BY ARUNANSH B. GOSWAMI
Today almost the entire world recognises the Holocaust and the oppression of Nazis fuelled by their racist policies, but it is a sheer travesty that a large part of the world has accepted the forced Turkification of huge swathes of Armenian and Greek Anatolian territories as normal!
As an Indian the author understands deeply the pain of loosing ancestral land, a significant part of ancient India was lost by a quintessentially similar process as mentioned above. The ancient temples in Gandhara (Now Pakistan), Balochistan (Now Pakistan and Iran) and Bangladesh extol the Indic civilisation that made them, and all those who keenly observe and listen, can easily discern this extolment.
Ancient civilizations like India, Byzantine Anatolia and Armenia have openly welcomed migrants who came and settled in our lands if not wholly substantially, but equally opposed resolutely, the nefarious intentions of conquerors who wanted to occupy our land, today our existence as countries of India, Greece and Armenia is a proof of our resolute defense of our motherlands. We exist because of our heroes like Theodoros Kolokotronis, Andranik Ozanian and Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaja that our respective civilizations produced.
Occupation
The author of this article was recently in Azerbaijan as a tourist, a country created by descendants of Persianised Oghuz Turks who migrated in eleventh century from Central Asia, fleeing Mongol persecution, and on their part doing exactly the same, persecuting the local Armenian, and Greek populations. Slowly they carved out major parts of what is now Azerbaijan and Turkey from the lands of great Armenian and Greek civilisations. While travelling in Azerbaijan, the author observed the boisterous display of victory in the second Nagorno-Karabakh war by the Azerbaijanis, in which they occupied Armenian Artsakh. Why is the author calling Arthsakh also known as Karabagh Armenian? The reason is as a part of Armenia Artsakh is mentioned in the works of Strabo, Pliny the Elder, Claudius Ptolemy, Plutarch, Dio Cassius, and other ancient authors and in no way can Muslim Azerbaijanis who have pan-Islamist friends like Pakistan and Turkey be considered successors of Christian Caucasian Albanians who ruled in Artsakh.
Almost everywhere there was display of Azerbaijani occupation from the buildings that had flags of the so called “three brothers” Turkey, Azerbaijan and Pakistan (A nation that has illegally occupied a part of Indian Kashmir which India wants back), to metro stations with posters showing military marching and slogans “Qarabağ Azərbaycandır!” and even water bottles that have “taste of victory and Qarabağ Azərbaycandır!“ written on them! In a small town called Sheki, once part of the Silk Road, few Azerbaijani kids asked the author’s nationality, and when the author told them Indian, they started shouting Pakistan in response! Is tourism sector also to be polluted by hate? Absolutely not, we should never let this happen as collective humanity. Author would like to add, that he also met Azerbaijanis who were nice to him but almost all hated Armenians. There was no clergy or worship happening in the churches author visited in Azerbaijan, which have been left not damaged to show the tolerance of Azerbaijani people towards Christians, but compare it with India a Hindu majority country where Islamic and Christian prayers are held daily in thousands of mosques and churches around the country respectively.
No Support
It is not as if Second Nagarno-Karabakh war was the first time a systematic attempt to expel or kill indigenous populations was made, there have been many such attempts in history, like by Pakistan in what is now the country of Bangladesh in 1971, when ethnic Pathans and Punjabis did genocide of Bengali Muslims and India had to intervene to save the Bengalis. Then 93,000 soldiers of Pakistan surrendered in-front of Indian army, because the entire world was not a mute spectator to the humanitarian disaster that Pakistan was executing, then USSR stood strongly behind India and with a strong army India saved the Bengalis. Unfortunately in the Second Nagarno-Karabakh war almost the entire, Christian world became a mute spectator to the atrocities committed against the oldest Christian nation of the world Armenia. More than 3,400 Armenian fighters and civilians have died since the beginning of Azerbaijani-Turkish-Pakistani operations, with over 100,000 civilians displaced. Armenian Orthodox churches have been targeted, as have civilians.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Turkey deployed up to 2,000 Islamist jihadis from Syria and Libya who are promised a bounty for killing Armenians. Situation today is very bad in Artsakh, and now Azerbaijan has submitted a demand to expel the Armenian clergymen from Dadivank Monastery in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh). “Armenian priests in Khudavang Monastery [i.e., Dadivank Monastery] should leave there,” said the chairman of the Azerbaijani State Committee for Work with Religious Organizations, Mubariz Gurbanli, APA reports. Something similar happened when Erdogan to consolidate his vote bank, made Hagia Sophia Museum (Originally a Greek Orthodox church) made a mosque and now he has won the elections!
Persecution
Lakhs of Greeks, Armenians and Indians (Hindu Indians) have been massacred by Turks, Sultan Abdülhamid was responsible for 1894 pogrom that resulted in the killing of between 100,000 and 300,000 Armenians. Between 1914 and 1918, in Ottoman Türkiye more than 100,000 unarmed Pontian Greek civilians were deported; most died and in India Turkic commander Mahmud of Ghazni slaughtered or enslaved 2 million Indian Hindus, and sent the slaves to Ghazni, where they were either sold or forced to serve the generals.
Even after centuries of persecution Greece, Armenia and India have never closed the doors for friendship even with our former enemies. But today the existence of Armenia is in danger because of collective apathy of the Christian world, does the Christin world Armenia to become just a part of history books as the first Christian nation in the world? If not then unity is must.
Solution
Christian world has to be united, to counter the aggression of Pakistan, Azerbaijan and Turkey and also welcome them with open arms as friends if they give up their aggressive militaristic mindset. One thing the so called “three brothers” need to remember, is that no Christian or even other nation, even those in the Islamic Arabic world will ever accept destruction of their independence or occupation of any part of their territory by Turks, therefore if they want to live peacefully in the modern world, they need to accept their neighbors as their friends. This age is not the age of war!
Arunansh B. Goswami is a Historian, Lawyer, and Political Consultant based in India
1 comment
Very interesting article. The author is 100% correct in that not one Christian nation came to the aid of Armenia when they were being attacked by the three parasites – pakistan, turkey and azerbaijan plus israel who supplied arms and assisted the azeries in using the drones and weapons against the Armenians of Artsakh. Yes! israel the country who had faced the same atrocities as the Armenians but yet and to their advantage they decided to aid the corrupt regimes of pakistan, turkey and azerbaijan. Oil being one of the main instigators and the fact that Iran is in their sights for whatever reason. Shame on the western christian world, the russians who did absolutely nothing to stop the attacks. The UN did NOTHING useful and have still done nothing. What is it called? “The United Nations”? what an absolute joke. Shame on those people who are sitting on their chairs, shuffling paper, getting paid but doing nothing constructive. No peace keeping forces were sent to stop the madness of these three corrupts nations. Shame on all involved.