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Armenian genocide
Background
Genocide
By region
Demography
Resistance
Perpetrators
International response
Prosecution
Cultural depictions
Aftermath
Related

The Armenian Genocide (Template:Lang-hy ("Hayoc' c'ejaspanut'iwn"), Template:Lang-tr) — also known as the Armenian Holocaust, Great Calamity (Մեծ Եղեռն "Mec Ejer'n" ) or the Armenian Massacre — refers to the forcible deportation and massacring of hundreds of thousands to over a million Armenians during the government of the Young Turks from 1915 to 1917 in the Ottoman Empire.

It is widely acknowledged to have been one of the first modern, systematic genocides, as many Western sources point to the sheer scale of the death toll as evidence for a systematic, organized plan to eliminate the Armenians. The event is also said to be the second-most studied case of genocide. To date twenty-one countries have officially recognized it as genocide. The modern Turkish government rejects the characterization of the events as genocide.

The status of the Ottoman Armenians

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See also: Ottoman Armenian population
Ethnic groups in the Balkans and Asia Minor as of early 20th Century (William R. Shepherd, Historical Atlas, 1911).

Until the late 19th century, Armenians were referred to as millet-i sadıka (loyal nation) by the Ottomans. Under the millet system of Ottoman law, Armenians (as dhimmis, along with Greeks, Jews and other ethnic and religious groups) were subject to separate laws from those that applied to Muslims. They had separate legal courts, although disputes involving a Muslim fell under sharia-based law. Armenians were exempt from serving in the military and were instead made to pay an exemption tax, the jizya; their testimony in Islamic courts was inadmissible against Muslims; they were not allowed to bear arms, and they were heavily taxed, although they were one of the largest minorities in the Ottoman Empire.

In 1914, before World War I, there were an estimated two million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. While the Armenian population in Eastern Anatolia was large and clustered, there were many Armenians in the western part of the Ottoman Empire, particularly in and around Constantinople.

Before the war

For more details on this topic, see Young Turk Revolution, Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, Hamidian massacres, Adana massacre.

Sultan Abdul Hamid II suspended the constitution early in his reign (1876-1909), assuming dictatorial powers. As the Ottoman Empire declined, Armenian political resistance stiffened, resulting in a series of massacres of Armenians throughout Abdul Hamid's reign. The persecution of Armenians under Abdul Hamid II became a cause célèbre in the West, as Europe and the United States actively lobbied the Sultan to treat Christian minorities more humanely. By the last years of the 19th century, the New York Times noted an apparent "policy of extermination directed against the Christians of Asia Minor".

Five years before World War I, the Ottoman Empire came under the control of the secular Young Turks. Abdul Hamid II was deposed, prompting Armenian political organizations to support the Young Turks, in hopes that there would be a significant change for the better. The Young Turks, however, splintered into two main factions. One faction, the Liberal Union, remained committed to liberalizing the country and establishing equal status among all minorities; the other, the Committee of Union and Progress, was more radical and racist in its views. It was headed by a triumvirate: Ismail Enver, Mehmed Talat Pasha and Ahmed Djemal. The CUP ultimately rejected the Liberal Union's ideals and assumed full leadership of the country.

Implementation of the Genocide

Planning

In November 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered World War I on the side of the Central Powers when Ottoman gunboats attacked Russian naval bases and shipping in the Black Sea. In November 1914, Enver, now the Minister of War, launched a disastrous military campaign against Russian forces in the Caucasus in hopes of capturing the city of Baku. Nearly 90% of the Ottoman III Army was destroyed by Russian forces in the Battle of Sarikamis and many more froze to death after Enver issued a retreat order in January 1915.

Returning to Istanbul, Enver largely blamed the Armenians living in the region for actively siding with the Russians. In 1914, the Ottoman Empire's War Office had already begun a propaganda drive to present Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire as a liability and threat to the country's security. An Ottoman naval officer in the War Office described the planning:

In order to justify this enormous crime the requisite propaganda material was thoroughly prepared in Istanbul. "the Armenians are in league with the enemy. They will launch an uprising in Istanbul, kill off the Ittihadist leaders and will succeed in opening the straits ." These vile and malicious incitements could persuade only people who were not even able to feel the pangs of their own hunger.

The Ottoman government, moving swiftly, arrested an estimated 250 Armenian intellectuals on the night of 24 April 1915.

Armenian intellectuals were arrested and later executed en masse by Ottoman authorities on the night of April 24 1915.

Legislation, May 29

Further information: ]

In May 1915, Talaat requested that the cabinet and grand vizier enact a law legitimizing the deportations of Armenians living both near the Russian front and interior. On 29 May 1915, the CUP Central Committee passed the Temporary Law of Deportation (Tehcir Law), giving the Ottoman government and military authorization to deport anyone it "sensed" as a threat to national security. Several months later, the Temporary Law of Expropriation and Confiscation was passed, stating that all property, including land, livestock, and homes belonging to Armenians, was to be confiscated by the authorities. Only one politician in the Ottoman parliament, Senator Ahmed Riza, a founder-member of the Liberal Union, protested against the legislation:

It is unlawful to designate the Armenian assets as “abandoned goods” for the Armenians, the proprietors, did not abandon their properties voluntarily; they were forcibly, compulsorily removed from their domiciles and exiled. Now the government through its efforts is selling their goods...If we are a constitutional regime functioning in accordance with constitutional law we can’t do this. This is atrocious. Grab my arm, eject me from my village, then sell my goods and properties, such a thing can never be permissible. Neither the conscience of the Ottomans nor the law can allow it.

The Ottoman government created a bureaucratic administration, divided into three echelons, to enforce the seizure of Armenian property and the removal of the Armenians. They were the Katibi Mesul ("Responsible Secretaries"), Murrahas ("Delegates") and Umumi Müfettish ("General Inspectors"). The administration's purpose was to ensure that the orders by the government were "implemented strictly."

During 1915, the New York Times published 145 articles about the mass murder of the Armenian people, describing the massacre as "systematic", "authorized" and "organized by the government." Theodore Roosevelt would later characterize this as "the greatest crime of the war."

Labour battalions

At the same time, Enver ordered that all Armenians in the Ottoman forces, some as old as sixty, be disarmed, demobilized and assigned to labor battalion units (in Turkish, amele taburlari). Many of the Armenian recruits were executed by Ottoman squads known as chetes. Some of the disarmed Armenian recruits were utilized as road laborers (hamals) or construction mules, though they too would ultimately be executed.

The Special Organization (Teşkilat-ı Mahsusa)

Main articles: Teskilati Mahsusa and Special Organization (Ottoman Empire)

While there was an official 'special organization' founded in December 1911 by the Ottoman government, a second organization that participated in what led to the destruction of the Ottoman Armenian community was founded by the lttihad ve Terraki. This organization technically appeared in July 1914, and functioned with far more autonomy than the existing organization.

Later in 1914, the Ottoman government influenced the direction the special organization was to take by releasing criminals from central prisons to be the central elements of this newly formed special organization. According to the Mazhar commissions attached to the tribunal as soon as November 1914, 124 criminals were released from Pimian prison. Many other releases followed; in Ankara a few months later, 49 criminals were released from its central prison. Little by little from the end of 1914 to the beginning of 1915, hundreds, then thousands of prisoners were freed to form the members of this organization. Later, they were charged to escort the convoys of Armenian deportees. Vehib, commander of the Ottoman Third Army, called those members of the special organization, the “butchers of the human species.”

Process and camps of deportation

See also: Armenian casualties of deportations
The remaining bones of the Armenians of Erzinjan.

Many Armenians were marched out to the Syrian town of Deir ez-Zor and the surrounding desert. A good deal of evidence suggests that the Ottoman government did not provide any facilities or supplies to sustain the Armenians during their deportation, nor when they arrived. The Ottoman government also prevented the deportees from supplying themselves. By August 1915, the New York Times reported that "the roads and the Euphrates are strewn with corpses of exiles, and those who survive are doomed to certain death. It is a plan to exterminate the whole Armenian people."

The Ottoman troops escorting the Armenians not only allowed others to rob, kill and rape the Armenians, but often participated in these activities themselves. Deprived of all possessions and marched into the desert by a hostile and desperate foe, hundreds of thousands of Armenians perished.

Naturally, the death rate from starvation and sickness is very high and is increased by the brutal treatment of the authorities, whose bearing toward the exiles as they are being driven back and forth over the desert is not unlike that of slave drivers. With few exceptions no shelter of any kind is provided and the people coming from a cold climate are left under the scorching desert sun without food and water. Temporary relief can only be obtained by the few able to pay officials.The New York Times. August 8, 1916.

Template:ImageStackRight It is believed that 25 major concentration camps existed, under the command of Şükrü Kaya, one of the right hands of Talat Pasha. The majority of the camps were situated near modern Iraqi and Syrian frontiers, and some were only temporary transit camps. Others, such as Radjo, Katma, and Azaz, are said to have been used only temporarily, for mass graves; these sites were vacated by Fall 1915. Some authors also maintain that the camps Lale, Tefridje, Dipsi, Del-El, and Ra's al-'Ain were built specifically for those who had a life expectancy of a few days.

Though nearly all the camps, including the primary sites, were open air, the remainder of the mass killing in minor camps was not limited to direct killings, but also to mass burning, poisoning and drowning.

Foreign corroboration and reaction

Hundreds of eyewitnesses, including the neutral United States and the Ottoman Empire's own allies, Germany and Austria-Hungary, recorded and documented numerous acts of state-sponsored massacres, though this evidence would later be disputed by the Republic of Turkey. Many foreign officials offered to intervene on behalf of the Armenians, including Pope Benedict XV, only to be turned away by Ottoman government officials who claimed they were "retaliating against a pro-Russian fifth column." On May 24, 1915, the Triple Entente warned the Ottoman Empire that "In view of these new crimes of Turkey against humanity and civilization, the Allied Governments announce publicly to the Sublime Porte that they will hold personally responsible for these crimes all members of the Ottoman Government, as well as those of their agents who are implicated in such massacres."

The American Committee for Relief in the Near East (ACRNE, or "Near East Relief") was a charitable organization established to relieve the suffering of the peoples of the Near East. The organization was championed by Henry Morgenthau, Sr., American ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. Morgenthau's eyewitness accounts of the mass slaughter of Armenians galvanized much support for ACRNE.

The U.S. mission in the Ottoman Empire

Main article: Van Resistance

The United States had several consulates throughout the Ottoman Empire, including locations in Edirne, Elazığ, Samsun, İzmir, Trabzon, Van, and another in the Syrian town of Aleppo. The State Department mission at the time was headed by ambassador Henry Morgenthau Sr. in Constantinople. The United States was an officially neutral party in the war until it joined the side of the Allies in 1917. As the orders for deportations and massacres were enacted, many consular officials reported back to the ambassador on what they were witnessing. One such report came in September 1915 from the American consul in Kharput, Leslie A. Davis, who described his discovery of the bodies of nearly 10,000 Armenians dumped into several ravines near Lake Göeljuk, later referring to it as the "slaughterhouse province".

Template:ImageStackRight Similar reports began to reach Morgenthau from Aleppo and Van, prompting him to raise the issue with Talaat and Enver in person. As he quoted to them the testimonies of the consulate officials, both justified the deportations as necessary to the conduct of the war, suggesting that the complicity of the Armenians of Van with the Russian forces that had overtaken the city justified the persecution of all ethnic Armenians. In his memoirs, Morgenthau later suggested that, "When the Turkish authorities gave the orders for these deportations, they were merely giving the death warrant to a whole race; they understood this well, and, in their conversations with me, they made no particular attempt to conceal the fact..."

In addition to the consulates, there were also several Protestant missionary compounds established in Armenian-populated regions, including Van and Kharput. Many missionaries vividly described the brutal methods used by Ottoman forces and documented numerous instances of atrocities committed against the Christian minority.

Newspapers and literary journals in the United States and around the world, including the New York Times (which ran 145 articles in 1915 alone), The Nation, the Halifax Herald, and The Independent, printed hundreds of articles both during and after the war, describing the deportations as state-enacted genocide. Numerous American figures also spoke out against the Genocide, including former president Theodore Roosevelt, rabbi Stephen Wise, William Jennings Bryan, and Alice Stone Blackwell. The American Near East Relief Committee helped donate over $110 million to the Armenians. In the United States and Great Britain, children were regularly reminded to clean their plates while eating and to "remember the starving Armenians".

Allied forces in the Middle East

On the Middle Eastern front, the British military engaged Ottoman forces in southern Syria and Mesopotamia. Throughout the fighting, the British documented and confirmed the reports of American consuls and missionaries. British diplomat Gertrude Bell filed the following report after hearing the account of a captured Ottoman soldier:

The battalion left Aleppo on 3 February and reached Ras al-Ain in twelve hours....some 12,000 Armenians were concentrated under the guardianship of some hundred Kurds...These Kurds were called gendarmes, but in reality mere butchers; bands of them were publicly ordered to take parties of Armenians, of both sexes, to various destinations, but had secret instructions to destroy the males, children and old women...One of these gendarmes confessed to killing 100 Armenian men himself...the empty desert cisterns and caves were also filled with corpses...

Reacting to numerous eyewitness accounts, British politician Viscount Bryce and historian Arnold J. Toynbee compiled statements from survivors and eyewitnesses from other countries including Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland, who similarly attested to the deliberate massacres of innocent Armenians by Ottoman government forces. In 1916, they published The Treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, 1915-1916. Although the book has since been criticized as British wartime propaganda to build up sentiment against the Central Powers, Bryce had submitted the work to scholars for verification prior to its publication. University of Oxford Regius Professor Gilbert Murray stated of the tome, "...the evidence of these letters and reports will bear any scrutiny and overpower any skepticism. Their genuineness is established beyond question." Other professors, including Herbert Fisher of Sheffield University and former American Bar Association president Moorfield Storey, affirmed the same conclusion.

Winston Churchill, in his The World Crisis, 1911-1918, described the massacres as an "administrative holocaust" and noted that "the clearance of race from Asia Minor was about as complete as such an act could be...There is no reason to doubt that this crime was planned and executed for political reasons. The opportunity presented itself for clearing Turkish soil of a Christian race opposed to all Turkish ambitions."

The joint Austrian and German mission

As allies during the war, the Imperial German mission in the Ottoman Empire included both military and civilian components. While experienced officers were sent to train and assist the Ottoman military in fending off the offensives launched by the combined British, French and ANZAC forces at Gallipoli and in Syria, Germany had also brokered a deal with the Sublime Porte to commission the building of a railroad stretching from Berlin to the Middle East, called the Baghdad Railway.

Among the most famous persons to document the massacres was a German military medic named Armin T. Wegner. Due to the strict censorship of both Germany and the Ottoman Empire, photographing the massacres was forbidden; nonetheless, Wegner disobeyed his orders and took hundreds of photographs of Armenians being deported and held in northern Syrian camps.

German officers stationed in eastern Turkey disputed the government's assertion that Armenian revolts had broken out, suggesting that the areas were "quiet until the deportations began."

Germany's diplomatic mission was lead by Ambassador Baron Hans von Wagenheim (and later Count Paul von Wolff-Metternich). Like Morgenthau, von Wagenheim received many disturbing messages from consul officials around the Ottoman Empire. From the province of Adana, Consul Eugene Buge reported that the CUP chief had sworn to kill and massacre any Armenians who survived the deportation marches. In June 1915, von Wagenheim, compelled by the evidence, sent a cable to Berlin reporting that Talat had admitted the deportations were not "being carried out because of 'military considerations alone.'" One month later, he came to the conclusion that there "no longer was doubt that the Porte was trying to exterminate the Armenian race in the Turkish Empire."

When Wolff-Metternich succeeded von Wagenheim, he continued to dispatch similar cables: "The Committee demands the extirpation of the last remnants of the Armenians and the government must yield....A Committee representative is assigned to each of the provincial administrations....Turkification means license to expel, to kill or destroy everything that is not Turkish."

German engineers and laborers involved in building the railway also witnessed Armenians being crammed into cattle cars and shipped along the railroad line. Franz Gunther, a representative for Deutsche Bank which was funding the construction of the Baghdad Railway, forwarded photographs to his directors and expressed his frustration at having to remain silent amid such "bestial cruelty". This process was noted by German historian Hilmar Kaiser as the first time "'railway transport of civilian populations' as part of a plan of race 'extermination'." Major General Otto von Lossow, acting military attaché and head of the German Military Plenipotentiary in the Ottoman Empire, spoke to Ottoman intentions in a conference held in Batum in 1918:

The Turks have embarked upon the "total extermination of the Armenians in Transcaucasia...The aim of Turkish policy is, as I have reiterated, the taking of possession of Armenian districts and the extermination of the Armenians. Talaat's government wants to destroy all Armenians, not just in Turkey but also outside Turkey. On the basis of all the reports and news coming to me here in Tiflis there hardly can be any doubt that the Turks systematically are aiming at the extermination of the few hundred thousand Armenians whom they left alive until now.

Similarly, Major General Kress von Kressenstein noted that "The Turkish policy of causing starvation is an all too obvious proof...for the Turkish resolve to destroy the Armenians." Another notable figure in the German military camp was Max Erwin von Scheubner-Richter, who documented various massacres of Armenians. He sent fifteen reports regarding "deportations and mass killings" to Germany's chancellor in Berlin. His final report noted that fewer than 100,000 Armenians were left alive in the Ottoman Empire; the rest had been exterminated (Template:Lang-de). Scheubner-Richter also detailed the methods of the Ottoman government, noting its use of the Special Organization and other bureaucratized instruments of genocide.

In a genocide conference in 2001, professor Wolfgang Wipperman of the Free University of Berlin introduced documents evidencing that the German High Command was aware of the mass killings at the time but chose not to interfere or speak out.

Russian military

The Russian Empire's response to the bombardment of its Black Sea naval ports was primarily a land campaign through the Caucasus. Early victories against the Ottoman Empire from the winter of 1914 to the spring 1915 saw significant gains of territory, including relieving the Armenian bastion resisting in the city of Van in May 1915. The Russians also recorded encountering the bodies of Armenians in the areas they advanced through. In March 1916, the scenes they saw in the city of Erzerum led the Russians to retaliate against the Ottoman III Army whom they held responsible for the massacres, destroying it in its entirety.

Armenians are marched to a nearby prison in Mezireh by armed Turkish soldiers. Kharpert, Armenia, Ottoman Empire - April, 1915.

1919–1920 Military tribunals

Domestic courts-martial

Main article: Turkish Courts-Martial of 1919-20

Domestic courts-martial began on 23 November 1918. These courts were designed by the Sultan Mehmed VI, who blamed the Committee of Union and Progress for the destruction of the empire through pushing it into World War I. The Armenian issue was used as a tool in these courts to punish the leaders of the Committee of Union and Progress. Most of the documents generated in these courts were later moved to international trials. By January 1919, a report to Sultan Mehmed VI accused over 130 suspects, most of whom were high officials. Mehmed Talat Pasha and Enver had left Istanbul before 1919, believing that Sultan Mehmed VI would not accept any verdict that did not result in their execution. The term Three Pashas generally refers to this prominent triumvirate that pushed the Ottomans into World War I.

The courts-martial officially disbanded the Committee of Union and Progress, which had actively ruled the Ottoman Empire for ten years. All the assets of the organization were transferred to the treasury, and the assets of the people who were found guilty were moved to "teceddüt firkasi". According to verdicts handed down by the court, all members except for the Three Pashas were transferred to jails in Bekiraga, then moved to Malta. The Three Pashas were found guilty in absentia. The courts-martial blamed the members of Ittihat Terakki for pursuing a war that did not fit into the notion of Millet.

International trials

Main articles: Malta exiles and Malta Tribunals

These Ottoman politicians, generals, and intellectuals were taken out of Istanbul jails and deported to Malta (Malta exiles), where they were held for some three years, while searches were made of archives in Istanbul, London, Paris and Washington to find proof of their guilt.

Following the Armistice of Mudros in January 1919, the preliminary Peace Conference in Paris (Paris Peace Conference, 1919) established "The Commission on Responsibilities and Sanctions" which was chaired by U.S. Secretary of State Lansing. Following the commission's work, several articles were added to the Treaty of Sèvres, and the acting government of the Ottoman Empire, Sultan Mehmed VI and Damat Adil Ferit Pasha, were summoned to trial. The Treaty of Sèvres gave recognition of the Democratic Republic of Armenia and developed a mechanism to bring to trial the criminals of "barbarous and illegitimate methods of warfare... offenses against the laws and customs of war and the principles of humanity".

Article 230 of the Treaty of Sèvres required the Ottoman Empire, "to hand over to the Allied Powers the persons whose surrender may be required by the latter as being responsible for the massacres committed during the continuance of the state of war on territory which formed part of the Ottoman Empire on August 1, 1914."

At the Military Trials in Istanbul in 1919 many of those responsible for the genocide were sentenced to death in absentia, after having escaped trial in 1918. It is believed that the accused succeeded in destroying the majority of the documents that could be used as evidence against them before they escaped. Admiral Calthorpe, the British High Commissioner, described the destruction of documents: "Just before the Armistice, officials had been going to the archives department at night and making a clean sweep of most of the documents." Aydemir, S.S., on the other hand, writes in his "Makedonyadan Ortaasyaya Enver Pasa":

Before the flight of the top CUP leaders, Talat Pasa stopped by at the waterfront residence of one of his friends on the shore of Arnavudköy, depositing there a suitcase of documents. It is said that the documents were burned in the basement's furnace. Indeed ... the documents and other papers of the CUP's Central Committee are nowhere to be found.

The military court established the will of the CUP to eliminate the Armenians physically, via its special organization. The Court Martial, Istanbul, 1919 pronounced sentences as follows:

The Court Martial taking into consideration the above-named crimes declares, unanimously, the culpability as principal factors of these crimes the fugitives Talat Pasha, former Grand Vizir, Enver Efendi, former War Minister, struck off the register of the Imperial Army, Cemal Efendi, former Navy Minister, struck off too from the Imperial Army, and Dr. Nazim Efendi, former Minister of Education, members of the General Council of the Union & Progress, representing the moral person of that party;... the Court Martial pronounces, in accordance with said stipulations of the Law the death penalty against Talat, Enver, Cemal, and Dr. Nazim.

Operation Nemesis

Main article: Operation Nemesis

"Operation Nemesis" was the Armenian Revolutionary Federation codename for the covert operation in the 1920s to assassinate the masterminds of the Armenian Genocide. It is named after the Greek goddess of divine retribution, Nemesis.

Casualties, 1914 to 1918

Main article: Ottoman Armenian casualties
Targets of movements from Ottoman Archives

While there is no consensus on how many Armenians lost their lives during the Armenian Genocide, there is general agreement among Western scholars that approximately a million Armenians perished between 1914 and 1918. Estimates vary between 300,000 (as per the modern Turkish state) to 1.5 million (as per the modern Armenian state). Encyclopædia Britannica references the research of Arnold J. Toynbee, of the British Foreign Office, who estimated a death toll of 600,000 to 800,000.

Influence of the Armenian Genocide on Adolph Hitler

Main article: Armenian quote

The lack of international prosecution of the organizers behind the Armenian Genocide is often speculated to have influenced Adolf Hitler, owing to his various references to the Ottoman killings of Armenians. The extent of Hitler's knowledge of the Armenian Genocide is unclear, though he did refer to their destruction several times. He first addressed their plight in 1924, referring to them as "cowards". The most notable quote attributed to Hitler on the Armenians is excerpted from an August 1939 conference with German military commanders prior to the invasion of Poland:

Our strength consists in our speed and in our brutality. Genghis Khan led millions of women and children to slaughter -- with premeditation and a happy heart. History sees in him solely the founder of a state. It’s a matter of indifference to me what a weak western European civilisation will say about me. I have issued the command -- and I’ll have anybody who utters but one word of criticism executed by a firing squad -- that our war aim does not consist in reaching certain lines, but in the physical destruction of the enemy. Accordingly, I have placed my death-head formation in readiness -- for the present only in the East -- with orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion, men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space which we need. Who, after all, speaks to-day of the annihilation of the Armenians?

This quote has been fiercely contested by Turkish scholars and historians, who have called it a fabrication. Nonetheless, there are numerous accounts of Hitler speaking in regards to the Armenians, with at least two similar versions of the 1939 speech coming from the German High Command archives. In 1931, for example, two years prior to his ascension as Germany's leader, Hitler noted in an interview that "everywhere people are awaiting a new world order. We intend to introduce a great resettlement policy...remember the extermination of the Armenians." In 1943, during the height of his attempts to exterminate the Jews in Europe, Hitler demanded of Hungarian regent Admiral Miklós Horthy that he deport the Jews from the country: "Nations which did not get rid of the Jews perished. One of the most famous examples of this was the downfall of a people who were so proud--the Persians, who now lead a pitiful existence as Armenians."

Academic views

There is general agreement among Western historians that the events constitute genocide. Several international organizations have conducted studies of the events, each in turn determining that the term "genocide" aptly describes "the Ottoman massacre of Armenians in 1915-1916." Among the organizations asserting this conclusion are the International Center for Transitional Justice, the International Association of Genocide Scholars, and the United Nations' Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities.

In 2007, The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity produced a letter signed by 53 Nobel Laureates re-affirming the Genocide Scholars' conclusion that the 1915 killings of Armenians constituted genocide. Wiesel's organization also asserted that Turkish acknowledgement of the Armenian Genocide would create no legal "basis for reparations or territorial claims", anticipating Turkish anxieties that it could prompt financial or territorial claims.

While some consider denial to be a form of hate speech or politically-minded historical revisionism, a small minority among Western academics in the field of Ottoman history have expressed doubts as to the genocidal character of the events. While these dissenting opinions are far more common among residents of modern Turkey, some academics have established reputations for having adopted the viewpoint of the Turkish state. Justin A. McCarthy of the University of Louisville, for instance, has regularly contended that the events do not constitute genocide; in 1998, the government of Turkey awarded him with the Order of Merit for his efforts.

The most important counterpoint may be that of British scholar Bernard Lewis. While he had once written of "the terrible holocaust of 1915, when a million and a half Armenians perished", he later came to believe that the term "genocide" was distinctly inaccurate, because the "tremendous massacres" were not "a deliberate preconceived decision of the Turkish government."

While academic opinions within the modern Republic of Turkey often seem to be at odds with international consensus, this may stem from the fact that it remains illegal to speak of the Armenian Genocide in Turkey. Nobel Prize-winning Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk, for instance, faced harassment and criminal prosecution for stating that "a million Armenians were killed in these lands". According to Pamuk,

What happened to the Ottoman Armenians in 1915 was a major thing that was hidden from the Turkish nation; it was a taboo. But we have to be able to talk about the past.

Similarly, Hrant Dink, the ethnic Armenian chief editor of the Agos newspaper in Turkey, was prosecuted by the Turkish state three times for "denigrating Turkishness", for his having criticized the Turkish state's denial of the Armenian Genocide. In 2007, he was gunned down by a Turkish nationalist while at work in his newspaper office. Leaked photographs of the assassin apparently being revered as a national hero while in police custody caused a scandal in Turkey, giving the academic community still more pause in regards to engaging the Armenian issue.

Dink had been considered a moderate, known particularly for his bitter criticism of Armenian Diaspora campaigns to garner formal recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

Turkish opinions

Views of Turkish academic community and intellectuals

Almost all Turkish intellectuals, scientists and historians accept that many Armenians died during the conflict, but they do not necessarily consider these events to be genocide.

Some Turkish intellectuals support the genocide thesis despite opposition from Turkish nationalists; these include Ragıp Zarakolu, Ali Ertem, Taner Akçam, Halil Berktay, Yektan Türkyilmaz. Fatma Müge Göcek, Dr. Fikret Adanır, and Seyla Benhabib. In 2004, five hundred Turkish intellectuals protested a new high-school history curriculum which ordered teachers to denounce to students "the unfounded allegations" of the Armenians.

The position of the Turkish government

Main article: Denial of the Armenian Genocide

The Republic of Turkey's formal perspective is that the deaths of Armenians during the "relocation" or "deportation" cannot aptly be deemed "genocide". This point has been contended with a plethora of diverging justifications: that the killings were not deliberate or were not governmentally orchestrated, that the killings were justified because Armenians posed a Russian-sympathizing threat as an ethnic group, that Armenians merely starved, or any of various characterizations recalling marauding "Armenian gangs". Some suggestions seek to invalidate the assertion of genocide based on semantic grounds, or on the grounds of its being an anachronism (the word "genocide" was not coined until 1943).

Often times, Turkish WWI casualty figures are cited to mitigate the effect of the number of Armenian dead. Turkish governmental sources will occasionally assert that the historically-demonstrated "tolerance of Turkish people" itself renders the Armenian Genocide an impossibility. A theory propounded by the Turkish military reaches even further into history to disprove the 1915 Armenian Genocide: "It was the Seljuk Turks who saved the Armenians that came under the Turkish domination in 1071 from the Byzantine persecution and granted them the right to live as a man should." The website of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey currently features a section entitled ARCHIVE DOCUMENTS ABOUT THE ATROCITIES AND GENOCIDE INFLICTED UPON TURKS BY ARMENIANS, apparently suggesting that, in some circles, it is believed that the ethnic Turks of Anatolia experienced a genocide at the hands of the Armenians.

Public prosecutors have utilized Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code prohibiting "insulting Turkishness" to silence some Turkish intellectuals who spoke of atrocities endured by Armenians in the last days of the Ottoman Empire. The modern Turkish government has frequently protested the formal recognition of the genocide by other countries.

In 2005 Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan invited Turkish, Armenian and international historians to form a commission to reevaluate the events of 1915. Armenian president Robert Kocharian responded that "to address the past cannot be effective if it deflects from addressing the present and the future. In order to engage in a useful dialogue, we need to create the appropriate and conducive political environment. It is the responsibility of governments to develop bilateral relations and we do not have the right to delegate that responsibility to historians. That is why we have proposed and propose again that, without pre-conditions, we establish normal relations between our two countries."

The position of the international community

Main article: Post-Armenian Genocide timeline

Although there has been much academic recognition of the Armenian Genocide, this has not always been followed by governments and media. Many governments, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Israel, Ukraine, and Georgia, do not officially use the word genocide to describe these events. Although there is no federal recognition of the Armenian Genocide, 40 of the 50 U.S. states recognize the events of 1915 to 1917 as genocide.

In recent years, parliaments of several countries, including France and Switzerland, have formally recognized the event as genocide. Turkish entry talks with the European Union were met with a number of calls to consider the event as genocide, though it never became a precondition.

Political map showing countries, US states, and UK Constitute countries which have officially recognized the Armenian Genocide.

Countries officially recognizing the Armenian Genocide include Argentina, Armenia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Cyprus, France, Iran, Greece, Italy, Lebanon, Lithuania, The Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland, Uruguay, Vatican City and Venezuela. Although part of the United Kingdom, Wales also officially recognizes the Armenian Genocide. The Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec recognize the Armenian Genocide independently of their federal government. The Parliament of the State of New South Wales, Australia passed a resolution acknowledging and condemning the Armenian Genocide in 1997.

File:GenocideMemorialLebanon.jpg
Genocide memorial in Bikfaya, Lebanon.

Many newspapers for a long time would not use the word genocide without disclaimers such as "alleged" and many continue to do so. A number of those policies have since been reversed.

In September 2004 President Mohammad Khatami of Iran visited the Armenian Genocide Memorial at Tsitsernakaberd in Yerevan.

On June 15, 2005 the German Bundestag passed a resolution that "honors and commemorates the victims of violence, murder and expulsion among the Armenian people before and during the First World War". The German resolution mentions that "many independent historians, parliaments and international organizations describe the expulsion and annihilation of the Armenians as genocide", but stops short of doing so itself. It also contains an apology for any German responsibility.

In 2006 the French parliament submitted a bill to create a law that would punish any person denying the Armenian genocide with up to 5 years of imprisonment and a fine of 45,000. Despite Turkish protests, the French National Assembly adopted a bill making it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered genocide in 1915 at the hands of the Ottoman Turks. The bill has been criticized as an attempt to garner votes from among the 500,000 ethnic Armenians of France. This criticism has come not only from within Turkey, but also from independent sources, such as Orhan Pamuk, Hrant Dink, French President Jacques Chirac and U.S. diplomat Daniel Fried.

On 10th May 2006, the Bulgarian Government rejected a bill on recognition of the Armenian Genocide. This came after Emel Etem Toşkova, the Deputy Prime Minister of Bulgaria and one of the leaders of the MRF, the main Turkish party in Bulgaria, declared that her party would walk out of the coalition government if the bill was passed. The bill itself was brought forward by the nationalist Ataka party.

International bodies that recognise the Armenian genocide include the European Parliament, the Council of Europe, the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the World Council of Churches and the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal.

On 4 September 2006, Members of the European Parliament voted for the inclusion of a clause prompting Turkey "to recognize the Armenian genocide as a condition for its EU accession" in a highly critical report, which was adopted by a broad majority in the foreign relations committee of the European Parliament. This requirement was later dropped on 27 September 2006 by the general assembly of the European Parliament by 429 votes in favor to 71 against, with 125 abstentions.

On September 26, 2006, the two largest political parties in the Netherlands, Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA) and the Labour Party (PvdA), removed three Turkish-Dutch candidates for the 2006 general election, because they either denied or refused to publicly declare that the Armenian Genocide had happened. The magazine HP/De Tijd reported that the number 2 of the PvdA list of candidates, Nebahat Albayrak (who was born in Turkey and is of Turkish descent) had acknowledged that the term "genocide" was appropriate to describe the events. Albayrak denied having said this and accused the press of putting words in her mouth, saying that "I'm not a politician that will trample my identity. I've always defended the same views everywhere with regard to the 'genocide'". It was reported that a large section of the Turkish minority were considering boycotting the elections. Netherlands' Turkish minority numbers 365,000 people, out of which 235,000 are eligible to vote.

On November 29, 2006, the lower house of Argentina's parliament adopted a resolution recognizing the Armenian Genocide. The bill was overwhelmingly adopted by the assembly and declared April 24th, the international day of remembrance for the Armenian genocide as an official "day of mutual tolerance and respect" among peoples around the world.

On July 17, 2006, the Brazilian state of Ceará became the second state after São Paulo to ratify a bill recognizing the Armenian Genocide. On March 8, 2007, Turkish nationalist Doğu Perinçek became the first person convicted by a court of law for denying the Armenian Genocide, found guilty by a Swiss district court in Lausanne. Perinçek appealed the verdict.

On April 20, 2007, the Basque Parliament approved an institutional declaration recognizing the Armenian Genocide. The Basque Parliament included 6 articles where it affirms the authenticity of the Armenian Genocide and declares sympathy to the Armenians, while at the same time denouncing Turkey's negation of the genocide and its economic blockade imposed on Armenia.

Impact on culture

Memorial

In 1965, at the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the genocide, a 24-hour mass protest was initiated in Yerevan demanding recognition of the Armenian Genocide by Soviet authorities. Two years later, the memorial was completed at the Tsitsernakaberd hill above the Hrazdan gorge in Yerevan. The 44 metre stele symbolizes the national rebirth of Armenians. 12 slabs are positioned in a circle, representing 12 lost provinces in present day Turkey. At the centre of the circle there is an eternal flame. Along the park at the memorial there is a 100 metre wall with names of towns and villages where massacres are known to have taken place. In 1995 a small underground circular museum was opened at the other end of the park where one can learn basic information about the events. Some photos taken by Ottoman-allied German photographers, including some by Armin T. Wegner, are also displayed. Near the museum is a spot where foreign statesmen plant trees in memory of the genocide.

Each April 24th, hundreds of thousands of people walk to the genocide monument and lay flowers around the eternal flame.

Art

File:1915medal.jpg
Armenian-Russian "Hour of Trial" Medal, issued in 1915

The earliest example of the Armenian genocide on art was a medal issued in 1915 in St. Petersburg, signifying Russian sympathy for Armenian suffering. It was struck in 1915, as the massacres and deportations were still raging. Since then, dozens of medals in different countries have been commissioned to commemorate the event.

Several eyewitness accounts of the events were published, notably those of Swedish missionary Alma Johansson and U.S. Ambassador Henry Morgenthau, Sr. Nonetheless, the most famous piece of literature concerning the Armenian Genocide is Franz Werfel's 1933 The Forty Days of Musa Dagh. The book became a bestseller, and there were early plans to convert the book into a screenplay for a movie, though these plans did not come to fruition.

Kurt Vonnegut's fictional 1988 Bluebeard featured the Armenian Genocide as a central theme. Other novels incorporating the Armenian Genocide include Louis de Berniéres' Birds without Wings, Edgar Hilsenrath's German-language The Fairytale of the Last Thought, and Stefan Żeromski's 1925 Before the Spring. A story in Edward Saint-Ivan's 2006 anthology "The Black Knight's God" includes a fictional survivor of the Armenian Genocide.

The first film about the Armenian Genocide appeared in 1919, a Hollywood production entitled Ravished Armenia. It resonated with acclaimed director Atom Egoyan, influencing his 2002 Ararat. There are also references in Elia Kazan's America, America or Henri Verneuil's Mayrig. Italian directors Vittorio and Paolo Taviani are planning another film about the events, based on Antonia Arslan's book, La Masseria Delle Allodole (The Farm of the Larks). Richard Kalinoski's play, Beast on the Moon, is about two Armenian Genocide survivors.

American composer and singer Daniel Decker has achieved critical acclaim for his collaborations with Armenian composer Ara Gevorgian. The song "Adana", named for the province of a 1909 pogrom of the Armenian people, tells the story of the Armenian Genocide. Decker was invited by the Armenian government to sing "Adana" at a concert in Yerevan, Armenia on April 24 2005 to commemorate the 90th Anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. "Adana" has been translated into 17 languages and recorded by singers around the world.

The band System of a Down, comprised of four California musicians who are all descendants of Armenian Genocide survivors, frequently promotes awareness of the Armenian Genocide, through its lyrics and concerts. Hardcore punk band Integrity features a song about the Armenian Genocide on its 1995 album Systems Overload.

Keyboardist Derek Sherinian collaborated with duduk master Djivan Gasparyan on the song "Prelude To Battle", which Sherinian "dedicated to his great grandmother who fought the Turks in the Armenian genocide" as part of his 2006 album "Blood of the Snake".

Documentary films

  • 1975 - The Forgotten Genocide (dir. J. Michael Hagopian)
  • 2003 - Germany and the Secret Genocide (dir. J. Michael Hagopian)
  • 2003 - Voices From the Lake: A Film About the Secret Genocide (dir. J. Michael Hagopian)
  • 2006 - The Armenian Genocide (dir. Andrew Goldberg)
  • 2006 - Armenian Revolt (dir. Marty Callaghan)
  • 2006 - Screamers (dir. Carla Garapedian)

Artwork

See also

References

  1. New York Times Dispatch. Lord Bryce's report on Armenian atrocities an appalling catalogue of outrage and massacre.. The New York Times, October 8, 1916.
  2. "Cultural Cleansing: Who Remembers The Armenians," in Robert Bevan. The Destruction of Memory, Reaction Books, London. 2006, pages 25-60
  3. Ferguson, Niall. The War of the World: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West. New York: Penguin Press, 2006 p. 177 ISBN 1-5942-0100-5
  4. A Letter from The International Association of Genocide Scholars
  5. "Senate Resolution 106 - - Calling on the President to ensure that the foreign policy of the United States reflects appropriate understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to Human Rights, Ethnic Cleansing, and Genocide Documented in the United States Record relating to the Armenian Genocide". Library of Congress.
  6. ^ R. J. Rummel, The Holocaust in Comparative and Historical Perspective, A Journal Social Issues, April 1, 1998 — Vol.3, no.2
  7. "Q&A: Armenian 'genocide'". BBC News. 2006-10-12. Retrieved 2006-12-29. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. Dadrian, Vahakn N. The History of the Armenian Genocide: Ethnic Conflict from the Balkans to Anatolia to the Caucasus. Oxford: Berghahn Books, 1995 p. 192 ISBN 1-5718-1666-6
  9. Melson, Robert. Revolution and Genocide: On the Origins of the Armenian Genocide and the Holocaust. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. pp. 54-56 ISBN 0-2265-1991-0
  10. Vartan Oskanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Republic of Armenia. "Ultimate Crime, Ultimate Challenge An International Conference on the 90th Anniversary of the Armenian Genocide CLOSING ADDRESS". Armenian Foreign Ministry.
  11. Robert Melson (November 1996). "Paradigms of Genocide: The Holocaust, the Armenian Genocide, and Contemporary Mass Destructions". Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 548: 156 - 168 (160).
  12. Hovannisian, Richard. Armenian people from ancient to modern times, Volume II. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. p. p.204. ISBN 0312101686. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
  13. Rae, Heather (2002). State Identities and the Homogenisation of Peoples. Cambridge University Press. pp. p. 140. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); line feed character in |publisher= at position 21 (help)
  14. Balakian, Peter. The Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America's Response. New York: Perennial, 2003. pp. 144-159 ISBN 0-0601-9840-0
  15. Balakian. The Burning Tigris, p. 200
  16. Dadrian., History of the Armenian Genocide, p. 220
  17. Balakian. The Burning Tigris, pp. 211-212
  18. Balakian. The Burning Tigris, pp. 186-188
  19. Y. Bayur. Turk Inkilabz. vol. III, part 3 op. cit. in Dadrian. History of the Armenian Genocide
  20. Balakian. The Burning Tigris, p. 185
  21. The hidden holocaust - by Ruth Rosen
  22. Balakian. The Burning Tigris, p. 178
  23. Toynbee, Arnold. Armenian Atrocities: The Murder of a Nation. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1915. pp. 181–182
  24. "FACT SHEET: ARMENIAN GENOCIDE". Knights of Vartan Armenian Research Center, The University of Michigan-Dearborn.
  25. Vahakn N. Dadrian (November 1991). "The Documentation of the World War I Armenian Massacres in the Proceedings of the Turkish Military Tribunal". International Journal of Middle East Studies. 23: 549-576 (560).
  26. ^ Template:Fr icon Kotek, Joël and Pierre Rigoulot. Le Siècle des camps: Détention, concentration, extermination: cent ans de mal radica. JC Lattes, 2000 ISBN 2-7096-1884-2
  27. Eitan Belkind was a Nili member, who infiltrated the Ottoman army as an official. He was assigned to the headquarters of Camal Pasha. He claims to have witnessed the burning of 5000 Armenians, quoted in Yair Auron, The Banality of Indifference: Zionism and the Armenian Genocide. New Brunswick, N.J., 2000, pp. 181, 183. Lt. Hasan Maruf, of the Ottoman army, describes how a population of a village were taken all together, and then burned. See, British Foreign Office 371/2781/264888, Appendices B., p. 6). Also, the Commander of the Third Army, Vehib's 12 pages affidavit, which was dated December 5, 1918, presented in the Trabzon trial series (March 29, 1919) included in the Key Indictment(published in Takvimi Vekayi, No. 3540, May 5, 1919), report such a mass burning of the population of an entire village near Mus. S. S. McClure write in his work, Obstacles to Peace, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1917. pp. 400-401, that in Bitlis, Mus and Sassoun, The shortest method for disposing of the women and children concentrated in tile various camps was to burn them. And also that, Turkish prisoners who had apparently witnessed some of these scenes were horrified and maddened at the remembering the sight. They told the Russians that the stench of the burning human flesh permeated the air for many days after. The Germans, Ottoman allies, also witnessed the way Armenians were burned according to the Israeli historian, Bat Ye’or, who writes: The Germans, allies of the Turks in the First World War, … saw how civil populations were shut up in churches and burned, or gathered en masse in camps, tortured to death, and reduced to ashes,… (See: B. Ye'or, The Dhimmi. The Jews and Christians under Islam, Trans. from the French by D. Maisel P. Fenton and D. Liftman, Cranbury, N.J.: Frairleigh Dickinson University, 1985. p. 95)
  28. During the Trabzon trial series, of the Martial court (from the sittings between March 26 and Mat 17, 1919), the Trabzons Health Services Inspector Dr. Ziya Fuad wrote in a report that Dr. Saib, caused the death of children with the injection of morphine, the information was allegedly provided by two physicians (Drs. Ragib and Vehib), both Dr. Saib colleagues at Trabzons Red Crescent hospital, where those atrocities were said to have been committed. (See: Vahakn N. Dadrian, The Turkish Military Tribunal’s Prosecution of the Authors of the Armenian Genocide: Four Major Court-Martial Series, Genocide Study Project, H. F. Guggenheim Foundation, published in The Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Volume 11, Number 1, Spring 1997). Dr. Ziya Fuad, and Dr. Adnan, public health services director of Trabzon, submitted affidavits, reporting a cases, in which, two school buildings were used to organize children and then sent them on the mezzanine, to kill them with a toxic gas equipment. This case was presented during the Session 3, p.m., 1 April 1919, also published in the Constantinople newspaper Renaissance, 27 April 1919 (for more information, see: Vahakn N. Dadrian, The Role of Turkish Physicians in the World War I Genocide of Ottoman Armenians, in The Holocaust and Genocide Studies 1, no. 2 (1986): 169–192). The Ottoman surgeon, Dr. Haydar Cemal wrote in Türkce Istanbul, No. 45, 23 December 1918, also published in Renaissance, 26 December 1918, that on the order of the Chief Sanitation Office of the IIIrd Army in January 1916, when the spread of typhus was an acute problem, innocent Armenians slated for deportation at Erzican were inoculated with the blood of typhoid fever patients without rendering that blood ‘inactive’. Jeremy Hugh Baron writes : Individual doctors were directly involved in the massacres, having poisoned infants, killed children and issued false certificates of death from natural causes. Nazim's brother-in-law Dr. Tevfik Rushdu, Inspector-General of Health Services, organized the disposal of Armenian corpses with thousands of kilos of lime over six months; he became foreign secretary from 1925 to 1938. (See: Jeremy Hugh Baron, Genocidal Doctors, publish in Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, November, 1999, 92, pp.590-593). The psychiatrist, Robert Jay Lifton, writes in a parenthesis when introducing the crimes of NAZI doctors in his book Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide, Basic Books, (1986) p. xii: (Perhaps Turkish doctors, in their participation in the genocide against the Armenians, come closest, as I shall later suggest). and drowning.
  29. Oscar S. Heizer, the American consul at Trabzon, reports: This plan did not suit Nail Bey .... Many of the children were loaded into boats and taken out to sea and thrown overboard. (See: U.S. National Archives. R.G. 59. 867. 4016/411. April 11, 1919 report.) The Italian consul of Trabzon in 1915, Giacomo Gorrini, writes: I saw thousands of innocent women and children placed on boats which were capsized in the Black Sea. (See: Toronto Globe, August 26, 1915) Hoffman Philip, the American Charge at Constantinople chargé d'affairs, writes: Boat loads sent from Zor down the river arrived at Ana, one thirty miles away, with three fifths of passengers missing. (Cipher telegram, July 12, 1916. U.S. National Archives, R.G. 59.867.48/356.) The Trabzon trials reported Armenians having been drown in the Black Sea. (Takvimi Vekdyi, No. 3616, August 6, 1919, p. 2.)
  30. Ferguson. War of the World p. 177
  31. 1915 declaration
  32. SIXTY-SIXTH CONGRESS. SESS. I. CH. 32. 1919 August 6, 1919. District of Columbia, Near East Relief incorporated.
  33. Balakian. Burning Tigris, pp. 244–245, 314
  34. In his memoirs, Morgenthau noted "When the Turkish authorities gave the orders for these deportations, they were merely giving the death warrant to a whole race; they understood this well, and, in their conversations with me, they made no particular attempt to conceal the fact....I am confident that the whole history of the human race contains no such horrible episode as this. The great massacres and persecutions of the past seem almost insignificant when compared to the sufferings of the Armenian race in 1915."
  35. See, for example, James L. Barton, Turkish Atrocities: Statements of American Missionaries on the Destruction of Christian Communities in Ottoman Turkey, 1915-1917. Gomidas Insttitute, 1998 ISBN 1-8846-3004-9
  36. Balakian. The Burning Tigris, pp. 282-285
  37. The Armenian Genocide. Prod. by Goldberg, Andrew. Two Cats Productions. DVD, 2006
  38. Macmillan, Margaret and Richard Holbrooke. Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World. New York: Random House, 2001 p. 378 ISBN 0-3757-6052-0
  39. Fisk, Robert. The Great War for Civilisation: the Conquest of the Middle East. London: Alfred Knopf, 2005. p. 327 ISBN 1-84115-007-X
  40. Dadrian. History of the Armenian Genocide, p. 228
  41. Dadrian. History of the Armenian Genocide, pp. 228-229
  42. Churchill, Winston. The World Crisis, 1911-1918. London: Free Press, 2005. p. 157
  43. Fisk. Great War for Civilisation, p. 326
  44. Fromkin, David. A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East. New York: Owl, 1989 p. 212 ISBN 0-8050-6884-8
  45. Balakian. Burning Tigris, p. 186
  46. Fromkin. A Peace to End All Peace, p. 213
  47. Ibid. p. 213
  48. Auswärtiges Amt, West German Foreign Office Archives, K170, no. 4674, folio 63, op. cit. in Burning Tigris, p. 186
  49. Ibid, p. 326
  50. Balakian. Burning Tigris, p. 191
  51. Dadrian. History of the Armenian Genocide, p. 349
  52. Dadrian. History of the Armenian Genocide, p. 350
  53. Fisk. Great War for Civilisation, pp. 329-330
  54. Fisk. Great War for Civilisation, p. 331
  55. New York Times Dispatch. Russians Slaughter Turkish III Army: Give No Quarter to Men Held Responsible for the Massacre of Armenians. The New York Times, March 6, 1916.
  56. Türkei By Klaus-Detlev. Grothusen
  57. Sumner, Colin (2003). The Blackwell Companion to Criminology. Blackwell Publishing. pp. p. 74. ISBN 0631220925. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
  58. Fisk. Great War for Civilisation, p. 330
  59. Lochner, Louis P.What About Germany? Dodd, Mead & Company, 1942 pp. 11-12.
  60. Note: numerous versions of the "Armenian quote" have appeared although they differ mostly in linguistics rather than meaning.
  61. Fisk. Great War for Civilisation, p. 330.
  62. Gilbert, Martin. The Holocaust: A History of the Jews of Europe During the Second World War. New York: Henry Holt & Company, 1985 p. 556 ISBN 0-8050-0348-7.
  63. http://www.armeniapedia.org/index.php?title=International_Center_for_Transitional_Justice
  64. Gilles Veinstein, "Trois questions sur un massacre", L’Histoire, no. 187 (April 1995), pp. 40–41.
  65. Jeremy Salt, "The Narrative Gap in Ottoman Armenian History, Middle Eastern Studies, Vol 39, No 1, January 2003 pp 19-36
  66. Erickons, E.J., 2006. Armenian Massacres: New Records Undercut Old Blame. The Middle East Quarterly. Summer 2006, Vol.13, No.3.
  67. Bostom, Andrew. "Dhimmitude and The Doyen", New English Review, November 10, 2006. Retrieved April 26, 2007.
  68. Statement of Professor Bernard Lewis, Princeton University, "Distinguishing Armenian Case from Holocaust", Assembly of Turkish American Associations, April 14, 2002 (PDF)
  69. Getler, Michael. "Documenting and Debating a 'Genocide'", The Ombudsman Column, PBS, April 21, 2006. Retrieved October 9, 2006.
  70. Nouritza Matossian (2005-02-27). "They say 'incident'. To me it's genocide". The Observer. Retrieved 2007-02-24. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  71. BBC News — "Author's trial set to test Turkey" — 14 December 2005
  72. "IPI Deplores Callous Murder of Journalist in Istanbul". International Press Institute. 2007-01-22. Retrieved 2007-01-24.
  73. Obituary: Ayse Nur Zarakolu by Felix Corley, Independent, February 14 2002.
  74. ^ "Minister Oskanian Comments on Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul's Recent Remarks". Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. November 4, 2006. Retrieved 2007-04-23. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  75. The 40 states of the United States recognizing the Armenian Genocide are Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin from the Armenian National Committee of America
  76. "Turkey 'must admit Armenia dead'". British Broadcasting Corporation. December 13 2004. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  77. "French in Armenia 'genocide' row". British Broadcasting Corporation.
  78. "Cyprus government condemns Armenian genocide". Financial Mirror.
  79. "NYC Commemorates 92nd Anniversary of Armenian Genocide". The Knight News. March 29 2007. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  80. Lale Sarıibrahimoğlu (April 14 2007). "Ankara to renew diplomatic action on Armenia". Today's Zaman. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  81. ^ "Harper affirms Cdn position on Armenian Genocide". GlobalTV.
  82. ^ "ARMENIA HOPES RECONSTRUCTION OF SURB KHACH ARMENIAN CHURCH IN TURKEY NOT TO BE SINGLE CASE". ARKA News Agency. March 29 2004. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  83. "Canadian Parliament recognizes Armenian Genocide". Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. April 25 2004. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  84. "Chile Senate recognizes Armenian Genocide". Yerkir. June 7 2007. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  85. ^ "French politicians pass Armenian genocide bill". Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. October 12 2006. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  86. Mariam Harutunian (April 24 2007). "Armenians mark anniversary of 1915 genocide". Middle East Times. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  87. "Recognition and Commemoration of Armenian Genocide". Canadian Senator Serge Joyal P.C., O.C.
  88. Kamer Kasim (October 13 2004). "Armenian Diaspora in Australia". The Journal of Turkish Weekly. Retrieved 2007-04-24. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  89. "Congressman Frank Pallone, Jr. (NJ06) - Pallone Calls on House Republican Leaders to Allow Floor Vote on Armenian Genocide Legislation". Congressman Frank Pallone, Jr. April 28 2004. Retrieved 2007-04-24. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  90. OurArarat.com - "International Affirmation And Recognition Of The Armenian Genocide"
  91. Bundestag resolution
  92. Template:Fr icon legislative file of the French National Assembly; vote tally
  93. "Accusation of an attempt to garner votes". Retrieved 2007-02-07.
  94. http://www.internethaber.com/news_detail.php?id=47327
  95. http://www.zaman.com/?bl=international&trh=20041219&alt=&syf=butun
  96. http://www.panarmenian.net/news/eng/?nid=17162
  97. http://euobserver.com/9/22331/?rk=1 "MEPs back Armenia genocide clause in Turkey report" by Lucia Kubosova, published by EU Observer on 5 September 2006
  98. "Parliament faces crucial enlargement decisions". EurActiv.
  99. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/Europe/5385954.stm
  100. http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=56157
  101. "Turkish to boycott election over Armenian 'genocide'". Expatica News. October 5 2006. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  102. "Turkish politician fined over genocide denial". Swissinfo with agencies. March 9, 2007.
  103. "En el 90.º aniversario del genocidio armenio" (in Spanish). Basque Parliament. 2007-04-27. Retrieved 2007-05-12. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  104. Sarkisyan, Henry (1975). Works of the State History History Museum of Armenia, Vol. IV:Armenian Theme in Russian Medallic Art. Yerevan: Hayastan. p. 136.
  105. Line Abrahamian. "Talking With Turks and Armenians About the Genocide". Reader's Digest Canada. Retrieved 2007-04-23.

External links

Bibliography

  • Akçam, Taner, From Empire to Republic: Turkish Nationalism and the Armenian Genocide, Zed Books, 2004
  • Akçam, Taner. A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility. Metropolitan Books, 2006
  • Balakian, Peter. The Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America's Response. New York: Perennial, 2003
  • Bartov, Omer, Mirrors of Destruction: War, Genocide and Modern Identity, Oxford Univ. Press, 2000
  • Dadrian, Vahakn, N. The History of the Armenian Genocide: Ethnic Conflict from the Balkans to Anatolia to the Caucasus Berghahn Books, 1995
  • Dündar, Fuat, Ittihat ve Terakki'nin Müslümanlari Iskan Politikasi (1913-18), Iletisim, 2001
  • Fisk, Robert, The Great War for Civilisation: the Conquest of the Middle East London: Alfred Knopf, 2005
  • Gaunt, David. Massacres, Resistance, Protectors: Muslim-Christian Relations in Eastern Anatolia During World War I Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2006. ISBN 1-59333-301-3.
  • Gust, Wolfgang, Der Völkermord an den Armeniern, Zu Klampen, 2005
  • Lepsius, Johannes. Deutschland und Armenien 1914–1918, Sammlung diplomatischer Aktenstücke. Donat & Temmen Verlag, 1986
  • Melson, Robert, Revolution and Genocide. On the Origins of the Armenian Genocide and the Holocaust, The University of Chicago Press, 1996
  • Power, Samantha. "A Problem from Hell": America and the Age of Genocide. Harper, 2003
  • Wallimann, Isidor (ed.): Genocide and the Modern Age: Etiology and Case Studies of Mass Death, Syracuse Univ. Press, 2000
  • Graber, G.S. Caravans to Oblivion: The Armenian Genocide 1915. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1996
  • "The Armenian Genocide: A Bibliography". University of Michigan, Dearborn: Armenian Research Center. Retrieved March 18. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
  • Walker, Christopher J. Armenia: The Survival of a Nation, Revised Second Edition. New York, NY: St. Martin's Press, 1990. 476 pp.

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