The Armenian, Assyrian,
Greek,
Kurdish and Greek Cypriot Genocides,
and the
Politics of Denialism
By Desmond Fernandes
Apec Press, Stockholm
ISBN: 978-91-86139-01-8
Available
from August 17th - Register your interest
“Desmond Fernandes examines important and
often ignored questions of genocide where clear evidence
exists but is still denied. The difficulty in acknowledging
genocide, not only in Turkey, but internationally, is also
surveyed and the conclusion leaves one in no doubt that the
international community continues to assist and support the
Turkish government's campaign of denial. In contrast to the
international order, Desmond uses the 'G-word' as a person
who has read the history, and does not choose to avoid it
like a politician, afraid of controversies” - Gurgin
Bakircioglu, Editor of Beyan.net and Vice-Chair of
the Kurdish Student and Academic Association (KSAF).
“Turkey is a lynch pin in the politics of
the Middle East, Europe and the United States. The country’s
history of hyperactivity in terms of nationalism and
secularism is clearly revealed in this scholarly study. The
research documents genocidal actions towards religious,
cultural and linguistic groups since the end of the Ottoman
Empire. Woven through Des Fernandes’ narrative is the
contradiction inherent in the democratic governance of the
present state and the level of extreme violence that can
still be inflicted on ordinary Turkish people. Not only
experts in Turkish affairs, but also activists will find in
this volume invaluable information to enrich their
understanding of Turkey’s role in the so-called ‘global war
on terror’” - Julia Kathleen Davidson, Scotland
Against Criminalising Communities.
“This book shows, with the help of massive
evidence and without any possible doubt, that the Turkish
state (and its forerunner, the Ottoman Empire) has been
committing genocide against the groups mentioned in the
title of the book, at least since 1894, and continues to
commit genocide even today, in 2008, within the meaning of
each of the five types of genocidal act, today most brutally
against the Kurds. Turkey is even today guilty of crimes
against humanity … This is a reference book that cannot be
surpassed easily (if at all). The book is filled with minute
detail in its documentation and presentation and has an
incredible number of up-to-date references. The comparative
aspect, documenting and comparing several genocides,
historically and today, is novel ...
“An important part of the book gives an
invaluable resource to concerned politicians, lawyers,
conflict resolution analysts, peace campaigners,
parliamentarians and academics, regardless of their ethnic
background. This is a compact presentation of key positional
statements and perspectives on the genocide by the leading
Kurdish parties, and several key Turkish ones. These quotes,
some quite difficult to get hold of, have hardly ever been
mentioned or used in mainstream US-UK genocide debates [in
English]. For these representative Kurdish groups genocide
is a key issue that they have explicitly been raising for
years ...
“Issues around the continuing broken
promises in relation to all human rights, be these civil and
political or economic, social and cultural (e.g. the right
to self-determination, a fair trial or the freedom of speech
and association) and an analysis of the fact that other
(mostly big western) countries have not only allowed the
crimes against humanity but have also very often been and
are today complicit in the genocides fill much of the book,
again, with massive documentation ...
“The painstakingly detailed, objective and
accurate description in itself forms ‘only’ a background for
other path-breaking aspects of this book. One reason for
writing a book like this has been voiced by Halil Berktay,
co-ordinator of the History Department at Sabanci
University, Turkey. He is quoted by Desmond Fernandes as
writing: ‘The question of what happened in 1915-1916 is not
a mystery, it’s not like we know just 5 percent, so the
question is not finding more evidence. The question is
liberating scholarship from the nationalist taboos’
(emphasis added). ‘There may be differing interpretations of
genocide - how and why the Armenian Genocide happened, To
deny its factual and moral reality as genocide is not to
engage in scholarship but in propaganda and efforts to
absolve the perpetrator, blame the victims, and erase the
ethical meaning of this history’...
“Turkey’s denial of documented facts, the
Turkish government’s threats towards and imprisonment of
people who have raised the issue of the genocides, and the
trouble Turkey is going into in order to prevent the issues
around genocide from getting to high-level courts is as well
known as it is difficult for outsiders to understand. This
denial has to be analysed from a multidisciplinary point of
view, and this is what Desmond Fernandes has also set out to
do …
“This book represents the cutting edge.
Not only because of its amazing research and documentation,
the sharp analyses, the absolute intellectual honesty. It is
a necessary book. It is horrifying to read, and makes one
feel ashamed and guilty of belonging to the same human race
as those who have been and ARE today committing the
atrocities described in the book. But this is also cutting
edge in Del Valle’s terms because it is a risky undertaking
to publish this book. Desmond Fernandes has already paid a
heavy price for working with issues of genocide.
Perpetrators are more often shooting the messenger than
listening to the message. The least you as a reader can do
is to start screaming, and to finally demand international
action to stop these crimes against humanity” – Dr. Tove
Skutnabb-Kangas, University of Roskilde, Department of
Languages and Culture, Denmark, & Ţo Akademi University,
Department of Education, Vasa, Finland [author of Linguistic
Genocide in Education - or Worldwide Diversity and Human
Rights? Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJ & London,
UK] – Excerpted from the Foreword to the book.