The ‘genocide’ controversy
Turkey grows more isolated in denial of what happened to Armenians
As Friday’s centennial of the Ottoman slaughter of Armenians approaches, the Turkish government has offered condolences to descendants of those killed but persists in denying that the massacres constituted genocide.
But Ankara is increasingly isolated in that view. In recent days some influential holdouts, including Germany, Austria and the Vatican, have called the campaign of terror that took as many as 1.5 million Armenian lives the first genocide of the 20th century.
Even President Obama, who has refrained from using the word in deference to modern-day Turkey’s strategic importance as a vital ally in the Muslim world, was reportedly wavering on how to refer to the mass killings that began 100 years ago Friday. White House officials said Tuesday that Obama would not use the word “genocide.”
Following is a look at the controversy that continues to divide Turks and Armenians the world over: What constitutes genocide?
Genocide — from the Greek and Latin root words for race and killing — was a term first used by Polish legal scholar Raphael Lemkin in his 1944 report on “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe,” which included proposals for redress of the crime defined as “the destruction of a nation or an ethnic group.” Lemkin coined the word in reference to the Holocaust but said the Armenian atrocities had come to mind in identifying the attributes of the war crime. Most definitions of “genocide” cast it as a deliberate attempt to wipe out a population, the point where Turkish leaders depart from the growing consensus that their Ottoman forebears sought the Armenians’ extermination. Why does modern-day Turkey reject the label applied to crimes committed a century ago by a vanquished empire?
Officials in Ankara, the capital, have acknowledged that atrocities were committed in the early years of World War I but contend that the Armenian death toll has been inflated and that most of those who died succumbed to the brutalities of war and dislocation. On Monday, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu issued a message of condolence, saying for the second year on the eve of the massacre anniversary that “we once again respectfully remember Ottoman Armenians who lost their lives during the deportation of 1915 and share the pain of their children and grandchildren.” But he criticized Armenians’ branding of the wartime tragedies a “genocide” for which today’s Turkish leaders should take responsibility and make amends. Lemkin’s concept of genocide included monetary reparations that, if applied to Turkey today in the case of the slain Armenians, would amount to tens of billions of dollars. Why were Ottoman Armenians subjected to atrocities at the hands of their own government?
As Christians in a predominantly Muslim empire, the Armenians in eastern Anatolia were suspected of collaborating with prerevolutionary Russia when World War I broke out, provoking German-allied Ottoman leaders to declare them enemies of the state. Savage village-by-village mass killings followed, as did the forcible expulsion of the Armenian population from eastern Anatolia that pushed hundreds of thousands into death marches in the Syrian desert. Hundreds of thousands of people died for lack of food, water or shelter. Diplomatic records from consulates in Syria a century ago told of corpses strewn along desert routes from eastern Anatolia and of the arrival of starved, sun-scorched and dehydrated Armenians who survived what the Turkish government refers to as “resettlement.” How does the international community’s assessment of the atrocities break down? Which countries side with the Armenians in calling the killings a genocide?
Pope Francis stirred the decades-old controversy with his reference last week to the Armenian slaughter having been “the first genocide of the 20th century.” Ankara recalled its ambassador from the Holy See in protest of the pontiff ’s description. The European Parliament a week ago reaffirmed its recognition of the Armenian genocide — announced in 1987 and again in 2005. The continental lawmakers called for establishment of diplomatic relations between Turkey and Armenia, as well as a candid assessment of Ottoman archives so that Turkey can come to terms with its past. Germany and Austria on Monday signaled that their parliaments would declare the Ottoman slaughter a genocide before Friday’s anniversary. Already, 23 countries and 43 U.S. states have acknowledged the Armenian massacre as a deliberate attempt to annihilate the Christian community that numbered about 2 million in Ottoman Turkey. Most European states are among those applying the genocide label. Switzerland, Italy, Greece and Slovakia additionally have made it a crime to deny that genocide occurred against the Armenians. What is the U.S. government’s position on the genocide label?
As a candidate, Obama called for recognizing the Armenian genocide but has refrained from applying the term on behalf of the United States since taking office in 2009. After the shifts indicated by the Vatican and Berlin, analysts speculated that Obama might refer to genocide Thursday when he pays respects to the victims on the eve of Armenian Remembrance Day. But White House officials disclosed Tuesday after a meeting with Armenian American community leaders that the president had concluded that the time isn’t right. Turkey is an important ally in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization that plays a front-line role in the global fight against extremist Islam.