Dear Editor,
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is threatening to deport Armenian nationals who are living and working in Turkey as a retaliatory move for the passing of resolutions by the Catalonian, American, and Swedish lawmakers recognizing the Armenian Genocide.
Basically, Turkey is threatening to deport Armenians in response to international acknowledgment of its previous efforts to “deport” Armenians from war regions (for own their safety, of course).
Will Turkish authorities use the same deportation routes as used previously? Maybe they’ll have everyone walk to the Der Zor dessert, and then have them walk back eastward towards Armenia? Also, will Mr. Erdogan repeat the generosity of the Turkish government by providing them with pocket money for their journey, as they did in 1915? According to him, they have proof of these generosities in the Turkish archives.
Based on Mr. Erdogan’s calculations, there are 170,000 Armenians in Turkey, of whom 70,000 are Turkish citizens, and the remaining 100,000 are the migrant works who have drawn the short stick and could be “deported.” While the figure of 70,000 Turkish citizens of Armenian ancestry might be exaggerated by a factor of two or so, as the previous “deportation” efforts make this figure a bit untenable, the 100,000 current deportation candidates figure is off almost by an order of magnitude—as the Eurasia Partnership Foundation puts this number to around 12,000-13,000, 94 percent of whom are women.
So while one can argue that Mr. Erdogan is simply engaging in political grand standing to scare Armenia and other countries that dare to criticize Turkey’s previous “deportation” efforts of Armenians and/or is exhibiting signs of his well-documented foot-in-mouth disease, such threats cannot and must not be taking lightly by world powers. This especially applies to the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Philip Gordon who tried to defend Mr. Erdogan’s statement by framing it as an issue of reigning in illegal immigrants in Turkey.
If the Turkish government wants to make “peace” with Armenia and Armenians by way of the protocols, it has found a really funny way of showing its sincerity by threatening a second wave of deportations. Such behavior by the Turkish government should only strengthen the resolve of countries such as the United States, Sweden, and Spain to hold Turkey’s feet to fire and force them to reconcile with their ugly past—and not rush to apologize to Turkey or assure them that resolutions acknowledging the Armenian Genocide will not see the light of the day. Let’s hope that the Bulgarian Parliament will follow suit.
Ara Nazarian
Watertown, Mass.
Personally, I’d like to see President Obama send Hillary Clinton to Der Zor for an extended vacation. Bon Voyage, Hillary.
I wonder how many of the targeted Armenian deportees this time around come from families who originally hailed from Western Armenia? If Erdogan wants to make good on his promise to ‘send them back to their country,’ then Turkey should be issuing citizenship permits to these Armenians and not deportation slips. Moreover, for those who say it’s logical for Armenians to be “sent back to their country,” then let the Turkish people return to theirs: Central Asia.
According to the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey whoever lives in Turkey is Turk. Next time Mr. Erdogan should say that he can deport 100,000 Turks [Armenian].