Events in Germany Honor Genocide Victims

Instead of living up to these moral and legal commitments, on the 110th anniversary of the genocide, officialdom has been silent.

“It is tragic enough,” Spangenberg said, that neither the German president nor government nor parliament “had a word of commemoration to offer the Armenians living here.”

Even more tragic, he said, is the fact that on April 25, EU Vice-President and Representative for Foreign Affairs and Policy Kaja Kallas “was courting dictator [Ilham] Aliyev in Baku.” This was a “slap in the face to all those who believe in European values,” as well as a “painful example of our culture of remembrance,” a reminder that the past can indeed return.

One German political figure named by Spangenberg as an exception to the rule of silence is Özdemir. And Özdemir spoke out clearly in Berlin. In his keynote address, he developed themes introduced by Spangenberg, with special emphasis on the need to fulfill the provisions of the Bundestag resolution. Glad to have been able to participate in the work leading up to its passage, Özdemir recalled that it was after “intense debates” that the atrocities were finally named by name as genocide and that the Bundestag “recognized the complicity of the German Empire and Germany’s special historical responsibility.”

However, it was the “sober truth” that this past and co-responsibility are still not part of the compulsory curriculum in any one federal state; if it is discussed in the classroom at all, that is due to the personal initiative of the teacher. It is the political forces, Özdemir said, who must push this through.

Addressing the relevant social context, with a large ethnic Turkish community in Germany, Özdemir said, “it’s not a matter of pointing the finger at Turkey or ethnic Turks in Germany,” but rather ensuring that “students of all backgrounds learn that a systematic genocide took place, and with German co-responsibility.”

In view of the close connection between the German and Turkish societies, he said “if German schools work through the Armenian genocide as part of the common history of the Ottoman and the German empires, then in a certain sense a new resonance space may come into being. Young people here could become in daily life transnational bridges of a critical culture of remembrance.”

To those critics who complain that this would “force students of Turkish background to accept a specific reading of history,” Özdemir quipped that such criticism “comes precisely from those who have done just that for decades.”

The issue for Özdemir is the active defense of democracy, and that requires “continuously renewing and strengthening the culture of memory in a pluralistic society.” And, concluding on an optimistic note, he mused aloud, “Who knows, who might in the future … be sitting next to the Armenian ambassador at such a ceremony? Perhaps the Turkish ambassador. I never lose hope.”

Fighting Cultural Genocide

The need to preserve culture figured in remarks by all the speakers, several of whom referenced the wanton destruction of Armenian churches, monasteries, and cultural identity itself through revisionist pseudohistory.

As is traditional in April 24 commemorations, Armenian music and literature interspersed the presentations. In Berlin, pianist Karine Gilanyan and soprano Narine Yeghiyan performed pieces by Bach, Komitas und Mirzoyan, whereas in Frankfurt, Maria Khachadourian-Spangenberg sang Krunk (Crane) and Hov areq sarer djan (Send me a fresh breeze, you lovely mountains), and Talin Jobanian, dressed in traditional garb, presented Tik zarkem, a work song from Shatak region, and Msho Gorani, a song of longing for the homeland.

In brief remarks, the young woman declared her intention to dedicate her life to the preservation and spreading of Armenian culture.

Anna Pfingsten Sahagian delivered a moving reading of selections from the memoirs of a survivor, “I remember everything…”

Bishop Isakhanyan concluded with very moving words of commemoration, with an appeal for peace, remembrance, and reconciliation. In Frankfurt his requiem prayers and final message assumed an ecumenical aura, as Reverend Christopher Easthill of the St. Augustine’s Anglican Church also took part.