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Weekly Editor's Conversation With Gul Highlighted In Turkish Media

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  • Weekly Editor's Conversation With Gul Highlighted In Turkish Media

    WEEKLY EDITOR'S CONVERSATION WITH GUL HIGHLIGHTED IN TURKISH MEDIA

    http://www.armenianweekly.com/2010/03/30/we ekly-editor%e2%80%99s-conversation-with-gul-dispat ches-highlighted-in-turkish-media
    Tue, Mar 30 2010

    ISTANBUL, Turkey (A.W.)-Armenian Weekly editor Khatchig Mouradian's
    "Dispatches from Turkey," a series of five blog posts he wrote during
    his trips to Istanbul, Ankara, Kars, and Ani in March, have received
    a significant amount of attention not only in Armenia and the diaspora
    but also in Turkey.

    Aydintasbas's column dealt with highlights and controversies from
    the U.S. delegation's meeting with President Gul.

    Mouradian, who was part of a nine-member delegation of U.S.

    commentators and analysts visiting Turkey at the invitation of TEPAV
    (Economic Policy Research Foundation of Turkey), wrote about his
    conversation with Turkish President Abdullah Gul, the reactions
    to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's statement about deporting
    Armenians from Turkey, and several related issues in his dispatches,
    which were cited in the mainstream Turkish papers Zaman, Milliyet,
    and Hurriyet, among others.

    ***

    In an article in Today's Zaman titled "Harsh rhetoric heralds
    gloomy spring for normalization," which appeared on March 21, an
    entire section discusses Mouradian's "Dispatch #2." This section is
    reprinted here.

    Spirit, hearts and politics

    And yet, damage has been done here and there, and the government
    should make clear whether it wants to make peace with only with
    citizens of Armenia or the entire Armenian nation, despite the
    Armenian Diaspora's actions, which are hampering the normalization
    process-without forgetting its own Armenian citizens, who are not
    guests, but people of this country.

    Khatchig Mouradian is an Armenian writer who arrived in Turkey on
    Wednesday as part of a delegation of U.S. commentators and analysts
    visiting the country at the invitation of the Ankara-based Economic
    Policy Research Foundation of Turkey (TEPAV).

    In an article posted on the Armenian Weekly website titled "Memleketine
    Hosgeldin" (Welcome to Your Country), Mouradian said the title was
    inspired by what a Turkish journalist told him when she learned of
    his arrival in Turkey.

    Recalling Erdogan's recent remarks, Mouradian argues, "Turkish
    diplomats and commentators do not view Armenians as a single monolithic
    block, but as three supposedly homogeneous blocks."

    Mouradian lists those groups: "The Armenians living in Turkey
    [mainly in Istanbul] comprise the first group. ... In Turkey, these
    Armenians are regarded as 'our Armenians,' or the 'good Armenians,'
    as long as they do not speak out about the genocide and the continued
    discrimination they face. ... The citizens of Armenia, the second
    group, are, according to the dominant rhetoric in Turkey, the
    'neighbors' (the 'poor Armenians'), who are under difficult economic
    conditions and do not mind forgetting the past and moving on, if
    the Armenian diaspora leaves them alone. The diaspora Armenians,
    the third group, are the 'bad Armenians'."

    Mouradian's arguments are controversial, but this doesn't change the
    fact that many hearts have been broken.

    ***

    On March 29, Milliyet published an article titled "Cankaya'da neler
    konusuldu?" by Asli Aydintasbas, where the author devotes a section
    to Mouradian's conversation with Gul about the Armenian Genocide
    following the official meeting.

    A shorter version (in English) of the same article appeared in
    Hurriyet Daily News under the title "What was really talked about in
    Cankaya"? The article begins:

    At a meeting with former U.S. Ambassador to Ankara Morton Abromowitz
    and the Forbes magazine's Claudia Rosett, whose statements were
    denied over the weekend by the Presidential Office in Cankaya, and
    with numerous American commentators, President Abdullah Gul talked
    about the pain and sorrow felt during the 1915 Armenian events and
    of Turks living in the Balkans. As leaving, he said "I salute your
    elderly in the family," to the Armenian decent journalist Khatchig
    Mouradian who told the story of his family left Turkey in 1915.

    ***

    On March 19, in a column by Amberin Zaman in Taraf about Erdogan's
    threat to deport Armenians, there was a reference to an earlier
    trip taken by Mouradian and Zaman to the Der Zor desert. Below is
    the English translation of the concluding paragraph of the column
    (the entire column will be published by the Weekly later this week):

    I recommend to those who are interested in our history that they
    go to the Der Zor desert in Syria. You know, the desert to which
    the Committee of Progress and Union sent hundreds of thousands
    of Armenians, women, elderly, and children alike. There are other
    horrible truths that shine as bright as the sun there. There are
    mass graves that the Armenians claim to belong to their ancestors
    and bones breaking out of the soil. I saw those bones. I am not
    in a position to prove whom they belong to. That is not the main
    issue anyway. The main issue is what those bones mean to millions
    of Armenians. My Armenian friend Khatchig Mouradian, who was there
    with me, said that his biggest dream was to one day pray, mourn, with
    his Turkish friends, for his relatives who died in that desert. I can
    almost hear the whispers of those tormented souls wandering on Der Zor:
    "It is you who are distorting the past

    From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
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