Another silent revolution

A different motive has become noticeable in Turkey over the past 13 years, and even more so over the past few years, when the military lost its influence and street protests and ballots have become the only way to stage coups. When Parliament was discussing the regulation of the Law of Foundations in September 2006, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the current chairman of the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), clamored desperately, saying: "No one can place dynamite in Turkey's foundations. You are enacting this law at the EU's request." The regulation concerned the termination of the brutal confiscation practices aimed at non-Muslim communities' foundations. For Kılıçdaroğlu, however, Turkey's non-Muslims are foreigners.

"We cannot offer these conditions for the foundations of some communities in Turkey at the EU's request. They will open schools here, establish universities and join the business world. Can our foundations, which were established by our own citizens in the Republic of Turkey, receive the [same] support that is given to them? Doesn't everyone know that they are backed by capital and religious groups? Doesn't everyone know that they are supported by states?"

While the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) has striven for 13 years to remove the shame of confiscating the properties of non-Muslim communities that were established by the state during the Ottoman period, the CHP has shown the greatest resistance to it. In a previous parliamentary session that was convened to discuss the same matter, the CHP claimed, "You worry about Agop's properties," and when the regulation was approved by Parliament, it appealed to the Constitutional Court for annulment. In the early Republic the CHP adopted a mentality regarding non-Muslims as non-citizens and continued to cling to the 1940 mentality and to resist. The same CHP has nominated an Armenian national as a parliamentary candidate in order to keep up with the AK Party. Do you see what a good development it is? This constantly reminds me of the remark of a theater actor who said: "You see what we put up with in order to get rid of you [Recep Tayyip Erdoğan]," when Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu was presented as a presidential candidate.

The anti-AK Party coalition has been overwhelmed by the change, which is why their election promises are much bigger than the AK Party's, instead of their previous habit of resisting reforms. Far from going on to fulfill their promises, they believe that once they convince the public, they can work on irreversibly burying the achievements of the past 13 years. For this cause, they seem to think that one can be a member of an illegal group such as the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP/C), can make nefarious agreements with the PKK and can do one's best to instigate a civil war or an economic crisis. After all, they believe that the ends justify the means. From their point of view, in order to bring back the old Turkey, they can tolerate being more Armenian than the Armenians and more Kurdish than the Kurds if they must. Once obstacles are overcome, these groups will be handled somehow or another, they imagine.

For a year now, the centenary of the 1915 incidents has been an additional front in the battle we are fighting. Unlike those who have been struggling for a true confrontation with the 1915 incidents for many years, the anti-AK Party coalition has used an expedient tactic like turning the grievances and feelings of those families, segments of society and individuals who were resentful about the 1915 incidents, into a political tool. The current representatives of those who are responsible for the Great Calamity of 1915 adopted a totally reverse position.

Unlike those who made this heartbreak an instrument to their short-sighted activism, the EU Minister and Chief Negotiator Volkan Bozkır, representatives from the Foreign and Interior Ministries, the deputy mufti and top-level representatives of other religions held a spiritual ceremony in commemoration of this loss at the church of St. Mary of Blachernae. Following a significant sermon, Erdoğan's condolence message was read out at the altar. With the exception of the first few years following the original events, this was a first in a century.

Regardless of by whom and with what intention the matter is approached, everyone has the right to freedom of expression and action. On April 24, everyone commemorated the 1915 incidents in their own way across Turkey. The state of things that we have achieved is gratifying in that another gap has been bridged with the denials of the Unionist/Kemalist mentality. No matter what the discussions above are, this convergence between sections of the public is likely to start the much-needed mourning for the Armenians and melt our fixed perceptions of 1915.