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House panel to take up Armenian genocide bill
WASHINGTON |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A congressional panel will vote next month on a resolution to label the World War One-era massacre of Armenians by Turkish forces as "genocide," a move that could infuriate Turkey.
Howard Berman, the Democratic chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said on Friday he intended to call a committee vote on the non-binding resolution on March 4.
The resolution would call on President Barack Obama to ensure that U.S. policy formally refers to the massacre as "genocide" and to use that term when he delivers his annual message on the issue in April -- something Obama avoided doing last year.
The panel approved a similar bill in 2007 but it was never put to a full House vote amid fears among both Democrats and Republicans that it would alienate Turkey.
The Obama administration sees Turkey as a key ally whose help it needs to solve confrontations from Iran to Afghanistan.
Obama, who as a candidate referred to the killings as genocide, in April used the term "atrocities" in his first presidential address on the issue -- spurring criticism from Armenian-American groups.
Turkey and Armenia last year signed accords to normalize ties after a century of hostility that traces its roots to the 1915 mass killing and deportation of Armenians.
But the deal has wobbled after an Armenian court last month reaffirmed the government's obligation to seek recognition of the killings as genocide, something Turkey strongly opposes.
Turkey accepts that many Christian Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks but denies that up to 1.5 million died and that it amounts to genocide. Turkish officials have warned that any new attempt in the U.S. Congress to brand the killings a genocide could damage U.S.-Turkish ties.
(Reporting by Andrew Quinn; editing by Eric Beech)
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1. William Batkay, Associate Professor at Montclair State University
2. Arend-Jan Boekestein, Professor International Relations at Utrecht University and also Member of Parliament in The Netherlands
3. Levon Panos Dabagyan, Armenian historian and writer
4. Roderic Davidson (RIP), former Professor at George Washington University
5. Paul Dumont, Professor at Strasbourg-II University, Director of the Institut Français d’études Anatoliennes (French Institute of Anatolian Studies, Istanbul)
6. Gwynne Dyer, Ph.D. in Ottoman Military History
7. Edward J. Erickson, Ph.D. in Ottoman Military History, Researcher at Birmingham University
8. David Fromkin, Professor at Boston University
9. Edwin A. Grosvenor
10. Michael M. Gunter, Professor at Tennessee University
11. E.Y. Hooijmaaijers, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, The Netherlands
12. J.C. Hurwitz, former Professor at Columbia University
13. Eberhard Jäckel, Professor Emeritus at Stuttgart University
14. Steven T. Katz
15. Avigdor Levy, Professor at Brandeis University
16. Bernard Lewis, Professor Emeritus at Princeton University
17. Guenter Lewy, Professor Emeritus at Massachusetts University
18. Heath Lowry, Professor at Princeton University
19. Andrew Mango, Researcher at University of London
20. Peter Mansfield, Professor of Middle East Politics at Willamette University, Oregon
21.Robert Mantran (RIP), former Professor of Turkish and Ottoman History at Aix-Marseille University
22. Justin McCarthy, Professor at Louisville University
23. Pierre Nora, former Professor at School of High Studies in Social Sciences (École des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris), Member of the French Academy
24. Pierre Oberling, Professor at Hunter College
25. Dankwart Rostow
26. Jeremy Salt, Professor of Political Science at Melbourne University
27. Stanford J. Shaw (RIP), former Professor at UCLA and Bilkent University
28. Philip H. Stoddard, Ph.D. in Ottoman Military History
29. Norman Stone, Professor at Bikent University
30. Dr. Hew Strachan (Ph.D), Chichele Professor of the History of War at Oxford University ( labels the issue “still not clear” )
31. Gilles Veinstein, Professor at Collège de France
32. Annette Wieviorka, Researcher at the French National Center for Scientific Research (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris)
33. Dr. Malcolm Yapp Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of The Modern History of Western Asia at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London
34. Robert F. Zeidner, Ph.D. in Ottoman Military History
The Turkish Government, which is the reincarnation of the same actors who perpetrated the genocide, has resorted to a “collective amnesia” to avoid responsibility and wants all governments and adhere to that collective amnesia in order to do business with it. Unfortunately the United States obliges it, not for lack of fact, as there are over 40,000 pages in the UNITED SATES ARCHIVES alone on the “Systematic Armenian race extermination” all written in real time as it was happening, but for a lack of moral fortitude. The thought is that it has always been better to have access to Turkish military bases then to recognize the deliberate organized mass murder of a race that has been clearly documented. Cleverly, the Turkish government also pays millions in the form of lobbying money for the likes of Dick Army, Dick Gephardt, Bob Livingston, Dennis Hastert and has even infiltrated our education system by offering grant money through the likes of the (ITS) Institute of Turkish Studies to any mercenary historian willing to participate in this “collective amnesia”.
It is repugnant to pick and chose which genocide we condemn for political and economical expediency. The Armenian Genocide must be recognized and condemned or we lose all credibility.
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