Genocide is Genocide
NRC Handelsblad (Dutch national
newspaper)
28 September 2006
The CDA (Christian Democratic Appeal) and the PvdA (Dutch Labor Party) were not aware of what it meant to put Dutch Turkish candidates on their draft list who deny the genocide committed against roughly one million Armenians.
The Armenian Genocide of 1915 and the late nineteenth century seems like an old, forgotten issue, but it is not. The massacre is part of the traumatic past of the Armenians around the world, including those in the Netherlands.
In Turkey, people have no understanding for this. In Turkey,people are still persecuted for writing texts or commenting on the Armenian genocide, among them writers Orhan Pamuk and recently Elif Shafak. Fortunately, Pamuk and Shafak were not convicted.
If Dutch politicians affiliated with the larger parties would begin to doubt the genocide, they would in essence support the reactionary powers at play in Turkey.
Dutch Turkish politicians should choose who they want to be loyal to: to Turkey or to their Dutch parties.
They cannot deny the Armenian Genocide in a Turkish newspaper after they have joined their Dutch parties' recognition. Moreover, the European Parliament wrongfully scrapped the Armenian genocide from the list of preconditions for Turkey's accession to the EU.
Research is no longer needed for the massacre of the Turkish government against the dissenting Armenians in 1915 and late nineteenth century, which was the result, among others, of Armenians' loyalty to Turkey's enemies during World War I. An abundance of documents, as well as research and family stories by Armenians themselves, clearly show that the massacre indeed took place and that in those days more than a million people perished. Barely anyone returned and the houses remained empty. There are photographs of mass executions of Armenians. People can twist around the exact numbers of murdered and how it happened, but it is still genocide.
According to the law, everyone has the right to his or her personal opinion,even if it goes against the facts. In the free debate in liberal society, the truth will catch up with the lie. The ChristenUnie's (Christian Union) bill, which calls for the penalization of genocide denial, therefore, has a reverse effect. If the Netherlands adopts this law, it will fall in the same trap as Turkey, which penalizes anyone who offends Turkish identity.
Publicly, we should be able to unmask mistakes, and this even applies to
the murder of six million Jews. By penalizing denial, as is now the
case, deniers are given credibility, when there is enough evidence to
prove them wrong.
Political parties are free to put candidates on their list who deny
the Armenian Genocide. However, it is morally objectional, because by
brushing aside the hard facts, deniers offend a minority. While it might
be true that parties would arguably receive a significant amount of
votes from Dutch
Turks, it should not be a reason to put them on the list. The PvdA and
the CDA have therefore done well to withdraw the candidates who deny the
Armenian Genocide.
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