www.armenianweekly.com, November 20, 2009
The former presidents of the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) sent the following letter to the Turkish Prime Minister:
November 3, 2009
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan
TC Basbakanlik
Bakanlikir
Ankara, Turkey
FAX: 90 312 417 0476
Dear Prime Minister Erdogan:
The recent signing of protocols by the governments of Armenia and Turkey that was brokered by leading states of the international community marks the beginning of a process that would lead to establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries. Constituencies in both countries find some or all of the protocols problematic. We the former presidents of the International Association of Genocide Scholars write to you to express our concern about one of them: the establishment of a historical commission to study the fate of the Armenian people in the Ottoman Empire in 1915.
We are sending you this amended version of the Open Letter we wrote you in June 2005 to reiterate our objection to your insistence that there be a historical commission, in which Turkey would be involved. Because Turkey has denied the Armenian Genocide for the past nine decades, and currently under Article 301 of the Turkish penal code, public affirmation of the Genocide is a crime, it would seem impossible for Turkey to be part of a process that would assess whether or not Turkey committed genocide against the Armenians in 1915.
Outside of your government, there is no doubt about the facts of the Armenian Genocide, therefore our concern is that your demand for a historical commission is political sleight of hand designed to deny those facts. Turkey has, in fact, shown no willingness to accept impartial judgments made by outside commissions. Five years ago, the Turkish members of the Turkish Armenian Reconciliation Commission pulled out of the commission after the arbitrator, the International Center for Transitional Justice, rendered an assessment that the events of 1915 were genocide.
And, Prime Minister Erdogan, you have repeatedly stated that even if a historical commission found that the Armenian case is genocide, Turkey would ignore the finding.
As William Schabas, the current president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, said in his letter to you and President Sarkisian, “acknowledgment of the Armenian Genocide must be the starting point of any ‘impartial historical commission,’ not one of its possible conclusions.”
Our previous letter, which was unanimously approved by the members of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, lays out the consensus among historians as to the historical reality of the Armenian Genocide. We believe the integrity of scholarship and the ethics of historical memory are at stake.
HELEN FEIN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF GENOCIDE, John Jay College, New York City, feinhelen@comcast.net;
ROGER W. SMITH, PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF GOVERNMENT, COLLEGE OF WILLIAM AND MARY IN VIRGINIA; theseus51@msn.com;
FRANK CHALK, PROFESSOR OF HISTORY, CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY, MONTREAL, AND CO-DIRECTOR OF THE MONTREAL INSTITUTE FOR GENOCIDE STUDIES, drfrank@alcor.concordia.ca;
JOYCE APSEL, PROFESSOR OF GLOBAL STUDIES, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY, jaa5@nyu.edu;
ROBERT MELSON, PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, PURDUE UNIVERSITY, AND PROFESSOR OF HOLOCAUST AND GENOCIDE STUDIES, CLARK UNIVERSITY, melson@polsci.purdue;
ISRAEL W. CHARNY, PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF PSYCHOLOGY, HEBREW UNIVERSITY, JERUSALEM,
AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE ON THE HOLOCAUST AND GENOCIDE, encygeno@mail.com;
GREGORY STANTON, DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR OF HUMAN RIGHTS, MARY WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY, VIRGINIA, and PRESIDENT, GENOCIDE WATCH, gregoryhstanton@aol.com
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