Die von den USA und Russland vorangetriebene und von der Schweiz vermittelte Unterzeichnung der beiden Protokolle löste in Armenien und der armenischen Diaspora – also bei mindestens zwei Dritteln der armenischen Weltbevölkerung – heftige Kritik, Proteste und Befürchtungen aus. Die internationale Berichterstattung aber geriet vor lauter Freude über den angeblichen diplomatischen Erfolg völlig aus dem Häuschen, was zur Begriffsverwirrung führte: Ohne dass Erfolge in den armenisch-türkischen Beziehungen bisher greifbar wurden – messbar etwa an der noch immer nicht vollzogenen Grenzöffnung seitens der Türkei, ihrer Bereitschaft zur Vergangenheitsaufarbeitung und zur Anerkennung des bisher hartnäckig geleugneten Genozids an den osmanischen Christen – war von Normalisierung, ja Aussöhnung zwischen den beiden ungleichen Staaten die Rede. Die Medieneuphorie erscheint deshalb ebenso vorschnell wie die Verleihung des Friedensnobelpreises an den US-Präsiden B. Obama.
Denn Aussöhnung unter den Nachfahren von Opfern und Tätern setzt die Verurteilung des Verbrechens und damit dessen psychologischen Abschluss voraus. Doch die türkische Justiz hat soeben die Zulässigkeit der strafrechtlichen Verfolgung des Literaturnobelpreisträgers Pamuk Orhan für seine Erwähnung von Massentötungen an Armeniern und Kurden zugelassen (wobei P. Orhan in seinem Interview von 2005 nicht einmal das G-Wort verwendete).
Die türkisch-armenischen Protokolle stellen die „unparteiliche Prüfung“ der gemeinsamen Geschichte und damit auch implizit des Genozids an 1,5 Millionen Armeniern im Osmanischen Reich in Aussicht. Die nachgeschobenen Bekundungen der armenischen Regierung, dass es bei dieser Prüfung gleichwohl zu keinem Revisionismus kommen werde, erinnern an das Gedankenexperiment des österreichischen Physikers Erwin Schrödinger aus dem Jahr 1935. Doch was in der Quantenmechanik theoretisch funktionieren mag – eine dem Experiment mit einem zerfallenden Atomkern im geschlossenen Raum ausgesetzte Katze ist zugleich tot und lebendig, da und nicht da – das wird in der internationalen Genozidrealität Völkermörder in ihrer Überzeugung stärken, dass sich das größte aller Verbrechen auszahlt, weil man damit in aller Regel davon kommt.
Die Erklärungen des türkischen Regierungschefs sowie des armenischen Staatsoberhaupts lassen zudem erkennen, dass beide ihre festen Ansichten über die Geschichte bereits besitzen und sich keineswegs von unparteilichen Kommissionen davon abbringen lassen wollen: Erdoğan ist fest überzeugt, dass es kein einziges Dokument gibt, das den Völkermord an den Armeniern beweist. Und sollte dennoch je eine Kommission zu anderen Ergebnissen gelangen, werde das seine Meinung nie ändern können. Serge Sargsjan ist ebenso fest überzeugt, dass die Armenier 1915 Völkermord und sogar einen „Patrizid“ erlitten haben (was immer das in Hinblick auf eine juristische Bewertung darstellt). Da die vereinbarte Kommission nicht aus Historikern, sondern Regierungsvertretern zusammengesetzt sein soll, fragt man sich, wie eine überparteiliche Wahrheitsfindung unter derartigen Voraussetzungen erfolgen kann.
Schrödingers Katze vermag im Niemandsland der theoretischen Spekulation zu überleben (und gleichzeitig zu sterben). Juristische Sachverhalte sind auf diese Weise nicht klärbar. Ein Genozid bildet nicht gleichzeitig ein Verbrechen und doch kein Verbrechen.
Aus der Flut von Protesten und Kommentaren haben wir vier ausgewählt: Den Brief des Präsidenten der International Association of Genocide Scholars vom 8.10. an Erdogan und Sargsjan, in dem er (erfolglos) daran erinnert, dass die „unparteiliche Geschichtskommission“ von der Anerkennung des Völkermordes an den Armeniern ausgehen müsse. Der Offene Brief des armenischen Präsidenten „an alle Armenier“ vom 10.10.2009 macht deutlich, dass S. Sargsjan die postgenozidale türkisch-armenische Normalisierung mit Schrödingers Katze verwechselt. Der in den USA geborene und aufgewachsene Raffi Hovannisian war der erste Außenminister (1990/91) des postsowjetischen Armenien; als oppositioneller Abgeordneter der armenischen Nationalversammlung und Führer der oppositionellen „Erbe“-Partei brachte er 2007 einen Antrag auf Anerkennung Berg-Karabachs durch Armenien ein. In seinem Offenen Brief an das armenische Volk vom 12.10.2009 drückt R. Hovannisian unter anderem seine Besorgnis um die negativen Auswirkungen der „Normalisierungs“-Politik auf Berg-Karabach aus. In Anspielung auf das Theorem der Genozidforschung, wonach die Leugnung die letzte Phase des Völkermords bilde, hat der US-Wissenschaftler Henry Theriault seinen am 11.10. veröffentlichten Aufsatz betitelt: „Die letzte Phase des Genozids – Konsolidierung“. In diesen Genuss kommen allerdings nur die Nachfolger der Täter.
Henry Theriault: The Final Stage of Genocide: Consolidation
“The Armenian Weekly”, October 11, 2009
This essay is an analysis of the Turkish-Armenian protocol process in relation to the Armenian Genocide. I say “protocol process” because mere analysis of the protocols themselves cannot be meaningful. The protocols exist within a complex historical, cultural, political, and geopolitical context dominated by genocide and its aftermath. It is impossible to interpret accurately the meaning of particular elements of the protocols without reference to that context.
Before I offer my analysis, I must point out that there has emerged a certain conceptual muddle in recent self-declared “objective” or “rational” evaluations of the protocols. I am especially concerned by Asbed Kotchikian’s neutralist analysis and David Davidian’s claimed “rational” analysis, both of which dismiss much of the recent diasporan discourse on the protocols that challenges their value and legitimacy (Kotchikian, “The Armenian-Turkish Protocols and Public (Dis)Content,” Armenian Weekly On-line, October 4, 2009, and Davidian, “Turkish-Armenian Protocols: Reality and Irrationality,” Armenian Weekly On-line, October 1, 2009). The conceptual muddle is this: Neutrality is not inherently objectivity and dispassion is not inherently rationality. In fact, neutrality itself is a position that can be biased or irrational, if the facts and logic call for taking a position one way or another on an issue. Furthermore, a person who chooses to advocate a position in strong terms is not by that fact automatically biased or irrational. Rationality—logic—is a form of thought in which reasons are given in support of a claim. Far from it being illogical to take a position on an issue, reasonable people have a moral responsibility to take positions if the facts and reason warrant doing so. The question of rationality is simply the question of whether one provides reasoning (facts and logical connection of the facts to the position advocated) to support one’s position. Unequivocal advocacy of a position, no matter how “all or nothing” (to quote Davidian), is not inherently irrational. A viewpoint is non-rational if it is not supported by logically connected reasons in support of the position or supported by facts that are not convincingly connected to the position advocated. A position is irrational if it contradicts or culpably ignores known evidence and the logical connections of that evidence to the question at hand. While of course there are irrational and biased individuals in any large group, overall, the numerous dissenting Armenian voices rejecting the protocols present rational arguments based on factual evidence for rejection. While one might challenge the logic and dispute the claimed facts, the fact that some rational people disagree with rejection of the protocols does not mean that those who reject them are irrational.
Perhaps with some dramatic irony, in his own thinking Davidian himself presents us with a very good example of irrationality. In the opening sections of his piece, he states that if Armenia chooses to reject international pressure to “discuss historical issues” (read: discuss whether a genocide happened) with Turkey, then the situation will be analogous to Slobodan Milosevic’s refusal to stop “ethnic cleansing” (does Davidian mean in 1995 in Bosnia or in 1999 in Kosovo?) because he believed (most genocide perpetrators, as contemporaneous genocide deniers, do) that the Serbs “didn’t start it.” Davidian points out that Serbs were bombed and were foolish not to yield to the pressure as Armenia appears poised to. Thus, Armenians today would be irrational not to cave to the international pressure being applied to them. But, an analogy is the presentation of a situation, argument, or event (1) that is emotionally, politically, culturally, etc., neutral for the author/speaker and/or his/her audience and (2) that has strong relevant structural similarities to a situation, argument, or event to which the author/speaker and/or audience have emotional, political, cultural, etc., connections to. The goal is to allow dispassionate analysis of the latter situation, in order to see things that proximity and emotion obscure. An analogy depends on the structural similarity between the things analogized. But Davidian is comparing (1) a post-genocidal victim state and society that have attempted to engage the international community, including Turkey, on the past genocide (though of course not in the way the perpetrator, committed to denial, would like) with (2) a perpetrator state actively engaged in an act of genocide and organized around pathological rationalization of that genocide despite legitimate international objection to and pressure against it. That Davidian finds it logically valid to liken the situation of the Armenian state and society today to Serbia at the time it was committing genocide does not call into question the rationality of Armenian resistance to pressure for the protocols but to Davidian’s own pretentions to logical analysis. When the issue is negotiation over the truth about a genocide, by definition the logical positioning of a state that is heir to a victim society cannot be analogous to the positioning of a perpetrator state. To suggest that Armenia would face military force for not signing the protocols in the way that Serbia faced bombing because it was participating in genocide makes no sense. Indeed, the real lesson regarding Serbia is that a state can do much more against international pressure than Armenia is doing—indeed, participate in a genocide for three years—without being subjected to any meaningful outside intervention for quite awhile, which is the opposite message from what Davidian suggests.
Let me qualify this somewhat. A victim state cannot be analogized to a perpetrator state in so far as the former is a victim state. If Armenia were to commit a genocide itself, then this would be the basis of an analogy between it and Serbia. In addition, if a particular individual or group within Armenia adopted a denialist position and agenda similar to that in Turkey, there could be some kind of analogy based on this as well. But this is not what Davidian is claiming.
Now to the analysis. It has become a truism that “denial is the final stage of genocide.” Greg Stanton, the former president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, for instance, asserts this in his stage theory of genocide. But, as with many truisms, this one is false. That denial is present long after a genocide does not mean that denial is the final stage of a genocide. Denial is present at many stages of a genocide. With very few exceptions, denials are issued by perpetrators while they are committing genocide. Denials are typically offered immediately after a genocide to prevent accountability of individual perpetrators as well as the perpetrator society. One need only look at the court transcripts of trials of Rwanda or Bosnia Genocide perpetrators to confirm this. And, denials are offered in the long-term aftermath of a genocide to cover up the historical facts. The motives for this include such things as the desperate desire to preserve the legitimacy of an ideology and linked sense of group identity in the face of exposure of the genocidal nature of that ideology, the desire to prevent reparations in terms of land and/or wealth, and a sense of shame among members of the perpetrator society that is not coupled with a moral commitment to rectify the impact of the past. Given this, denial is dominant in the long-term aftermath of genocide, but it is an instrument for deeper goals. The last stage of genocide is consolidation of the gains of the genocide. In this stage, the perpetrator group tries to establish the results of the genocide as the status quo, rather than a persisting violation requiring rectification. It uses denial as a tool, because if deniers convince enough people that a genocide did not happen or is doubtful, then these people will see the existing post-genocidal state of affairs as legitimate. They will see the small population of the victims, their political weakness, their cultural tenuousness, their relative poverty, and so forth as the natural result of an uneventful history. If a perpetrator society can effectively deny the past genocide, it will succeed in keeping what the direct perpetrators gained for it. To the credit of Stanton and others who view denial as the last stage of genocide, it is typically the dominant activity of the perpetrators in the long-term aftermath of genocide. What is more, even when the possibility of material rectification is lessened, the perpetrators or their progeny typically aggressive seek to cover up even the knowledge of the genocide, to achieve full erasure of its victims and full validation of the perpetrators such that they do not even pay a moral price for the past. Such figures as Elie Wiesel and Israel Charny have commented on this attempted final conceptual erasure.
But, sometimes denial fails to change perceptions of history or at least to produce a stalemate in which the issue is viewed as a perpetual and irresolvable conflict between two parties over history, which is a victory for perpetrators in so far as they are allowed to keep the material, political, ideological, and cultural gains of the genocide for the foreseeable future. In such a case, denial has become ineffective, but consolidation is still the goal. The perpetrator state will seek to consolidate the gains of the genocide in question by some other means.
This is precisely what we are seeing with the new protocols. Denial has failed the Turkish state, and until April 2009 the pressure was mounting to deal with the legacy of the Armenian Genocide in a meaningful manner. That pressure had intensified especially over the past two years through the challenges posed by activists, journalists, and intellectuals inside Turkey after the Hrant Dink assassination shocked morally-grounded members of Turkish society with the genocidal anti-Armenianism that had previously been rationalized by their government or hidden from their view. The stage was set for the kind of real transformation in Turkey that can be the only path toward a genuine improvement in Armenian-Turkish relations.
The protocols are the last-ditch response by the Turkish government to protect and solidify the gains of the genocide. Through them, Turkey has gone from the brink of required justice to a potential victory deniers could only dream of three decades ago. What the protocols do is achieve agreement from the putative representative of the victim community that the perpetrator’s successor state and society will never have to give up the land gained through the genocide nor make any material restitution for the horrific suffering imposed on the victim community, which still reverberates today. What the protocols ensure is that the weak and poor Armenia produced by the genocide will become the permanent state of Armenians, while the increased power, prestige, land, wealth, and ideological security the Turkish state and society gained through genocide will remain its. In other words, the protocols finish the Armenian Genocide as successfully as the pro-genocidal segment of today’s Turkey ever could have hoped. The protocols are the last stage of the Armenian Genocide, the successful completion of the Armenian Genocide.
It is telling that an important element of the protocols is the reinsertion of denial of the Armenian Genocide as a credible position by agreement of the Armenian government itself. This is the meaning of the provision for a historical commission to study the mutual history of the two protocol partners. Denial is the official position of the Turkish government and clearly the starting position for their participation in such a commission. The fact that the protocols do not specify that the commission will consider the issue of “the Armenian Genocide” shows that Turkey wants to maintain this position. Given that its government and academic leaders know full well a genocide occurred, there is no reason Turkey would not just admit the genocide if it were not intent on maintaining denial. As Roger Smith, the former president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars and current chair of the Academic Board of Directors of the Zoryan Institute, states in his Sept. 30 letter to Armenian President Sarkisian, Turkey would even be bound by its own laws to reject a finding of genocide by this historical commission. Of course, it is unlikely that the commission’s membership will be constituted in such a way as to allow that result to emerge–we are sure to see Turkey insist on deniers as members of the commission. In this way, the denial campaign that has faltered and been widely discredited will be relegitimized within the process that has resulted from the denial’s failure in the first place. The irony is thick here.
For Armenians to acquiesce in this is not merely to betray the memories of those who died and those who survived. It is not merely to accept one of the great grand larcenies of history and the debilitating poverty that has resulted. It is to accept the permanence of the destruction of Armenian political, social, cultural, and economic life, rather than receive the rehabilitative rectification that world ethical and legal principles unequivocally recognize as the victims’ desperate need and right.
Davidian and others argue that Armenia and Armenians have no choice and should try to get what they can in the face of this inevitable destruction. But, if, as many in Armenia and outside have argued, Armenia’s survival depends on some rectification of the genocide that continues to impact it materially, geopolitically, etc., then acquiescing is dangerous self-delusion. It is yet another instance of Armenians in a desperate situation giving up and embracing a thoughtless, irrational faith that those who have done them great harm in the past and present will somehow suddenly change utterly and things will work out. It is the mentality of the beaten, the destroyed, the resigned. It is the mentality that Armenian Genocide survivors rejected despite the horrific suffering they experienced. Can we do less now?
Davidian claims that the geopolitical realities of Armenia’s existence preclude it “from engaging in zero sum inanity, such as demanding an all-or-nothing state of affairs.” The idea is that realism should replace ethical principle as the basis of Armenian decision-making. But, given the history with Turkey, given its clear intentions and absolute lack of repentance for the Armenian Genocide to the point where it cannot even recognize the genocide in the interest of negotiating better relations with Armenia, it would be truly “inane” to enter into an agreement that depends on Turkey working with Armenia in good faith. It is not just that it is wrong to trade recognition of the Armenian Genocide for some short-term economic benefit (which might prove illusory anyway); the trade cannot work by its very nature. The fact that the perpetrator successor state remains committed to denial of the genocide and thus to the acceptability of genocide as a tool against Armenians makes it impossible for it to enter a productive relationship with Armenia and Armenians. So long as the Turkish state and society remain unrepentant for the genocide, Armenians have no choice but to require an all-or-nothing state of affairs regarding the Armenian Genocide. It is Turkish denial and approval of genocide that forces Armenians into this position.
Contrary to Davidian’s assertion, such an all-or-nothing ethics-based approach that rejects coercion by the pressure of “interests” and power is anything but irrational. We need look no further than Plato’s Republic and Gorgias to see advocacy of ethical principle over realpolitik by a thinker universally recognized as one of the most rational in human history. Of course, those who understand how social movements really work, how they succeed, will recognize this all-or-nothing strategy as quite practical, and not only because the squeaky wheel gets the oil or because pressing such demands pushes the compromise point of the negotiation further toward the goals of that squeaky wheel. It wasn’t those who accepted segregation because it was backed by tremendous political, cultural, social, and military power whose view of race relations changed the United States; it was Malcolm X’s and Martin Luther King’s all-or-nothing challenges. India was not freed from the British because Gandhi compromised with the British, but because he asserted an all-or-nothing requirement for independence and dignity. What is striking about these examples—and many others from history–is that these all-or-nothing demands came from positions of great material, political, and military weakness and yet still succeeded because of the moral strength of the position of the “weak” vis-a-vis the “strong.” Moral legitimacy is a great force in geopolitics and is the reliable ally of the weak, oppressed, and marginalized. It is the force that those committed to power politics, realpolitik, fear so desperately that they incessantly mock it as if whistling in the dark, ridiculing those who believe in it in the hope that they will stop believing and thus be tricked into giving up the most powerful tool of change. It is Armenia’s one advantage today, and the present leadership, through unhistorical, naive “realpolitical” calculations of the web of power and interests around them, are about to squander it.
* Henry Theriault is a Professor of Philosophy at Worcester State College.
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Raffi Hovannisian: An Open Letter to the Armenian Nation: Protocols and Preconditions
“The Armenian Weekly” October 12, 2009
By Raffi K. Hovannisian
The history of the Armenian people has been an ordeal of suffering, tragedy, and genocide. In this millennial series of misfortunes, however, never has the nation invited destruction upon itself. But today it stands at the brink, with a small group of improperly elected leaders apparently racing toward a forsaking of both identity and interest.
With the stroke of a pen, the Armenian president and his foreign minister have crossed the line of danger and dignity; in Zurich, Switzerland on Oct. 10, they resigned from a long-standing national quest to preserve the fundamental rights, security, and integrity of an ancient land and its native heirs.
The signing of the two diplomatic “protocols” between Armenia and Turkey might indeed constitute the latest entry in the ledger of crimes committed, and covered up, against the Armenian nation.
Core values are not commodities
As a servant of the Armenian nation, reflecting both prior office and present opposition, I am appalled by this latest offense. As an Armenian citizen, for many years denied that honor by successive authorities, I ache as the soul of our nation is traded away for illusory promises of “goodwill” and “open borders” with Turkey. Our vital values, from our collective responsibility as heirs of the genocide to our individual expression of liberty and belonging, are not commodities. That unrequited murderous conception of 1915—the original plan to drive to extinction the Armenian people, the Armenian homeland, and so the Armenian species—is one of the principal sources of our modern identity, just as its equitable resolution is the anchor of our future national security.
This is duplicity, not diplomacy
What will “open borders,” a courtesy commonly extended at no cost to all civilized nations, cost the Armenians? Of course every Armenian seeks peace, prosperity, and good neighborly relations. But what we have in these protocols is only an expensive illusion of them.
The ends, generally stated, are sound: Open borders and normal diplomatic relations among neighbors are pure and prudent goals. But the means we use must be as pure and prudent as the ends we seek. Unfortunately, the secretive diplomatic process launched by the Armenian and Turkish administrations is defective at the fundaments, sourced as they are in bloody soil, where a pronounced asymmetry of power survives to this day.
First, the protocols stipulate that Armenia relinquish its lawful historic rights and extend an unlimited de jure recognition of Turkey’s de facto borders, which were drawn and defined on the very basis of the eradication and violent dispossession of the Armenian people from its ancestral heartland. In so doing they demand, and have received, the Armenian presidency’s endorsement of that fantastic crime against humanity which has deprived generations of Armenians of its civilization, heritage, and patrimony.
Second, the protocols entail a joint condemnation of terrorism, yet fail to include any corresponding renunciation of the broader criminal outrage of genocide.
Third, the protocols impose a requirement for a “dialogue on the historical dimension” of relations. This measure, representing a unilateral attempt at imprisoning the Armenian genocide in a bilateral echo chamber, not only challenges the untouchable veracity of the genocide, but secures the complicity of the Armenian state in absolving Turkey of any responsibility for its genocidal actions.
Once these terms are brought to life, absolutely little will remain of the legitimate expectation to secure Turkey’s and the world’s reaffirmation of and redemption for the genocide. Turkey will forever deflect and delay liabilities for its genocidal acts by leveraging the infinite and inconclusive nature of the bilateral “dialogue.” Normalization or not, these protocols move us not one inch toward reconciliation, that pure and total communion based on the truth—a brave recognition of all aspects of shared Turkish-Armenian history, including the great genocide and national dispossession of the Armenian people.
The protocols in the proper perspective
In all the pomp and circumstance of diplomatic “breakthroughs,” we cannot forget that the burden of “normalization” rests, as it always has rested, with the Turkish republic. The decisions to close the border with Armenia and to withhold normal diplomatic relations—violations, both, of all viable international norms—were decisions that Turkey made and realized on its own. Hence, each of the Turkish “concessions” reflected in the protocols represents only the most basic minimum commitment of a decent and civilized country. Turkey’s bare and stated readiness to open borders and normalize relations—the extent of its responsibilities in the framework of the protocols—is, therefore, a non-event. No international initiative should have been necessary for those moves. And that Turkey has made that determination now—only after accepting the sacrifice of an entire nation—deserves not praise but continued skepticism in the substance behind its diplomatic flourishes, whether they relate to the European Union or broader geopolitical objectives.
From protocols to parliaments
Now that the Armenian and Turkish sides have signed these protocols, the second stage, of ratification, is set for the parliaments at Yerevan and Ankara.
Regrettably, dispensing with a parliament’s traditional role of advice and consent in the foreign policy of state, the executives have imposed a prohibition on amending or altering these protocols in any way. While this stands in clear contradiction with democratic standards and practices, it also denies the public and its members in each country the right to exercise or engage their opinions in this process. This extraordinary methodology flies in the face of customary diplomatic practice, which calls for the establishment of official relations through a simple exchange of notes.
The scheme here is plain, perfectly tailored, and aimed at tying down for good history’s loose ends. Soon the Armenian National Assembly, too, will be called upon to bear complicit responsibility in giving legislative validation nearly 90 years after the fact to the illegal Bolshevik-Kemalist pacts which crowned the genocidal process and sought to seal the fate of the Armenian nation.
What is more, not content with pursuing this official acceptance of Turkey’s long-standing occupation of the Armenian homeland, its leaders will continue audaciously to abuse every turn of the ratification process in order to deflect their own culpability by linking implementation of the protocols and lifting of the Turkish blockade with what they pitch as the “occupied territories of Azerbaijan.”
Clearly, that would be a disingenuous and inapposite reference to the freedom-loving people of Mountainous Karabagh, its odds-defying liberation and constitutional decolonization from the Turco-Stalinist legacy, and its resultant territorial integrity.
In the final analysis, Armenian and Turkish citizens have been refused both voice and choice in determining the outcome of an immensely significant process that will forge the future course of both countries. This is especially distressing, because on the judgments to be made in the coming weeks and months shall turn the fate of generations to come—and their imperative to face history, remember collectively, and bridge in earnest the great Turkish-Armenian divide.
Oct. 12, 2009
Yerevan
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Address of the President of Armenia to the people of the Republic of Armenia and to all Armenians
A1+
06:25 pm | October 10, 2009 | Politics
Dear compatriots:
For the past several months the attention of Armenia and the Armenians worldwide was focused on the ongoing process of the normalization of the Armenian-Turkish relations and in particular the two initialled Protocols. All parts and layers of the Armenian nation answered our call to open a public debate on the documents and engaged in it. We saw a new strong wave of a debate over the smaller and bigger issues which concern Armenia and the Armenians.
The debate included a large variety of issues not related to the Armenian-Turkish negotiations but concerning the whole Armenian nation. This process caused and triggered a new, engaged discussion on the place and the role of Armenia and the Armenians, the present and the future of Armenia and the Armenians. As a result, the world saw and understood that, when it comes to the normalization of the Armenian-Turkish relations, they have to deal not just with Armenia with its three million population, but with the ten million Armenians. And let no one ignore the fact that, contrary to any slogans, the Armenian nation is united in its goals and is strong with its sons and daughters. And let no one try to split Armenia and our brothers and sisters in the Diaspora in presenting their concern over the future of Armenia as an attempt to impose something on the Republic Armenia.
My fellow compatriots,
The historic destine of our nation has many times been focuses on the directive of searching wise exits of the most complex situations. We have only succeeded when we pragmatically assessed the current challenges and took appropriate actions. Today we also find ourselves in a similar position. In order to build and consolidate our statehood we, in our collective identity, need to demonstrate adequate thinking and action.
Today, we are trying to put on a normal track the relations with a country where, under the Ottoman rule, our nation fell victim to the policy of patricide and genocide. The scars of the Genocide do not heal. And the memory of our martyrs and future of our generations dictates to have solid and stable state, powerful and prosperous country, a country which is the rebirth of the dreams of the whole Armenian nation. One of the significant steps along that road is having normal relations with all our neighbors, including Turkey. Independence dictates the will and determination to take responsible decisions; it dictates pragmatism and forward-looking sustained work. That is the road I have selected. I have done it with the strong understanding of the historical reality and a strong belief in the future of our people.
There is no alternative to the establishment of the relations with Turkey without any precondition. It is the dictate of the time. It is not this need that is being debated today. The concern of individuals and some political forces is caused by the different interpretation of certain provisions contained in the Protocols and their historic mistrust towards Turkey.
Having realistically assessed these circumstances and being convinced in the necessity and correctness of the steps undertaken, I insist on the following:
1. No relations with Turkey can question the reality of the patricide and the genocide perpetrated against the Armenian nation. It is a known fact and it should be recognized and condemned by the whole progressive humanity. The relevant sub-commission to be established under the intergovernmental commission, is not a commission of historians.
2. The issue of the existing border between Armenia and Turkey is to be resolved through prevailing norms of the international law. The Protocols do not go beyond that.
3. These relations cannot and do not relate to the resolution of the Nagorno Karabagh conflict, which is an independent and separate process. Armenian does not regard the clause of the territorial integrity and inviolability of the borders contained in the Protocols as in any way related to the Nagorno Karabagh problem.
4. The Armenian side will give an adequate reaction if Turkey protracts the process of ratification or raises conditions for it. Armenia undertakes no unilateral commitments though these Protocols and does not make any unilateral affirmations. Armenia is signing these Protocols in order to create basis for the establishment of normal relations between our two countries. Hence, if Turkey fails to ratify the Protocols within a reasonable timeframe and does not implement all the clauses contained herein within the provided timeframe or violates them in the future, Armenia will immediately take appropriate steps as stipulated by the international law. Dear compatriots, in addressing you I want to emphasize that today, more than ever our people should stand united; we should have capability of maturing our collective identity to life in the reality of statehood. That is our road to the future.
The signing of the Protocols will be followed by stages of their ratification and implementation. All the concerns and possible threats which were so widely expressed in the course of the debate will be taken into careful consideration and we shall be able to prevent any development that might contradict our national interest. Today, I am more than convinced that we will succeed. And we will do that together, all of us, the Armenians. Today we are not the same we were only a few months ago. And it is a fact from now on. I have confidence in the wisdom of our people. I have confidence that together we shall hand down a prosperous and peaceful motherland to our generation. It will definitely be so. And may God be with us!
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IAGS President to Sarkisian, Erdogan: Acknowledgement Must Be First Step
“The Armenian Weekly”, October 12, 2009
On Oct. 8, William Schabas, the president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS), addressed an open letter to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Armenian President Serge Sarkisian, in which he said: “Acknowledgement of the Armenian Genocide must be the starting point of any ‘impartial historical commission,’ not one of its possible conclusions.”
Below is the full text of the letter, acquired by the Armenian Weekly.
Dear Prime Minister Erdogan and President Sarkisian,
The proposed protocols between Armenia and Turkey call for an “impartial historical commission” to investigate what the world knows as the Armenian Genocide of 1915.
As the leading scholarly organization engaged in the study of genocide, we welcome continued investigation that will enhance our understanding of the 1915 massacres. However, we are extremely wary of any call for allegedly impartial research into what are clearly established historical facts.
Acknowledgement of the Armenian Genocide must be the starting point of any “impartial historical commission,” not one of its possible conclusions. The world would not accept an inquiry into the truth of the Nazi Holocaust, or the extermination of the Tutsi in Rwanda, and nor can it do so with the genocide of the Armenians.
William Schabas,
President, International Association of Genocide Scholars
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