Death of an Editor Offers Glimpse into the Armenian Genocide
By Loren Olson ‘08
News Staff Reporter
Twenty-five days ago, a seventeen-year-old halfway around the globe was arrested and charged with murder. This event might have been another unremarkable act of violence—unfortunate but commonplace—had the target of the teen’s crime not been the editor Hrant Dink. His paper, Agos, was the sole Armenian-Turkish newspaper printed in Turkey. At this point, I am sure that you have already dismissed—or are about to dismiss—these words and put down the paper. Perhaps you are thinking (quite jadedly) “That’s the Middle East for you.” That blanket statement, however, diverts our attentions from exploring what lies beneath one editor’s story. Hrant Dink’s assassination affords us a rare window into Turkey’s cultural and political workings, and a chance to better understand the perpetuation of genocide.
It is too easy to attribute Mr. Dink’s murder to simple terrorism; perpetrated, perhaps, with the specific goal of destabilizing Turkey’s already-problematic journey towards European Union membership. It is important to note, however, that Armenian-born Hrant Dink, apart from remaining under close nationalist supervision, was serving a suspended six-month sentence for having repeatedly criticized the Turkish government’s official (but as Dink argued, deliberately inaccurate) recounting of the Armenian Genocide. Although international interest in his assassination brings Mr. Dink’s story to Choate, he is not the only Turk worthy of widespread attention; another courageous Turkish intellectual, Orhan Pamuk, has also recently brought the Turkish version of the genocide into question. Pamuk, winner of the 2006 Nobel Prize for literature, finds acclaim and popularity everywhere but in his own country. And in light of the Hrant Dink slaying, Pamuk’s plight has begun to gain the press attention and political significance that it deserves.
Though Pamuk has only recently come into the media’s eye, his rocky relationship with the government of Turkey is surprisingly deep-rooted; indeed, it has been developing for over a decade, beginning in 1995 when he gave public and outspoken support for Kurdish political rights. During that time, the Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan—which has been identified by the EU and UN as a secessionist terrorist organization—was engaged in a civil war with Turkey in the hopes of creating an independent Kurdish state. In the midst of the open warfare, Turkish forces often evacuated and destroyed Kurdish villages in the countryside, displacing some 378,000 people.
Because he identified with Turkey’s political enemies, Pamuk was tried among a group of authors who had also written essays criticizing the Turkish treatment of the Kurds—an event that, though surprising to us, was hardly out of the ordinary in a country where freedom of the press is not guaranteed. Not only are Turks unable to write and print freely, as we do; they are even prohibited to make honest comments about their government. Indeed, a new penal code introduced June of 2005 included the following:
“A person who, being a Turk, explicitly insults the Republic of Turkish Grand National Assembly, shall be imposed to [sic] a penalty of imprisonment for a term of six months to three years.”
Though he was despised by his government, Orhan Pamuk enjoyed moderate support from his countrymen—that is, until his fatal interview with the Swiss publication Das Magazin in February of 2005. In his statement, Pamuk stated that “Thirty thousand Kurds and a million Armenians were killed in these lands and nobody dares to talk about it.”
Following the interview’s publication, Pamuk was summoned on criminal charges by two Turkish professional associations and subjected to a hate campaign so virulent that he was forced to flee Turkey. While the private charges were dropped, the Turkish government retroactively charged Pamuk with having violated the penal code mentioned above. The situation was hardly ameliorated when, after the prosecution had begun, Pamuk reiterated the taboo statement that had already provoked severe public and government scrutiny: “I repeat, I said loud and clear that one million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds were killed in Turkey.”
This speech, made at an award ceremony in Germany, only further inflamed his government and many Turkish citizens. Pamuk’s books, though not as politically controversial as their author, were stripped from shelves and burned. Only following international outcry, including a reassessment of Turkey’s proposed entry into the European Union, were the charges dropped on a technicality.
It may come as surprising to us that a mere statement like the one made by Pamuk can result in such national uproar and evoke the same level of government wrath as Pamuk’s did. But considering the lengths in recent years that the Turkish government has gone to suppress recognition of the Armenian genocide, Pamuk’s persecution was no less than guaranteed. The UN defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.” During World War I, the Young Turk government of Ottoman Turkey organized and carried out the forced deportation of the Armenian people to Syria, where they were starved, tortured, and even massacred. Between 1915 and 1923, the bulk of the Armenian population was completely decimated. Although many countries recognized the atrocities as genocide and there still remai many living witnesses, the Republic of Turkey has adamantly denied the charge and dismisses all evidence as mere allegation. Rather, the government claims that sectional fighting and starvation—and not government-organized mass execution—were the culprits. Failure to recognize the genocide not only denies the pain of the survivors’ descendents; it also hurts the world audience.
At our school, we have the privilege of reading history textbooks that criticize our government. Jackson’s organized massacre of the Indians who hindered his planned westward expansion is neither denied nor glamorized. However, many countries do not have that privilege. In Japan, for example, recent ‘revisionist history’ has removed the rape of Nanjing from student’s textbooks. “Interesting,” many will say, “but how does this concern us here at Choate?” Most governments, in an attempt to conceal their worst acts, will hide genocide and diminish its horrors. The atrocities are made almost unreal to the people; and the longer a country is denied the truth, the easier it becomes to deny past genocide—and increasingly difficult to loathe in the same way that victims would. Once it is out of sight and out of popular awareness, genocide is allowed to perpetuate elsewhere. Only in full disclosure may the detestable cycle of genocide be ended.
Clearly, we have not learned from the past, for the events in Darfur have been unfolding unabated for years. So what can we do here at Choate, thousands of miles away and consumed by our own problems? By keeping updated on news as ephemeral as Orhan Pamuk’s Nobel Prize or Hrant Dink’s assassination, we can recognize the direness of ongoing genocides and increase our awareness of the suffering of others. While we loudly complain about how hard it is to be a teenager or a student at Choate, there are others suffering in silence. As future leaders, it is our duty to stay informed, so that we may one day have the knowledge to prevent history from repeating itself.
