TARC MODERATOR'S BOOK REVEALS INITIATIVE'S ANTI-ARMENIAN
INTENT
08-02-2005 14:58:00 | USA | Articles and Analyses
By Harut Sassounian
Publisher, The California Courier
David Phillips, the moderator of the Turkish-Armenian
Reconciliation Commission, is about to publish a book that
discloses the true motives of those who initiated and supported
TARC.
Based on an advanced copy of Phillips's book, "Unsilencing
the Past: Track Two Diplomacy and Turkish-Armenian
Reconciliation," analyst Emil Danielyan wrote two lengthy
reports last week for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Here are
some of the highlights of Phillips's interesting revelations, as
reported by Danielyan:
- Phillips confirms that the US government was the driving
force behind TARC. The idea was suggested to him by
Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman, the
number three figure in the State Department under the Clinton
and Bush administrations. TARC held its first meeting in Vienna
in early 2001.
- Phillips acknowledges that the State Department provided
"some of TARC's direct costs." All of the sources of TARC's
funds and their uses have not been made public.
- Phillips accuses Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian of
reneging on his pledge to support TARC. Apparently, he would
have preferred that Oskanian continue backing TARC, even after
it became clear that TARC was a clever ploy to undermine the
recognition of the Armenian Genocide.
- Phillips bitterly complains: "Instead of standing by its
commitments, the Kocharian government ran for cover." This made
Phillips so furious that he slammed the Kocharian regime in an
op-ed column in the Wall Street Journal by calling it "corrupt
and inept," and accusing Pres. Kocharian of "running a mafia
state."
- Phillips attributes Oskanian's change of mind on TARC to
criticism from Armenian "nationalist circles." Once TARC's
anti-Armenian intent became clear, just about everyone in
Armenia and the Diaspora opposed this sinister initiative.
Shortly after TARC's creation, one of its Turkish members, Ozdem
Sanberk, even gave an interview acknowledging that the purpose
of this initiative was to block the international recognition of
the Armenian Genocide.
- Gunduz Aktan, a Turkish member of TARC, who repeatedly
and aggressively denies the Armenian Genocide, put his foot in
his mouth by suggesting that an independent panel of experts
review the facts of the Genocide. TARC engaged the International
Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) for that purpose. Aktan
boasted that he would "destroy" the ICTJ experts with his legal
arguments during his testimony. Phillips says that Aktan
appeared "nervous" after making his presentation. Aktan had good
reason to be nervous. The ICTJ qualified the events of 1915 as
genocide.
- Trying to give importance to his own efforts, Phillips
claims that Turkey came within an inch of opening its border
with Armenia in the summer of 2003. Showing his political
naivete, Phillips says in his book: "I had hoped that Ankara
would quietly open its border sometime during the dead of
summer, when everyone was on holiday and not paying attention."
- Phillips writes that when Turkey's Foreign Minister
Abdullah Gul came to Washington in July 2003, Secretary of State
Colin Powell, Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld, and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice
reminded him at every meeting that "the issue of genocide
recognition was not going away. He was told that real progress
was the best way of deflecting pressure." Not surprisingly, the
US officials' real intent for pressuring Turkey into opening its
border with Armenia was not the improvement of Armenia's
economy, but the removal of the nettlesome Armenian Genocide
issue from the agenda of the Congress.
- As further evidence of the sinister intent of the Bush
Administration, Phillips writes that Vice President Cheney
personally intervened by lobbying against a congressional
resolution that barely mentioned the Armenian Genocide. "Cheney
worked the phones and was assured by [House Speaker] Dennis
Hastert that [the resolution] would be kept from the House
floor," Phillips says.
- In an interesting revelation, Phillips reports that Pres.
Kocharian was highly infuriated when the Armenian Genocide
resolution was blocked by Pres. Clinton and Speaker Hastert. A
month later, when Pres. Kocharian received Stephen Sestanovich,
an assistant secretary of state in the Clinton administration,
the Armenian President was "in a foul mood and railed against
Clinton's betrayal," Phillips says. This is yet another
indication that Armenian officials, not just the Diaspora, care
deeply about the Genocide issue.
- Phillips reveals that he helped arrange the controversial
February 2001 interview between Pres. Kocharian and prominent
Turkish journalist Mehmet Ali Birand that "helped mollify
[Turkish] concerns about Armenia's intentions." Apparently,
Phillips promised Pres. Kocharian that should he make
conciliatory statements during the interview, the Turks would
then open the border with Armenia. Pres. Kocharian kept his end
of the bargain. Phillips did not or could not, since the border
remained closed!
- Phillips wrongly blames "Armenian nationalists" for both
of his failures - inability to have Turkey lift its blockade of
Armenia and collapse of the reconciliation efforts. Phillips
refuses to acknowledge that his profound ignorance of
Armenian-Turkish issues played a much greater role in his
failures than anything said or done by so-called Armenian
nationalists.
More on Phillips's escapades, once we get hold of his book!