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| PRESS RELEASE |
March 6, 2009 |
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ABOUT US |
The objective of the Assembly is to coordinate the activities of member Turkish American associations and individual members of the Assembly for the purpose of presenting a more balanced view of Turkey and of the Turkish people, and emphasizing the importance of enhanced understanding between Turkey and the United States. [more]
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BECOME A MEMBER |
By becoming a member you will be part of a network of Turkish-Americans and friends of Turkey who care about the historic relationship between the two peoples and who are aware of the crucial role each one of us plays in strengthening the relationship and promoting an accurate and fair picture of Turkey and Turks. [Join ATAA]
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Nurten Ural, President, ATAA
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Phone: 202.483.9090
E-mail: assembly@ataa.org |
ATAA Commends Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson for her "Dear Colleague" letter
ATAA sent the following letter to all the representatives at Capitol Hill on March 6, 2009 to commend Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson for her "Dear Colleague" letter of February 25, 2009.
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Dear Representative:
The Assembly of Turkish American Associations (ATAA) commends Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson for her "Dear Colleague" letter of February 25, 2009, which states that a proposed resolution equating the Armenian case with genocide is a one-sided assessment of the inter-communal war between Ottoman Armenians and Ottoman Muslims in 1915, and that the resolution prejudices Turkish and Armenian rapprochement.
Over 1.1 million Ottoman Muslims perished as the Armenian Revolt (1885-1919) and inter-communal attacks aimed to carve out an ethnically and politically pure Armenian state from the eastern Ottoman Empire.
To recognize this Muslim suffering is not to diminish Armenian suffering, but to respect all tragedies regardless of the race, ethnicity or religion of the victims, and to place the Armenian tragedy in its proper context of a violent independence movement that failed at a tremendous human cost to Ottoman Armenians and Muslims alike.[1]
Most experts on the Ottoman history disagree with the Armenian allegation of genocide. Princeton University Ottoman Historian Bernard Lewis commented on C-Span as follows:
"[T]hat the massacre of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire was the same as what happened to Jews in Nazi Germany is a downright falsehood. What happened to the Armenians was the result of a massive Armenian armed rebellion against the Turks, which began even before war broke out, and continued on a larger scale."[2]
The ATAA supports United States foreign policy not to disturb the Turkish and Armenian rapprochement to which Congresswoman Johnson referred in her letter. The ATAA supports United States foreign policy to encourage Armenia to accept Turkey's proposal to establish a historical truth commission, which would address the legal issue of whether either of the tragedies, Armenian or Muslim, constitute genocide, utilize Ottoman and WWI historians as expert witnesses, and secure absolute access to the archives of the relevant parties, particularly those of the Armenian Republic and Armenian Revolutionary Federation who carried out the Armenian Revolt.
Please do not hesitate to contact me with any questions or comments.
Sincerely,
Nurten Ural
President,
The Assembly of Turkish American Associations
[1] The ATAA recommends viewing war documentary producer, Marty Callaghan's, "The Armenian Revolt" and "Blood and Oil, The Middle East in World War I."
[2] April 14, 2002, at the National Press Club on C-Span 2. Other scholars whose work ATAA recommends for any disinterested reader are Guenter Lewy, Andrew Mango, Avigdor Levy, Stanford Shaw, Masaki Kakiszaki, David Fromkin, Norman Stone, Edward Erickson, Heath Lowry and Justin McCarthy.
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