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The Kurdish and Armenian Genocides - From
Censorship and Denial to Recognition?
19.2.2008
By Desmond Fernandes - Book Review
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February 19, 2008
Turkey’s repression of the Kurds has been widely
documented - and is acknowledged as a major obstacle
to Turkey’s accession to the European Union. But
what lies behind such repression? Fernandes
confronts the issue head on, forcing the reader to
probe a question that many in Turkey and elsewhere
would rather avoid: does the systematic repression
of the Kurds amount to genocide? Open discussion of
this issue is critical if a long-term resolution of
the Kurdish issue is to be achieved – Nicholas
Hildyard, Policy Analyst.
The book is an exceptionally important read for
anyone with a broad interest in human rights and
social justice. It has a scholarly account of the
historical background to the present awful situation
of Turkish Armenians and Turkish Kurds. In
particular, the book provides a powerful comparative
analysis of the policies of the US,www.ekurd.net
Israel and Turkey in
terms of their rationale for labelling human
atrocities as genocide – Dr. Julia Kathleen
Davidson, Research Fellow, Faculty of Education,
University of Glasgow and Membership Secretary of
Scotland Against Criminalising communities (SACC).
In this important book, Desmond Fernandes exposes
the details of the sordid and largely hidden role of
Israel and the US Israel Lobby in preventing
Congress from recognizing the Turkish genocide of
the Armenians – Jeff Blankfort, Former Editor,
Middle East Labor Bulletin.
Among its Cold War victories the United States
certainly succeeded in its ambition to make the
world safe for nationalism. As identity politics is
reprocessed as a function of global capital, and
rehabilitated as its natural ally, Desmond Fernandes
documents the fractured consequences of the
ready-made social fantasy - Variant: Cross Currents
in Culture.
Desmond Fernandes writes for those who spoke the
truth and were murdered, those who spoke 200 days
ago and are still imprisoned, and for those who live
in terror and in silence, or who meet in nameless
buildings, so that the words ‘GENOCIDE’, ethnic
cleansing, or the Turkish military word ‘TEMIZLEME’,
may be heard as a siren call for the muted victims
of the Turkish state - Diamanda Galás, Composer and
Performer of Songs of Exile, Vena Cava, Schrei X,
Plague Mass and Defixiones, Will And Testament.
Fernandes’ painstaking investigation sheds much
needed light on the collusion between the Turkish
State and the Israel lobby in preventing recognition
of one of the darkest episodes of the past century,
the genocide of Ottoman Turkey’s ethnic Armenians -
Muhammad Idrees Ahmad, Spinwatch.
[This is] a judiciously assembled vast, syntactic
mosaic ‘illustrating’ the total state terror
inflicted upon two ancient peoples ... Desmond
Fernandes has laboriously integrated a vast amount
of historical events,www.ekurd.net
scholarly data, secret
documents, live witnesses, relevant literature and
even poetry ... [He] has hit the target: mainly
encapsulating the enormity of censorship, denial and
recognition of that ultimate crime of man’s
inhumanity to man - Genocide - Khatchatur I.
Pilikian [from the Epilogue].
Desmond Fernandes is a policy analyst and former
Senior Lecturer in Human Geography and Genocide
Studies at De Montfort University, England. He has
published widely in a number of journals and is
co-author of Genozid an den Kurden in der Türkei? -
Verfolgung, Krieg und Zerstörung der ethnischen
Identität (2001, Medico International, Frankfurt).
Forthcoming titles by the author include The Kurdish
Genocide in Turkey and US, UK, German, Israeli and
NATO ‘Inspired’ Psychological Warfare Operations
against the ‘Kurdish Threat’ in Turkey and Northern
Iraq, due to shortly be released by Apec Press,
Stockholm.
The book can be ordered securely online at the
recommended retail price of L14.99 (postage and
packing free within the UK). It can also be ordered
from most bookshops in the UK and via the UK
distributor AK Press and Distribution
http://www.akuk.com/dosearch.php?itemid=5326
By Desmond Fernandes
Apec Press, Stockholm, December 2007
ISBN: 91-89675-72-X
**
Kurds are not recognized as an official minority in
Turkey and are denied rights granted to other
minority groups. Under EU pressure, Turkey recently
granted Kurds limited rights for broadcasts and
education in the Kurdish language, but critics say
the measures do not go far enough.
The use of the term "Kurdistan" is vigorously
rejected due to its alleged political implications
by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize
the existence of a "Turkish Kurdistan" Southeast
Turkey.
Others estimate over 40 million Kurds live in
Big Kurdistan (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Armenia),
which covers an area as big as France, about half of
all Kurds which estimate to 20 million live in
Turkey.
Turkey is home to over 25 million ethnic Kurds, a
large Turkey's Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey.
Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed
severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish language,
prohibiting the language in education and broadcast
media.
The Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized
in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q
which do not exist in the Turkish
alphabet has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and
2003
The Kurdish flag flown officially in Iraqi Kurdistan
but unofficially flown by Kurds in Armenia. The flag
is banned in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where flying it
is a criminal offence"
Southeastern Turkey:
North Kurdistan (
Kurdistan-Turkey)
wikipedia
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