Excerpt
SUMMARY: The Turkish government has rejected the term “genocide” to describe the mass killing of Armenians 100 years ago, a stance that has sparked criticism and protest. For two perspectives on the history and meaning today, Jeffrey Brown talks to Soner Cagaptay of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and Hrach Gregorian of American University.
JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour): Some perspective now on history and today.
Hrach Gregorian is an adjunct professor at American University and president of the Institute of World Affairs, a nonprofit organization that focuses on conflict analysis and post-conflict peace-building. And Soner Cagaptay is the director of the Turkish Research Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He’s the author of the recent book “The Rise of Turkey: The Twenty-First Century’s First Muslim Power.”
Welcome to both of you.
Let me start with you, Hrach Gregorian.
1915, I just want to fill in a little bit of the history. The Ottoman Empire is collapsing. What led specifically to the killing of so many Armenians?
HRACH GREGORIAN, American University: Well, I think there was a general feeling that the Armenians were not to be trusted.
And even before that, there was a policy of Turkification by the young Turks dating back to 1908. And the Armenians were viewed as a threat to Turkish identity and Turkish security. And there were orders to rid the country of the community.
JEFFREY BROWN: For Turks, this history is tied to the creation — the end of the Ottoman Empire and the creation of the modern Turkish state.
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