Yerevan — We are at the brink of a pair of wars, civil and regional, and it is better to speak now.
Armenia, that ancient civilization deprived by the tragedies of yore of its capacity for contemporary statecraft, needs immediately to put its house in democratic order. Finally responsible for its own record, it also has legitimate expectations of the international partnership.
In this global and so contracted century of ours, where resources and rights often compete for precedence, domestic demeanor and foreign affairs form part of one and the same policy agenda. Nuclear or not, all pieces count.
Armenia needs to finally empower its citizenry, ensure due process and accountable government, and hold true elections. The corruption of state and its ill-disguised feudalesque vertical of post-Soviet power must give way to basic liberties and equal opportunities for all. Political prisoners should be released forthwith and those responsible for the deaths of ten citizens on March 1, 2008 brought to account. Justice must begin from within, or else civil strife is sure to ensue.
Modern independent statehood is an immeasurable gift that must not be squandered or ceded to anybody, friend or foe. Armenia’s security and armed forces are functions of its sovereignty, and no one, neither the Collective Security Treaty Organization nor NATO, should be called upon to guard its borders and its interests. Sound mutual relations with Russia, the United States, Europe and China are pivotally important, but Armenia must from now on be in sovereign command of its own frontiers and strategic assets. This choice should be universally respected.
The resetting of regional imperatives requires correlation with Armenia’s vital concerns.
Armenia and its people the world over shall never forget the great Genocide and the dispossession of their homeland. They cannot be expected, through protocols or other avenues of persuasion, to ratify their loss or to legitimize the fruits of genocide. These include an illegal de facto boundary negotiated by the Bolsheviks and Turkish Nationalists, the destruction of a thousand years worth of cultural heritage and architectural treasures, the mass expropriation of homes, schools, academies and other properties, and an abiding official escape from responsibility into the annals of schizophrenic denialism.
There is a growing current in Turkish society which seeks to look their history in the eye and thus to recast the exclusivist foundations of their state. They should be embraced and supported in their long-overdue self-discovery, just as the Turkish family who in 1915 saved my grandmother’s life by risking their own should find their due in the textbooks of tomorrow.
As with the Holocaust and the liberating leadership of postwar Germany, acknowledgment must beget atonement which, if anchored in truth, will lead to redemption, restitution, a right of return to a national home, and ultimate reconciliation between the Armenian and Turkish nations.
Armenia expects the world community to uphold and attach the rule of law, both internally and internationally, without seeking refuge in intellectually and legally false distinctions such as sui generis. Mountainous Karabagh’s case for post-Stalinist decolonization and independence is juridically at least as strong as, if not more than, Kosovo’s, Abkhazia’s, Eritrea’s or East Timor’s. It must formally be recognized—and within its existing constitutional borders—by Armenia and the very same countries that have extended recognition to the aforementioned.
Supported by Turkey, Azerbaijan today is trying to breathe bellicose fire into its failed war of aggression, 1988-1994, against Mountainous Karabagh by which it lost any claim it rhetorically might ever have had. Contrary to Baku’s familiar projection of blame upon others, it alone holds in occupation the ancestral Armenian heartlands of Gardmank, Shahumian, Getashen, Artsvashen, and Nakhichevan. Let the refugees of all nationalities, including the local Azeris and the nearly one million Armenians displaced from these territories as well as from Azerbaijan proper, return to their places of origin. That is comme il faut, but there can be no further territorial adjustment without resolving the occupation above.
Georgia would do itself and its firm future relationship with Armenia a favor by defending in full the linguistic, cultural, civil, political and religious rights of its large Armenian community. The historically Armenian region of Javakhk must be given special consideration in terms of its identity, representative self-government, and connection with the Armenian republic. This is fundamental to both Armenia’s and Georgia’s national security, as is the requirement to release all ethnic Armenian prisoners from the injustice of their politically-driven incarceration.
Iran, too, shall change—at its pace and in its way. A long-standing bilateral rapport with Armenia as its basis, the Islamic Republic ought to work to improve its domestic performance and, among other things, to recognize the Holocaust. So too should Israel, as bearer of the Shoah, no longer rest complicit in the denial of the Armenian Genocide. Washington, Moscow and the capitals of Europe have a lot of critical rethinking to do in this connection.
The time, perhaps, has come for all past paradigms to shift their script. Whether classically geopolitical or energy-sourced, the curtain must soon fall on the east-west and north-south axes of yesterday’s cliché.
For the sake of little old Armenia and the grand New World.
Let me make a summary of what Mr. Hovannisian recommends to Armenians :
1 – Adopt a 1930’s Nazi style nationalist regime and deceive the Armenian people with an unrealistic dogma,
2 – Declare current borders with some neighboring countries illegal and make claims against them (after all, this is exactly how the Nazi Germany started its WWII campaign)
3 – Assume that Armenia is the center of the world and all nations, starting from neighbors, should comply with its nationalist interests (did I mention similarity to the Nazi’s ?)
Well spoken Mr Hovannisian. You are an example of the same mentality that caused Armenians to suffer and seems there is still room for progress for you and your think-alike’s.
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Please quote Mr. Hovannisian where he made any of those recommendations.
Mert proves again that the Turk’s denial is strongly embedded in our society. We all know Mert is a Turk and lives to play the shell game!
Thank you Mr. Hovanessian we look forward to more insightful Op-Ed’s, articles, etc… such as this one. Many of us need to read the real issues, and it needs to come from people such as yourself.
When and where is your next piece??
It is cynical to claim a supporter of justice at home and abroad while being nourished by a tale of genocide which had already been denied by the ancestors of the Armenians or the makers of the Armenian history! Is it justice to change the history and write it as it is wanted by the Armenians and create criminals accordingly while refusing any scholar research.
Here are a few of thhe Armenian ancestors who are the deniers themselves. Remember that whoever tells about topics which obviously abolish the imaginary past of the Armenians are labelled as ‘deniers’, as ‘agents of Turkish government’, or ‘people hired by the Turkish government’ or ‘disingenous scholars/authorities’ Turkish nationalists’, ‘Turkish racists’
“Garo Pasdermichan (Pastirmaciyan), the Ottoman deputy of Erzurum and commander of all the Armenian officials and soldiers of the Ottoman Third Army which joined the Russian Army in 1914, was the main denier and Turkish racist. Because, he wrote in his book ‘Why Armenia Should Be Free’ (Boston, Dec.1918, Hairenik Publishing Company p. 16-17) that annual Congress of Armenian Party Dashnagzoutiun was held in Erzurum in August 1914, before the war broke, and Turkish emissaries offered Dashnaks an autonomous Armenia (made up of Russian Armenia and the three Turkish vilayets of Erzurum, Van and Bitlis) under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire’, if they joined the Turkish side and stopped supporting the Russians.
He also stated that the executive committee of the Dashnagzoutiun rejected the proposal! The Armenian members of this parley were the well-known publicist E.Aknouni, the representative from Van, A.Vramian, and the director of the Armenian schools in the district of Erzurum, Mr Rostom.
Another main denier was Boghos Noubar Pasha, the Armenian National Delegation President in The Paris Peace Conference 1919 who also stated that the Turks offered them autonomy in August 1914, much before the deportation, but they rejected this proposal and placed themselves without hesitation on the side of the Entente Powers from whom they expected liberation [Papers relating to the foreign relations of the United States The Paris Peace Conference 1919 (United States Government Printing Office, 1948, Vol IV, p 139-157)].
Armenian Boghos Noubar Pasha, who told that ‘150 000 Armenian volunteers in Russian Army were the only forces against Turks’ (Times of London , 1919 Jan 30 Link: http://armenians-1915.blogspot.com/2007/10/2013-150-000-armenian-volunteers-in.html) was obviously a denier and agent of Turkish government.
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Hovannes Katchaznouni, the first prime-minister of the Armenian state founded in 1918 and the prime authority of the Dashnagzoutiun Party who wrote a book ‘Dashnagzoutiun Has Nothing to do Anymore’ was also another chief denier. Because, in his book which is banned in Armenia at present, he stated that:
*it was a mistake to establish the volunteer units.
*They were unconditionally allied with Russia,
*They massacred the Moslem population,
*The Armenian terrorist acts were directed, at winning the Western public opinion.
*British occupation aroused hopes of the Dashnaks,
*They were provoked by imperial Sea to Sea land demand,
*They had not taken into consideration Turkey’s power,
* They should have used a peaceful language towards the Turks but they (Armenian Dashnaks) rejected the Turks who suggested to negotiate with them and they went on making war
(KS Papazian the writer of ‘Patriotism Perverted’ published in 1934, in Boston, also confirms this Turkish suggestion. Note that ‘Patrionism Perverted’ is banned in Armenia).
*The decision of the deportation of Armenians was a rightful measure taken by Turks.
*Turkey had acted with an instinct of self-defence.
*Their government was a Dashnak dictatorship.
*The fault was within the Dashnak Party. They should commit suicide. They had nothing to do.
Vratsyan, the last prime minister of Dashnaks who wrote in an article published in December 3 1920 issue of Araç, that they transformed Armenia to an arenna of endless wars with its neighbours for the Entente Powers (RGASPİ fond 80, list 4, file 83, sheet 136) was another chief denier and agent of Turkish government.
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Armenian Messrs. Ahonian and Hadissian who were the spokesmen of the Armenian delegation of the New Armenian Republic and visited Sultan Mehmet VI, Vahdeddin in Istanbul on September 6, 1918 were also Turkish nationalists. See the telegram sent by Mr Ahorian to the Armenian Prime Minister Kachaznuni:
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‘On September 6th, we presented our congratulations on his accession to the throne. We submitted our best wishes for the development of the Empire and its well-being and stated that the Armenian nation would never forget that it was the Ottoman Government which first conceived the idea of founding an independent Armenia, and recognized it, that the Armenian Government would do everything possible to protect friendly relations between the two countries and to strengthen them. His Majesty thanked and stated that he was very happy at seeing the envoys of independenbt and free Armenia, that he wished not only her development , but that she be strong in order to retain her independence. His Majesty is entirely convinced that friendly relations will always exist between the two neighboring countries, Turkey and Armenia, in order that both of them may develop. He concluded his remarks by stating that he was very hapy to see that Armenia had the strength to found an independent state which was able to send envoys to Istanbul, and repeated his best wishes for our country’. (Erich Feigl, A Myth of Terror, Edition Zeitgeschichte Freilassing, Salzburg, Austria p.97)
The Armenian Soviet historian A.A.Lalayan who stated that the Dashnaks displayed extreme courage to massacre Turkish women, children and ill and old people (Contrarevolyutsionnıy ‘Daşnaktsutyun’ İ İmperialisti-çeskaya Voyna 1914-1918 gg.’, Revolyutsionnıy Vostok, No.2-3, p.92, 1936) and
who also quoted the following report of a Dashnag officer, Aslem Varaam
written in 1920, in Beyazit-Varan was an Armenian denier and he was also hired by the Turkish government . The report of Aslem Varaam was:
“I exterminated the Turkish population in Bashar-Gechar without making any
exceptions. One some times feels the bullets shouldn’t be wasted. So, the
most effective way against these dogs is to collect the people who have
survived the clashes and dump them in deep holes and crush them under
heavy rocks pressed from above, not to let them inhabit this world any longer.
So I did accordingly. I collected all the women, men and children and
extinguished their lives in the deep holes I dumped them into, crushing them
with rocks.”
A.Lalayan, Revolutsionniy Vostok (Revolutionary East) No: 2-3, p.92 vd, Moscow, 1936; Istoricheskie Zapisky No 2, p.101, 1928
Armenian T. Haçikoğlyan who told that the Dashnaks eradicated thousands of Turks with their bloody hands (T. Haçikoglyan, 10 Let Armyanskoy Sttrelkovoy Divizii ,p4-6. İzdatelstvo Polit. Uprav. KKA, Tiflis, 1930) was also a denier and agent of Turkish government.
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The Armenian poet Mikael Nalbandyan who wrote these lines in his poem ‘The March of People of Zeytun, was another denier and Turkish nationalist:
‘..Şad ısdrugner yeğan azad/Miyayin menk mnank hılu hıbadag/Zeytuntsiner mer zposank/E baderazm yev arşavank/ Sur, tur, kıntag yev hıratsan/ Mer khağalikın en havidyan….’
(A lot of slaves were set free/ Only we were left who were obedient/Amusements of us, people of Zeytun are/ War and raid/ Our inexhaustible toys are/ Sword, saber, bullet and gun…….) (Nor Knar, p99). Zeytun was one of the places where the Armenians rebelled and massacred the Turks and Muslims.
The Armenian journalists of Armenian newspapers published in İstanbul, like Hayrenik, were also deniers, since they praised the Ottoman government for letting the relocated Armenians return their previous locations in 1918 and allocated 2 million liras for their return. They were deniers since they also critized the Russians and other states for using the Armenians as their tools.
KS Papazian the writer of ‘Patriotism Perverted’ published in 1934, in Boston was also a denier. Because:
Papazian critized A. Khatisian and the then prime minister S.Vratzian for not publishing the text of Treaty of Gümrü which they signed on December 2, 1920 to put an end to the war between Turkey and the Armenian Republic on December 2, 1920, which coincided with the entrance of Bolsheviks in Armenia.
Papazian also stated that the Armenian prime minister Simon Vratzian applied to the Turkish government on March 18, 1921 and asked military help of the Turks against the Bolsheviks!
Even Gourgen Mıgırdıç Yanıkyan (age 78), the Armenian murderer of Los Angeles prime consul of Turkey Mehmet Baydar (age 49) and the co consul Bahadır Demir (age 30) in Santa Barbara, in 1973, was a real denier, Turkish nationalist and agent of Turkish government. Because he admitted in his trial on June 13, 1973, via his attorney Lindsay that he (Yanıkyan) had been a member of an army made up of 10 000 volunteers to fight against the Turks in Armenia, in the beginning of March 1915 and in chief of this army had been an Armenian general called Andranik.
This had been prepared as four parties and had started to battle with the Turks in Iğdır, under the leadership of Russian general Dron and had proceeded to Van, they had occupied Van and meanwhile had destroyed and had fired Turkish villages (Dışişleri Bakanlığı <Santa Barbara Suikasti. Telephone from Washington Embassy to the Turkish Foreign Ministry, 15.6.1973, No:220 and June 21, 1973. No:225)
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Of course, even these few examples give great harm to the present Armenian
thesis and lead people to question the Armenian’s innocence, their
predominance in Ottoman population, and most importantly their genocide
thesis. Of course, the fact that Turks offered the Dashnaks an autonomous
Armenia (made up of Russian Armenia and the three Turkish vilayets of
Erzurum, Van and Bitlis) under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire’, if they
joined the Turkish side and stopped supporting the Russians, the other fact
that the executive committee of the Dashnagzoutiun rejected the proposal in
August 1914 before the war broke and that they rejected all other Turkish calls
of negotiations repeated during WWI too, are the major points that are not
wanted by the Armenians to be known
(Garo Pastırmacıan, Why Armenia Should be Free?, Boston, Dec.1918, Hairenik Publishing Company p. 16-17 and Papers relating to the foreign relations of the United States The Paris Peace Conference 1919 , United States Government Printing Office, 1948, Vol IV, p 139-157).
Of course they fear a question of why the Turks did offer autonomy to
Armenians if they decided to eradicate them.
And they fear the question of why and how the Armenian prime minister
Simon Vratzian applied the Turkish government on March 18, 1921 and asked
military help of the Turks against the Bolsheviks, in spite of the fact that the
Turks committed a (so-called) genocide and murdered 1.5 million
Armenians!
And they also are very frightened of the question how the Ottoman
Government eradicated 1,5 million of Armenians but in spite of this it was the
Ottomans who first conceived the idea of founding an independent Armenia,
and recognized it first. Moreover, it was the Ottoman Sultan who first wished
not only the development of Armenian Republic, but that she be strong in
order to retain her independence! Astonishingly, it was the Ottoman Sultan,
who stated that friendly relations would always exist between the two countries
That is, the Armenian ancestors who created their history (the top
representatitives of the Ottoman Armenians, Dashnags and prime ministers
of Armenia), the Armenian historians and poets who wittnessed this period
and even the Armenian murderers of Turkish diplomats are the main deniers!
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So, it is not surprising that both the book of Hovannes Katchaznouni, the first
prime-minister of the Armenian state, ‘Dashnagzoutiun Has Nothing to do
Anymore’ and the book of K.S.Papazian ‘Patrionism Perverted’ are banned in
Armenia. It is also a fact that all the copies of the book of Hovannes
Katchaznouni, in all languages were collected from the libraries in Europe by
Dashnags. The book is included in the catalogues but no copies can be
found in the racks.
It is not surprising either that, the Armenians even claim that nobody called
A.A. Lalayan, the Soviet-Armenian historian, ever lived!
Yes, they can ban the books of the makers of their history, they can buy
politicians by their votes and urge them to accept historical resolutions and
memorial laws in their parliaments, they can threaten the historians who do
not support their thesis, they can sue them, they can even bomb their houses
(http://209.232.239.37/gtd1/ViewIncident.aspx?id=56624), they can make the
world opinion blind by their propaganda and may deceive some of them.
Additionally they can cynically claim to be supporters of justice both at home
and abroad!
However they can never ban scholar thought and silence all the historians of
the world!
Note that Pierre Nora, president of the association ‘Liberty for history’ founded in 2005, has recently stated that the history should not be a slave to currency or written under the dictation of competing memoirs; in a free state, it does not belong to any political authority to define the historical truth and restrict freedom of the historian under threat of criminal sanctions. In a democracy, freedom for history is the freedom of all (http://www.lph-asso.fr//articles/46.html, . http://www.lph-asso.fr//tribunes/49.html)
It seems that Mr. Hovannissian did not read the book written by the prime minister of Armenia in 1918-1919. H. Katchaznouni, Bucarest 1923, Dashnagtzoutiun has Nothing to do Anymore. I strongly suggest him to read that book, because he needs to know about Mr. Katchaznouni’s conclusions:
1. It was a mistake to establish the volunteer units.
2. They were unconditionally allied with Russia.
3. They had not taken into consideration the balance of power which was in Turkey’s favor.
4. The decision of the deportation of Armenians was a rightful measure taken by Turks.
5. Turkey had acted with an instinct of self-defense.
6. The British occupation once more aroused the hopes of the Dashnaks.
7. What they established in Armenia was a Dashnak dictatorship.
8. They had acted in pursuit of the imperialist demand, ‘From Sea to Sea’ and had been provoked.
9. They massacred the Moslem population.
10. The Armenian terrorist acts were directed, at winning over the Western public opinion.
11. The fault was not to be found outside the Dashnakzuoutin Party.
12. The Dashnakzoutiun Party had nothing else to do by commit suicide.
In regards to Azerbaijan, Mr. Hovanissian forgets that Armenia is the only monoethnic country in South Caucasus. This fact shows how xenophobia is spread among Armenians. He again forgets to look at Azerbaijan’s map in 1919 to realize who these lands belonged back then and how Stalin awarded Armenia with Zanghezur area that separated Nakhichevan from mainland Azerbaijan. One cannot distort the historical facts more. The only truth is that Armenia invaded internationally recognized territories of Azerbaijan and it needs to vacate those lands if we want peace to come to this region.
Mr. Hovannisian, just two questions if you can answer.
1) When will Armenians stop moaning about the ‘genocide’ that took place almost a century ago? Why is it that this nation seeks sympathies of all the nations of the world when almost every nation has faced a genocide or massacre in living memory? Tens of thousands of Bosnians died recently yet I don’t see them moaning about it, asking Serbia to accept the responsibility and seeking reparations. Why does Armenian psyche revolves around the ‘genocide’? Will this nation ever grow up and move on?
2) The very Azeris, that are Armenians’ arch rivals, have faced genocide by the hands of the greatest butcher of all times, Joseph Stalin, and other Soviet rulers along side other Caucasian nations yet they never raise hue and cry. The Chechens are a prime example too. Please help me understand this mentality of going back in time and crying like hyenas. Mr. Kacinsky, late Polish president, harped the same tune during an EU conference back in 2006 loathing Germany for the World War II losses, seeking concessions and asking for reparations. Armenians want something similar???
How has the real estate market’s fluctuations impacted your business?
Fehmi, thanks for the post.
The funny thing is that some Armenians will say your sources are propaganda and begin emnifying you with ridicule and hatemongering.
everytime they read these, they ignore it because they want to believe what they have been told by their parents, and they have been conditioned to hate. this genocide campaign is th eonly thing that holds them together.
If the Armenian diaspora is so confident, then they should stop calling us denialists and take us to a court like the ICC….where their claims will be basless.