Lawmakers to take witness of Armenian atrocities to US

07.02.2007
Today's Zaman
ERCAN YAVUZ ANKARA

Turkish parliamentarians who will visit the United States later this month to lobby against the passage of an Armenian genocide resolution have decided to include in the delegation a lawmaker whose father survived inter-communal fighting between Turks and Armenians and atrocities committed by Armenians in eastern Anatolia during World War I.

A resolution was recently introduced in the US House of Representatives urging the US administration to recognize an alleged genocide of Armenians at the hands of the Ottoman Empire. The sponsors of the resolution announced the resolution at a press conference attended by two Armenian survivors of the episode.
Turkey denies Armenian allegations of genocide and says the killings were the result of an inter-communal fight that killed Turks as well as Armenians. Clashes ensued as Armenians of eastern Anatolia, in collaboration with the invading Russian army, attacked Turks in a revolt aimed at creating an independent Armenian state in the region.

Passage of the resolution is expected to strain Turkish-US relations, and Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül, currently on a visit to Washington, is urging US authorities to exert efforts to prevent passage of the resolution.
The Turkish parliamentary delegation, led by Parliament's Foreign Affairs Commission Chairman Mehmet Dülger, will visit the United States on Feb. 11, the first in a series of planned trips to Washington until April. Dülger and Parliament Speaker Bülent Arınç insisted that the delegation should include Muzaffer Gülyurt, a ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) deputy from the eastern province of Erzurum because he could give an account of what happened in the World War I years in Anatolia in talks with US congressmen.

A grim story
Gülyurt, in an interview with Today's Zaman, said his father had gone through the hardship that almost all families in Erzurum had gone through during the years of World War I. His father's story included grim details such as an wound that saved him from a painful death in a house set ablaze by Armenian gangs.
His father, who was 15 when the Russians began invading Erzurum, told him that the invasion led to waves of migration from the province and that his family, too, was among those who were trying to flee. The rest of his story continues:
"As my family was preparing to set off for Tokat on oxcarts, the Russians launched a siege. They could not move. My father was among them. As whoever was capable of using a weapon was recruited to the army, the remaining population of Erzurum consisted of only the elderly, children and women. When the Russian invasion first started, my father went out for scouting purposes. But when an Ottoman arsenal was destroyed,my father was injured with a shrapnel wound to the head. Some women took him inside a house and hid him. As he was injured, he was not recruited as a soldier, so he was the only young person in the neighborhood.

"After the Russians left the region following the Bolshevik revolution, the city was dominated by Armenian gangs. They started to persecute Turkish people. My father had to work under their command for two more years. Since my father was a high school graduate, they made him a chief in the camp of Turkish prisoners. With the advance of Turkish troops toward the city, the Armenians started to incinerate Turkish prisoners, who were forced to work in quarries or in digging shelters, from early March to March 12. On that day, my father could not go to work since he contracted tetanus due to a nail cut on his foot. On March 12, Turkish prisoners were taken to a house in Yanıkdere, Erzurum, and the house was set ablaze by Armenians, incinerating them alive. My father would say, 'If I had not been hurt by a nail, I would have been one of those incinerated.'"

The Bolshevik revolution took place July-Oct. 1917. This story seems to have happened in March 1918. Talat resigned on October 14, 1918. Just a week later the Ottoman government capitulated to the Allies and signed an armistice at the island of Mudros. A week later, Talat Pasha, Enver Pasha and Djemal Pasha fled to Berlin. The story must have happened well after the 1915 genocide of Armenians had started. It could have been retaliatory by revenge gangs.

Gülyurt recalled that Turks and Armenians were living in peace until the Russian invasion and added: "In the US, I will state that it was the Turks who were massacred in reality. There is no need to generate hatred and animosity out of the incidents of the past. Using the evidence, historians can decide the ultimate truth in such issues. I will take the documents and photos I have to the US."
The parliamentary delegation includes Yaşar Yakış, head of Parliament's EU Harmonization Commission and Foreign Affairs Commission members Murat Mercan, Ali Rıza Alaboyun, Onur Öymen and Gülsün Bilgehan Toker as well as Gülyurt.
A second delegation will depart after Feb. 24 and is expected to include Şaban Dişli, one of the AK Party's experts on foreign policy, as well as Vahit Erdem, Necdet Budak, and Republican People's Party (CHP) members İnal Batu and Yakup Kepenek. The third delegation will consist of Egemen Bağış, who has close contacts with the US, Reha Denemeç, CHP's Zeynep Damla Gürel and Şükrü Elekdağ.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.