AZERIS LIVING IN IGDIR, TURKEY, GATHER TO PROTEST " ARMENIAN AGGRESSION "

As the 92nd anniversary of the 1915 Armenian Genocide in Ottoman Turkey approaches the Turkish , as well as the Azeri, propaganda machine is being shifted into high gear. One merely has to sift through the pages of the Turkish and Azeri press to see examples of how this campaign is being manifested. The anti-Armenian propaganda machine no longer spews out denials of the 1915 Genocide but lately has taken to portray Armenians as the aggressors and not the victims.

The following April 2nd report from the Azeri ANS press website is one example. It describes a recent protest meeting organized by the Igdir Society of Victims of Armenian Aggression that took place in the Igdir region of Turkey, close to the Armenian border.

Participants included Azeris now living in the region as well as faculty of the Nakhichevan State University. What resulted was a blanket condemnation of alleged "historic Armenian aggression" against Turks and Azeris alike which supposedly started in Ottoman times.

It concluded that Armenian claims of a 1915 genocide are false and that Ottoman Turkey was forced to exile its Armenian populace because of Armenian revolts against the Ottoman state at the behest of various western powers. The claim was also made that only 10,000 Armenians died during the exile due to "bad weather".

Jefer Chor, a lawyer for the Igdir Society described the Republic of Armenia as, " a state unaware of democracy, human rights and modern values and where dictatorship reigns."

What should be clear to all, Diaspora and Armenia alike, is that the unresolved issues emanating from the 1915 Genocide affect us all. One can prioritize issues that currently need to be addressed in the Armenia-Diaspora duality, but one cannot naively neglect the interdependence of these issues.