Posted 04 May 2005
Kuwaiti writer Ahmad Al Rabe'e has published an interesting article in the 25th April 2005 issue of the well-known Saudi international daily “Asharq Alawsat”. Below is a translation of the article from Arabic:
Commemorating the Armenian Genocide
It is already the 90th anniversary of one of the most brutal mass annihilations in the history of mankind: the Armenian Genocide, a chain in a series of crimes against humanity, involving many peoples: massacres against Jews, Kurds, Palestinians and Armenians.
A short while ago was the anniversary of the Holocaust, the crime that Hitler committed against the Jews. Newspapers, radio and TV stations conducted many interviews and discussions on the subject of Holocaust. It is true that our human duty is to express solidarity with the Jewish victims of Nazism, but it is pity that human beings are still selective, even when it comes to the past: for example the killings of the Jews have become an international event, commemorative monuments are erected and museums for the victims are built, acts that are required indeed. But what about the Armenian Genocide? Why this appalling silence every year? Why the Turkish insistence on not publicly apologizing to the Armenian people, although the current Turkish generation is not guilty and the apology would be for a historical crime, all of whose victims and perpetrators have passed away by now.
I am used to write on the occasion of the Armenian Genocide. I am also used to receive every time a letter from the Turkish Embassy in
There are other tragic events in the history of mankind, dealt also with a selective method: The anniversary of the Kurdish Halabja passes silently, although a crime with chemical weapons have been committed there against innocent families. The day of Sabra and Shatila and before that Deir Yassin: people were killed brutally like sheep. The anniversary of Saddam Hussein's invasion to Kuwait: the killing of people, the destruction of a country and the burning of more than five hundred oil wells, one of the greatest crimes against the environment.
I hope that we all read the message of the Prime Minister of Japan, in which he is apologizing to all the nations who were victims of the Japanese colonial period. He apologized in frank, clear and comprehensive way, with pride. It is a great human merit to act so, especially all we are asking is a mere apology … the least a faithful can do.
See article in Arabic language
