenian historian of the killings. Their unlikely friendship became the subject of a 1997 Dutch film, "The Wall of Silence."

Turks fear to acknowledge the crimes of the past, Mr. Akcam says, because admitting that the founders of modern Turkey, revered today as heroes, were complicit in evil calls into question the country's very legitimacy. "If you start questioning, you have to question the foundations of the republic," he said, speaking intensely over glasses of Turkish tea in the book-lined living room of his Minneapolis home, as his 12-year-old daughter worked on her homework in the next room. In a study nearby transcriptions of Turkish newspapers from the 1920's were neatly piled.

He and others like him insist that coming to terms with the past serves Turkey 's best interests. Their view echoes the experience of countries in Latin America, Eastern Europe and Africa that have struggled with similar questions as they emerge from periods of repressive rule or violent conflict. Reflecting a widespread belief that nations can ensure a democratic future only through acknowledging past wrongs, these countries have opened archives, held trials and created truth commissions.

Mr. Akcam says some headway is being made, particularly since the election of a moderate government in 2002 and continuing Turkish efforts to join the European Union. After all, he says, in the past dissent could mean imprisonment or even death. "With the Armenian genocide issue, no one is going to kill you," he said. "The restrictions are in our minds."

Mr. Akcam is convinced the state's resistance to historical dialogue is "not the position of the majority of people in Turkey ," he said. He cites a recent survey conducted by scholars that appeared in a Turkish newspaper showing that 61 percent of Turks believe it is time for public discussion of what the survey called the "accusations of genocide."

Ronald Grigor Suny, an Armenian-American professor of political science at the University of Chicago , was invited to lecture at a Turkish university in 1998. "My mother said, `Don't go, you can't trust these people,' " he remembered. "I was worried there might be danger." Instead, to his surprise, though he openly called the killings of Armenians "genocide," he encountered more curiosity than hostility.

Still, Mr. Akcam's views and those of like-minded scholars remain anathema to the nationalist forces that still exercise influence in Turkey . Threats by a nationalist organization recently prevented the showing there of "Ararat," by the Canadian-Armenian filmmaker Atom Egoyan, a movie that examines ways in which the Armenian diaspora deals with its history.

Mr. Akcam's own attempt to resettle in Turkey in the 1990's failed when several universities, fearing government harassment, refused to hire him. And when Mr. Berktay disputed the official version of the Armenian killings in a 2000 interview with a mainstream Turkish newspaper, he became the target of a hate-mail campaign. Even so, he says, the mail was far outweighed by supportive messages from Turks at home and abroad. "They congratulated me for daring to speak up," he recalled.

Scholarly discussion can also turn into a minefield among the large numbers of Armenians in the United States and Europe . Attempts to discuss the killings in a wider context raise suspicions. "Many people in the diaspora feel that if you try to understand why the Turks did it," Mr. Suny explained, "you have justified or legitimized it in some way."

Like their Turkish colleagues, a younger generation of Armenian academics in the United States and elsewhere has grown frustrated with the intellectual impasse. In 2000 Mr. Suny and Fatma Muge Gocek, a Turkish-born sociology professor at the University of Michigan, organized a conference that they hoped would move scholarship beyond what Mr. Suny called "the sterile debates on whether there was a genocide or not." Despite some disagreements between Turkish and Armenian participants, the group they brought together has continued to meet and grow.

Mr. Akcam had been building bridges even before that meeting. At a genocide conference in Armenia in 1995, he met Greg Sarkissian, the founder of the Zoryan Institute in Toronto , a research center devoted to Armenian history. In what both describe as an emotional encounter, the two lighted candles together in an Armenian church for Mr. Sarkissian's murdered relatives and for Haji Halil, a Turkish man who rescued Mr. Sarkissian's grandmother and her children.

Mr. Akcam and Mr. Sarkissian say Halil, the "righteous Turk," symbolizes the possibility of a more constructive relationship between the two peoples. But like most Armenians, Mr. Sarkissian says Turkey must acknowledge historical responsibility before reconciliation is possible. "If they do," he said, "it will start the healing process, and then Armenians won't talk about genocide anymore. We will talk about Haji Halil."

I wonder why the Cyprus question shouldn't be resolved by simply recognizing the status quo as the starting point going forward. If the Greeks want independence or union with the mainland, either way, let them.

And likewise the Turkish enclave, if they want independence or union with the mother country, let them.

The situation wouldn't be worse than it now is. It would recognize that neither community wants to be ruled by the other, and allows each to move forward according to its own dynamic.

Final resolution would come by bringing each half of the island into the EU, separately or with its mother country. That would allow cross border traffic, but leave the two communities separated. If the northern half chose union with Turkey, their entrance into the EU would have to wait until the mother country entered if indeed it did.

Yours, is a very good idea! Smart person!

Obviously I've overlooked something...

Could you have overlooked: 1) Muslims are human too 2) Turkish Cypriots could have prospered if it was not for the unfair trade embargo of the last 25 years.

Not intentionally. I encourage you to re-read my post #3, and point out my mistake. My suggestion was, rather than continue chasing this problem around and around, to simply draw a curtain on the past, accept the status quo as being the new reality, and move forward from here. If the Greeks on the south side of the island want independence, or if they prefer union with the mother country, fine.

Similarly, if the Turks on the north side want independence, or more likely union with the mainland, again fine. It is obvious that neither wants to be ruled by the other, and I can't think of any reason why they should.

And the likelihood of acheiving a unified island, where the two populations re-integrate, seems remote to me. And how do you make a unified Cyprus out of two populations that don't want either to be ruled by the other?

I did not take issue with the Turkish so-called occupation, at all. And I don't. I notice that the killing stopped the day the Turks rolled ashore. So fine, thats all the answer I need for that subject. I'm sure there are complications I don't understand, on both sides, which is one reason I follow these threads. But for the life of me, I see no reason to try to force the reintegration of these two populations if they don't want it. And I see no reason the two populations shouldn't unite each with their mother country, if they want it, although outright independence should be available if that is their preference.

I may be wrong, but not out of malice.

Then let me go further. In calling for the status quo to be accepted as the starting point as we move forward, I see no reason for any embargo at all. The embargo is intended to bring an end to the Turkish occupaton, but if the two sides of the island are to be permitted union each with their mother country, then the occupation isn't an occupation.

In short, I am suggesting that we forget about trying to create a country called "Cyprus" which the inhabitants seem not to want. The problem began because the Greek Cypriots wanted union with the mainland. When the two populations were intermingled such a thing couldn't be done, but sadly the events of the sixties and seventies divided them, and there seems to be no way to reintegrate them. So, fine. Since the damage is done, it is best to simply accept the green line as the permanent border between Greece and Turkey, and be done with it.

With that, there is no further need for any embargo against anyone. In fact, there never was, we have been trying to create something no one wanted. Well, probably some wanted it, but enough didn't want it as to make it impossible. You can't impose a common citizenship on people who don't consider themselves to be co-citizens. So the embargo is pointless.

The only problem with your suggestions marron are these.

-The Greek Cypriots are perfectly happy being their own country and do not seek union with Greece. Similarly, a large protion of the indigenous Turkish Cypriots prefer the same (I'm not talking about Turkish mainland settlers).

-There are approximately 280,000 Greek Cypriots who want their lands and homes back.

The Greek Cypriots are perfectly happy being their own country and do not seek union with Greece.

That may well be true. At one time there was a fairly strong movement there for union with the mainland. In my opinion either option should be available, according to the wishes of the inhabitants.

My opinion is the same where the Turkish inhabitants are concerned. Either option should be available, to be settled by a vote. If each enclave chooses independence, each enclave could then seek entry into the EU if thats what they want, and once they are both members of the union, over time, there would be a slow reintegration between the two populations. The reintegration should not be forced, however. Once they are all fellow EU citizens, it would come naturally over time.

There are approximately 280,000 Greek Cypriots who want their lands and homes back.

There is probably a proportional number of Turks with the same problem. The problem is that a forced reintegration probably isn't going to happen. A united island requires the Turks to be willing to be ruled by Greeks, the demographics being what they are. That probably isn't going to happen willingly, not in the short term. True union would come slowly, once they are both EU citizens with the right to cross the line freely.

In either case, whether quickly, or in slow motion, the Greeks wind up in control of the whole island if it is reunified. So the advantage to the Greeks of reunification is obvious. The advantage to the Turks is not so obvious, at least to me, since they will be ruled by Greeks.

If they are willing to let go of their sovereignty, and subsume themselves into the European whole, which they may be, then they may as well get on with it and get it done quickly. But if they want self-rule, they had better keep the border as long as they can. The only way the Turks can be secure that they won't be simply outnumbered by the Greeks is to remain independent, perhaps reunify with the Turkish mainland, and remain outside the EU so that the border remains intact.

If you have contacts on the island you may know better than I what Turkish sentiment is with respect to union with their Greek co-islanders.

Good article.

Again, if you have contacts on the island, you may know how the islanders feel about it. But the demographics are clear. The Turks are a minority on the island. This means that accepting reunification means accepting Greek rule over the entire island. I find it hard to believe that this is going to be acceptable to the Turkish islanders.

If both halves of the island are brought separately into the EU, with the right to freely cross the line, over time the two populations will reintegrate. And if this is done slowly, some of the hard feelings of the past may be avoided. But at the end of the day, even a slow-motion reintegration means eventual Greek rule of the whole island.

If the Turks want to subsume themselves into the European whole, then this isn't an issue. But if they want to retain the Turkish character of their part of the island, then they are better off to keep the border, and perhaps seek formal union with the Turkish mainland. Their EU status would in that case follow whatever Turkey itself did.

Sorry mate, but the issue is not union with either peoples 'mother' nations, and there is simply not the number of Turks with homes in the south wishing to return. The ones that there are in that situation, are not opposed on the Greek side marron.

Now you seem to think it is the Greek side's advantage of a re-unification. I don't think so neccasarily. For instance the Turkish Cypriots want EU entry with the south, and that's fine for them, but then that would mean a German or a Swede could buy property in the north but a Greek Cypriot couldn't get his home back.

That is no solution.