Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Commentary: Erdogan's Apology Opens A Pandora's Box For Turkey

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Commentary: Erdogan's Apology Opens A Pandora's Box For Turkey

    COMMENTARY: ERDOGAN'S APOLOGY OPENS A PANDORA'S BOX FOR TURKEY
    By Edmond Y. Azadian

    http://www.mirrorspectator.com/2011/12/01/commentary-erdogan%E2%80%99s-apology-opens-a-pandora%E2%80%99s-box-for-turkey/
    Posted on December 1, 2011

    By all estimates, Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is
    a smart politician and much of the credit of Turkey's rise on the
    international stage goes to him personally and, to some extent, to
    his party. But his country's history does not cooperate with him,
    since Turkey has too many skeletons (figuratively and literally)
    in its closet and they may jump out at any moment to embarrass the
    country and its leaders.

    That is exactly what happened when the prime minister made a calculated
    move to apologize for the mass murders of Dersim during 1937-38
    operations, when more than 100,00 Alevis and Kurds were massacred in
    the name of suppressing a so-called revolt.

    Erdogan's calculated political risk triggered incalculable reactions,
    which are still piling up. He is a master of hypocrisy and demagoguery;
    he can use anything and everything to pursue his political agenda.

    But, it seems, this time, there is a boomerang effect that may cost
    Turkey dearly as compared to the anticipated political dividends.

    Currently there is a cutthroat competition between Erdogan's Justice
    and Development Party (AK) and the main opposition Republican People's
    Party (CHP) and both are trying not to leave any stone unturned when
    it comes to embarrassing and bringing down the other.

    The ruling AK Party successfully eliminated a powerful opponent, Deniz
    Baykal, who was the head of the Republican Party, by leaking a sex
    tape involving him and a former staffer. The seemingly mild-mannered
    and moderate Kemal Kilicdaroglu replaced him, though now he, too,
    is spewing fire against Erdogan, his party and his administration.

    At this time, accusations and counter accusations are flying from one
    party to the other. Mr. Erdogan had multiple targets in mind when he
    touched upon the Dersim issue, when he stated: "Dersim is among the
    most tragic events in recent history. It is a disaster that should
    now be questioned with courage. The party that should confront this
    incident is not the ruling Justice and Development Party; it is the
    Republican People's Party which is behind this bloody disaster, who
    should face this incident and its chairman from Tunceli (current name
    of Dersim)."

    In a dramatic move, Mr. Erdogan went further by stating: "Is it me who
    should apologize or you [Kemal Kilicdaroglu]? If there is the need for
    an apology on behalf of the state and if there is such an opportunity,
    I can do it and I am apologizing. But if there is someone who should
    apologize on behalf of CHP it is you, as you are from Dersim. You
    were saying you felt honored to be from Dersim. Now, save your honor."

    Erdogan, who is fond of asking for apologies from Israel, Germany
    and Armenia, himself was engaged in this apology game.

    One of the multiple targets of Erdogan's apology policy is to get at
    the opposition Republican People's party, founded by Ataturk himself.

    The hot target was Kilicdaroglu, head of that party. The cold and
    discrete target, however, is Ataturk himself, whose legacy is being
    dismantled, brick by brick, by the ruling Islamist party.

    The Ergenekon investigations, the arrest of the army brass and the
    campaign against the military establishment are all part and parcel
    of that persistent policy. Another target, of course, was the Alevi
    population in Dersim, whose votes the prime minister was wooing.

    All these are on the domestic front. But Erdogan also was targeting
    his international audience by indicating that Turkey is gradually
    coming to terms with its bloody history.

    Thus, he was expecting to win brownie points to be applied towards
    Turkey's admission to the European Union. Some quarters in Armenia and
    the Armenian Diaspora raised premature hopes that the floodgates of
    apologies were being thrown wide open and that the next apology could
    come regarding the Armenian Genocide. But Erdogan manipulated his
    debate with the opposition party in such a way that he shut the door
    on that possibility. To begin with, his statement about Dersim case
    was exclusionary as he began his statement with the following sentence:

    "Dersim is among the most tragic events in recent history," which
    means there is no event more tragic, thus the Armenian Genocide is
    not even being considered. But Erdogan further developed on that
    exclusionary theme when Kilicdaroglu suggested Erdogan's policy may
    also force upon Turkey an apology for the Armenian Genocide, much in
    line with the Diaspora-Armenian thinking. Erdogan retorted: "You are
    putting me in the same basket with the Armenian Diaspora! Shame on
    you! How dare you put me and the Armenian Diaspora in the same basket!"

    Kilicdaroglu said that it is not enough to apologize for the
    Dersim massacres and that the state has to open the archives on that
    incident. Opening the archives will become another can of worms, where
    the military leaders who had concocted the incident there, where the
    Alevi population had managed to continue in a semi-autonomous system
    despite Ataturk's policy of population engineering to homogenize
    Turkey, will be implicated. One of the demands of the military, at
    that time, was for Alevi leaders to hand over 25,000 Armenians who had
    survived the Genocide by finding a safe haven in Dersim. Another case
    was the crimes committed by Sabiha Gokcen, Ataturk's adopted daughter
    and Turkey first military pilot. Armenians in Dersim were doubly hurt
    that their "sister" had joined the Turkish military to shower bombs
    on them. Hrant Dink had discovered and publicized the fact that Sabiha
    Gokcen was an Armenian orphan, much to the chagrin of Turkish racists.

    Of course, the Turkish military conducted carpet-bombing and exiled
    the Dersim survivors to other regions of the republic to assimilate
    them, after confiscating their properties. Despite Erdogan's careful
    delineation of his apology, virtually avoiding and excluding the
    Armenian Genocide, an avalanche of press commentaries are demanding
    apologies for the Armenian Genocide.

    It was impossible for Armenians to explode and explore the Genocide
    issue in the Turkish media in current dimensions. But one statement
    by Erdogan didn't.

    He may live to regret it, or if we give too much credit to his
    political acumen, his move may have been a deliberate one.

    Eren Keskin, a contributor to Radikal newspaper, says that before
    anyone else, Turkey should apologize for the 1915 genocide of the
    Armenians. He has further conducted a survey among many academics
    who have come up with a series of cases which need apologies. Thus Dr.

    Mourad Paker brings the case of 5,000 inmates in Diyarbakir prison
    who were tortured. Another professor reminds people of the massacre of
    Marash and Chorum. Rifaat Bali brings up the cases of Jews in Thrace
    being bankrupted through confiscations in 1934 and the wealth tax on
    non-Muslims in 1941, which sent many to die in labor camps. Regarding
    the Armenians, Keskin insists that an apology is not enough. They
    also have to be compensated for their losses.

    The Human Rights Committee of Turkey has released a communique
    requesting the formation of Truth Committee to investigate the issues
    of the Armenian Genocide and the forced assimilation of the Kurdish
    population.

    But the most succinct and sharp questions were asked in the newspaper
    Sabah by columnist Engin Ardic, informing that lawyers have already
    taken up the issue of Dersim and they are planning to sue the Turkish
    state. Coming to the Armenian case he states that there is a conspiracy
    of silence, especially by the wealthy class. "If you dig down their
    past, you will find out that they murdered Armenians and they usurped
    their properties. Should the case be raised, there will be an issue
    of money. They think how could a government compensate Armenians
    after spending $200 billion to suppress Kurdish rebellion?

    But there is a basic question: is there a principle of continuity in
    the government? If no, why apologize for Dersim? If yes, why leave
    out 1915?"

    These questions lead to the very fact that Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, under
    the guise of Europeanizing his country, conducted the racist policy of
    the Nazis, as characterized by the above writer. In carrying that state
    policy, he has used and collaborated by all the government officials
    who had executed the Ittihadist plan of the Armenian Genocide.

    >From Sultan Abdul Hamid to Talaat, the genocidal policy has worked
    inexorably. Ataturk continued it, under the nose of the Great Powers,
    who even now claim Turkey as our "trusted ally," no matter how much
    blood has stained that "ally's" hands.

    The Genocide issue has become a hot topic for Turkish society,
    more than Armenians could anticipate. Should Turkey take the road
    to self-cleansing, maybe the turn will come to apologize for the
    Armenian Genocide.

    Erdogan has opened Pandora's Box inadvertently. Let us see what may
    come out of it.


    From: Baghdasarian
Working...
X