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By Prof. James Mace, Consultant to The Day
The Day Weekly Digest in English
Kyiv, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 23, 2004
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Our Armenian friends have had an uphill road to tell the world about
their national tragedy when in 1915 they were marched off on charges
that they supported Russia in World War I (some did) and about half
of those so herded to wherever died along the way, an estimated
million and a half of them. Fifteen countries have recognized their
tragedy as an act of genocide.
The United States is not among them, because it values its relationship
with Turkey, one of the main reasons for founding NATO having been
to save that particular country from the blessings of Communism, where
after ten years Saudi Arabia would have no doubt suffered a shortage
of sand.
This writer recalls how in 1982, when Israel hosted the International
Conference on the Holocaust and Genocide, Turkey was almost ready
to declare war at the thought that there would be papers on the Armenian
genocide. In 1978 the Third Committee of the United Nations adopted
the Ruhashankiko report on genocide, which due to Turkish pressure
left the Armenians out, but in 1985 another report by Ben Whitaker put
them in. There are Ukrainian diplomats at the United Nations ready to
follow suit on the basis of these earlier reports.
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James Mace
Photo by the ArtUkraine.com Information Service
(Click on image to enlarge it)
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Most recently, the Armenians in the USA found lawyers, began a class
action suit in California, and were awarded $20 million from the New
York Life Insurance Company (Why them? Did they insure all those
unfortunate Armenian victims?). Of course, the lawyers took a large
part of the award, but our Armenian friends were not after the money.
They wanted recognition, and at least a court in California gave it
to them. This can only be welcomed.
Ukrainians also have their national tragedy, the Holodomor. There are
also Ukrainian-Americans preparing to pursue an identical class
action suit against whomever they might find among the companies
doing business with the Soviet Union at the time and that might be
said to have some responsibility for the death of millions of
Ukrainians. The writer of these lines has no idea about who might be
culpable except the now dead leaders of the then Soviet Union, but
our Armenian friends showed an example that Ukrainians can follow.
The dead victims deserve recognition, and our Armenian friends have
blazed the trail. There are Ukrainians in America who already follow
that trail (especially the Trident Foundation in California) and
undoubtedly lawyers who will take half the money, should any be
awarded. The money is not the point here. There is a 1987 book from
Canada by the late Doug Tottle, "Fraud, Famine and Fascism: The
Ukrainian Genocide Myth from Hitler to Harvard." The least we can do
for those who suffered is to seek recognition that their sufferings were no
myth.
LINK: http://www.day.kiev.ua/DIGEST/2004/11/issue.htm
FOR PERSONAL AND ACADEMIC USE ONLY
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