I was shocked and deeply saddened to hear of Hrant Dink’s murder (more like assassination) today in front of his Agos newspaper offices, in Istanbul Turkey.
I met Hrant Dink at the L.A. premiere of “Screamers“, the documentary by Carla Garapedian featuring System Of A Down. Hrant is interviewed by Carla in the film where he explains how the “deep state” in Turkey is utilizing an outdated penal code, Article 301 to try him, Orhan Pamuk, and other journalists, writers, and human rights activists for “insulting or offending Turkishness.”
In his newspaper Agos, Hrant discussed issues important to the Armenians of Turkey. He was quite careful not to insult anyone in Turkey present or past regarding the Armenian Genocide or any other “sticky issues” that may be taken negatively. He instead tried to truly understand why so many people in Turkey were in denial of their past, why it was important to have a “real democracy” there where everyone can speak freely without worrying about retributions. He was by no means a fanatic nor extremist, but was a humble, kind, yet truthful individual who cared about Turkey, his country, and being Armenian, his culture and heritage.
He yearned to bridge the understanding between Armenians and Turks to get over the pains of the past stemming from the Armenian Genocide by the Ottomans in 1915. The difference between Hrant Dink and Orhan Pamuk and other writers or journalists incriminated under Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code was that Hrant Dink was of Armenian descent and therefore may have been viewed more so as a traitor than other Turks of Turkish descent.
After many attempts at appealing the 3 different cases brought against him in reference to Article 301, Hrant was ready to take his case of freedom of speech to the European Court of Human Rights. In the last article he wrote for Agos on Jan. 10th, he made it very clear that the overwhelming amount of death threats against him were psychologically punishing him for speaking out. He felt his life was in extreme danger and asked for help from security officials of the country, but was not given any. When friends encouraged him to leave Turkey to avoid danger, he said that if he left now, he would be betraying the fight for democracy in Turkey, and that wouldn’t be fair to others in his situation. I am not that heroic, I would have left. And funny enough when we met, he mused with me, calling me heroic, the whole time while I looked into his gentle eyes and knew in my heart that he was the true hero. It’s easy for me to speak out against things, because at worst, I’ll be faced with brutal disagreement, where he was faced with prison terms, harassment, psychological torture, and now death.
So he was killed, brutally, in daylight, with bullets to the head, another beautiful soul silenced no more.
Hrant Dink’s cases along with Orhan Pamuk’s past case and many others facing incrimination in Turkey under Article 301 of the penal code encouraged me to work with Amnesty International in getting the word out and working on trying to reverse this unjust incrimination of the freedoms of speech there
Zum 
Hello Serj,
I read your article on the Genocide of the Armenians. My compliments on your work. I noticed that you had assistance from Mr. Jean Arhan when you did the research. Mr. Arhan was my teacher in the late sixties at St. Joseph Aintoura. If you happen to have his e-mail address, would you be so kind to share it with me? I wish you continued success in your efforts on your publications on behalf of the opressed.
Best regards,
Richard Sleiman
Greenville, SC USA
dear richard,
i did not write this article, ” serj tankian ” did, who is an armenian – american musician. but i will try to send your comment to his record label and perhaps he will respond.
thank you very much for reading this article,
regards,
zum~
Hello Zum,
You would kindly remove my message from your blog?. Many thanks
Richard
Thanks, always good posts on your blog!
Dear Zum
Yusuf Halaçoğlu, president of the Turkish Historical Society (TTK), has announced that a graveyard in Mardin’s Nusaybin district that had been claimed by the Armenians in fact dates to the Roman period.
During a press conference Halaçoğlu said they had appealed to foreign scientists to come and assist with the opening of the graveyard. David Gaunt, a scientist from Switzerland, was the only one to express interest.
Gaunt accepted the offer on condition that the research be conducted without intervention from the Turkish administration. Gaunt began studies with the TTK president and delegation on April 24. However Gaunt soon realized that the photographs of the graveyard he had seen were different from the graveyard in Nusaybin and thus decided to return home without taking any soil or bone samples from the grave.
Reading the results of the soil and bone samples tested at Ankara University’s engineering department, Halaçoğlu said Turkish scientists had determined that the bones to belong to the Roman period.
Have a nice day with Armenian raphsody of lies to all enemies of the Turks.
regards
Oguz Tolga
ıt’s been quite a long time from my last visit.I realy want to ask your opinions about the Switzerland parliement’s law agains denaying the Armanian so-called killings.According to the champions of democracy country Swştzerland it is forbidden to say against Armenian idiotic derams of 1915.Please let me know what do all you thinking.
All the best from Istanbul
Oguz
hello serj, my name is davit and I am a big fan of your work (your poetry, your music and your lyrics everything)and I realy respect you as a person how u speak your mind about the armenian genocide I want to be like one day ur the best tsavet tanum
Dear Serj Tankian
I really do honor your work on the genocide in Armenia and I have recently heard your song “speak on it” These pieces are truly reflective of how bad the people in this planet can be…But at the same time if there are more people like you and the people who took their time to read it and think about it, maybe there is hope after all
Respectively yours
Mitchell
P.S. Is there anyway you can come to Newfoundland, Canada I would be more than honored to go to your concert along with all of my friends.
Liarmenian allegation is the Big Lie of the century?
They are just as convinced that it is a lie as Liarmenians are convinced it is true.
The killings of 1915 were the result of a massive armed uprising by the Lirmenians, instigated by the Liarmenian terror gangs of Dashnaks and Hunchaks, among others.
Not only did Liarmenians commit mass murder of defenseless villagers, they sabotaged the Ottoman war effort and collaborated with the invading Russian armies.
Russian soldiers are not known for their quality of mercy, but even they were aghast at the atrocities committed by the rampaging Liarmenians – so much so that the Russian commander on the scene gave an ultimatum to his superiors back home : Allow me to pull the rampaging Liarmenians to the back of the lines or I resign my command.
The government took action to protect the population from the Liarmenians and to prevent them from aiding the Russian invaders.
It ordered a relocation of the Liarmenians away from the war zone.
Yes, some died during the relocation.
There wasn’t enough, food, enough clothing, medicine.
There was disease.
There were attacks by Kurdish bands who were seeking revenge for earlier atrocities against the Kurds committed by Liarmenians.
But there was no genocide.
I think the rest of the Ottoman population could be a little excused for not feeling too much sympathy for the Liarmenians, for they were starving as well, and they had not even committed treason like the Liarmenians had.
I submit to you if the Liarmenians of this country did to the United States today, what the Liarmenians did to Ottoman Turkey back then, tomorrow we would not be speaking of an “Liarmenian diaspora”.
And the U.S. government would not even bother with a relocation.
At the same time, many other Ottomans died of the same causes.
The Ottoman soldiers fighting at Gallipoli had to subside on a daily ration of a handful of flour.
Yes, many Liarmenians who were innocent died, but Liarmenians killed innocents Turks and Kurds as well, and they did it first.
Liarmenians fired the first shot.
They drew first blood. Once you fire that first shot, you forfeit your life.
You cannot fire that first shot and then bellyache for the next hundred years that the other guy fired back with a volley.
That’s called war – not genocide.
This was a civil war started by Liarmenians and instigated by Machiavellian Liarmenian terrorists.
As someone said, any civil war, including our own, will look like genocide if you only count the dead of one side.
How about one of those genocide “experts” of yours start tallying the numbers murdered by the Liarmenian side?
The Holocaust comparison is the height of obscenity.
It is an insult to the Holocaust victims and to the nation of the Turks.
Jews of Germany committed none of the above-mentioned crimes against the German state or Germans.
Nor did the Jews commit any of those crimes against any other European country in which they were murdered.
Armenians of Ottoman Turkey committed those crimes and much more.
To boot, Shimon Peres of Israel, when he was foreign minister of that country, rejected the Liarmenian allegations as “meaningless”.
He said nothing similar to the Holocaust happened to the Liarmenians all said were lies and manufactured tales.
Last month(March)we have sent this email 360.000.000 times to the world:))with 200.000 Sukru Server Aya’s book summary freee:))hahahahaha ahahahaahahahahaha ahahah
Keep playing with your shit….in pigshit
.. hahahahah Liarmenians have 36485 days left on the earth… They have been cursed for their lies and they are counting the days of the vanishing point by natural reasons..
VERY FAMOUS LIARMENIAN LIES…….
1.Hitler’s speach was a lie.Nurenberg trials took it under record.
2.Vereshagin’s 1840s painting of skulls was used as Liarmenian skulls
3.Liarmenian population in 1914 and 1922 according to the USA records was 2.200.000 and 3.300.000 after war
4.Mr.Morgenthau’s diary was completelt written by his Liarmenian Secretery
5.Bue Book has been written for propoganda only
6.40 days in Moses Mountain aswell
7.All have been written by Toynbee were manufactured for propoganda against the Ottomans.
8.The crying Liarmenian boy and the Turkish soldier fake photo
9.Mustafa Kemal and Liarmenian boy under his leg fake photo
10.Mr.Kacaznuni’s book of confessions about non-existing Disney Genocide tale
11.Yerevan Museum has no even a single original document in there
12.Closed Liarmenian arcieves are still closed
13.Joint commission for the Liarmenian genocide is a strong fear of Mr.Liar sarkissian 14.There are no mass graves in Der Zor Syria
15.There are no
mass graves in Anatolia no eyewithnesses no documents nothing.
16.Talat Pasha’s telegram has been written 25 years after his dead by a Liarmenian liar
Hi Zum,
Thank you so much for this wonderful article. It doesn’t surprise me that Serj being such a great artist and speaker would also make such a wonderful writer. I read about Hrant Dink before and I was deeply saddened. Anyone for human rights should be a countries treasure. I always thought Turkey was a democracy. But alas Turkey has proven it’s no different than the rest of that part of the world
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