Monday, 5 November 2007

Armenian Genocide debate - Kurds - Cyprus

Immediately below an embeddeed video of the entirety of the historic and much argued-over 'Armenian Genocide Debate' held in the Foreign Relations Committee of the US House of Representatives on 10th October 2007.



As Turkish PM Erdogan visited Washington 5th November for talks with George Bush, which he will no doubt would wish to emerge from with a Turko-American version of the strategic partnership agreement he signed with Britain last month, in exchange for not rocking the boat in Northern Iraq (over the Kurds), readers of this blog might wish to take a look at the video material at the two following profiles on YouTube, (which provide the source material for the videos below). The true historical nature of the Turkey which is such a good expedient partner for the US, and now a "Strategic Partner" for poodle Britain is shown. But, will the master of the poodle jump as high as the poodle at the urgings of the Turkish Prime Minister? This is the Turkey for whom Britain will strategise entry to the EU?


http://youtube.com/sakobb
The two playlists below DO NOT WORK but are included here anyway as 'placemarkers' to encourage viewers to visit the YouTube account (detailed immediately above) to view the material.

(a) Professor
Taner Akcam talks about the Armenian genocide (watch all five parts).



(b) Germany Turkey and the Armenian Genocide - documentary (7 sections)



More material by Turkish archives-historian Taner Akcam, at:
http://www.youtube.com/LanguageSoup
(A talk on Taner Akcam's book "A Shameful Act", at the Human Rights faculty of Columbia University)



Also, I found the following video on FORA TV which goes over history which I must admit I did not know the details of, and I imagine many of us don't, so I make it available here for those who have a spare hour-and-a-half to follow it all. The period of history being talked about is the Lausanne Treaty of 1923, but it is just as relevant today, with events happening in Iraq and still now in the Balkans with Kosovo -- as well as Cyprus of course.

http://fora.tv/2007/10/18/A_Troubling_History_of_Ethnic_Conflict

Harvard University
Cambridge, MA
Oct 18th, 2007

Historian Bruce Clark discusses the emergence of modern Greece and Turkey in the early 20th century. Leaders in both countries sought to advance a national ethnic identity, resulting in mass expulsions of Christian Greeks from Turkey and Muslims from Greece.




Below, a playlist from my own YouTube account with items from a variety of media sources, though mostly from Al-Jazeera English which has chosen to follow the Turkey-Kurds situation particularly closely, to show the developing 'attitude' in Turkey during and following the Armenian Genocide debate in the US House of Representatives early in October 2007.




Lastly, a playlist with items from recent Cyprus politics, providing a reaction in Cyprus to Britain's Gordon Brown having signed a "Strategic Partnership Agreement" with Turkey's Erdogan during the latter's visit to Downing Street in October 2007. Video clips of the press conference are included, with Erdogan referring at length to how it is the UN Security Council which has failed to endorse the Report about the Annan Plan process which is to blame for the lack of progress. During the press conference both Brown and Erdogan failed to refer to the Gambari Agreement in November 2006 which has been agreed by the UN Security Council as the 'way forward' .

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