By Asbarez | Monday, 23 December 2013
Carvings are seen on the exterior of the Church of the Holy Cross, an Armenian church on Akhtamar Island in Lake Van (Photo by Reuters)
In an Al-Monitor article titled “Turkish academia and the Armenian genocide,” author Orhan Kemal Cengiz asks “Are there no academics willing to write dissertations contesting Turkey’s official history line and argue, for instance, that the 1915 events were a genocide? Or is there a state mechanism in place that doesn’t leave it up to chance?”
He also elaborates on several recent media reports which suggest that Turkish academicians engaging in the study of the Armenian Genocide are being targeted by national institutions, such as the Turkish Historical Society (TTK), which has asked Turkey’s Higher Education Board (YOK) to provide the names of all academicians researching the Armenian Genocide.
The author says this effort aims to control academia. The academicians are also secretly profiled by the government.
Cengiz is a human rights lawyer, columnist and former president of the Human Rights Agenda Association, a Turkish NGO that works on human rights issues ranging from the prevention of torture to the rights of the mentally disabled. Since 2002, Cengiz has been the lawyer for the Alliance of Turkish Protestant Churches.
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