24 April 2008 / International Bureau / Statement No: 34

24 April is the starting date of the genocide of the Armenian people in Anatolia. The policy and practice of the genocide which was registered as an "Armenian resettlement" by the Ottoman Empire in 1915 has been the historical tradition of the Turkish Republic which was shaped on its heir.
Osmanlı Devleti'nin 1915'te "Ermeni tehciri" olarak kayıtlara geçen soykırım politikası ve pratiği, onun mirası üzerinde şekillenen Türkiye Cumhuriyeti'nin de tarihsel geleneği olmuştur.
Until now the Turkish state has continued to apply the annihilation and denial policy taken over from the Ottoman Empire as the official ideology of the state. Racism and chauvinism are the basis of this ideology.

The policy of hostility and annihilation taken over from the Ottoman has also continued after the Armenian genocide throughout the Republic`s history. They have continued with the massacres on September 6-7, 1955 carried out mainly against the Greeks as well as against the other minorities, dozens of massacres against the Kurdish people, the bombs on the Kurdish people nowadays and the land operations in Southern Kurdistan in February this year. With the hostility against Armenians and Greeks, the Turkish state managed to stop the Turlish people to show any reaction and question these massacres organised against non-Turkish people.

Although 93 years have passed since the Armenian genocide, it has still not been recognised by the state. The Turkish state has continued its Armenian hostility for 90 years and strengthened this as the most absolute and fanatic side of the official ideology. By keeping the Armenian hostility always alive, it could be hindered that the genocide faced an
examination by society.

The annihilation and denial policy against the Kurdish people that has existed for several tens of years have outmoded with the freedom struggle of the Kurdish people and the national uprise in the last 30 years. Although the state`s annihilation and denial policy continues, the struggle of the Kurdish people paying a high amount for it managed to make the whole world accept the existence of the Kurdish nation and the reality of the Kurdish question.

The insistence of the state on the Armenian hostility was once again displayed with the murder of the Armenian intellectual Hrant Dink. However, the mass reflex shown at the funeral of Hrant Dink and the mass action on the anniversary of his death showed that the taboos on the Armenian genocide were broken.

Defending a people, that is a victim of genocide, by saying "We are all Armenians" concerning the case of a murdered one among them, is a strike against the Armenian hostility, chauvinism and denial and at the same time it shows the path to follow.

Questioning the official ideology that started with the broad defence of Hrant Dink will continue rapidly. Our party will strengthen its struggle in order to drive the efforts of the Turkish people social enlightenment and to strenghten the brotherhood and friendship of the people. The examination of our Turkish people with this bloody history will not be hindered.

On the occasion of the anniversary of April 24, our party is sharing once again the pain of our Armenian people and will strengthen determinedly its fight to send those who let the Armenian and the other people face this pain garbage dump of history.

As written in its program of the anti-imperialist democratic revolution, our party will continue with its struggle to ensure the equality on rights of the Kurdish and Turkish people, to stop the oppression of all languages and cultures, to fight systematically against Turkish nationalism and to make the Kurdish and Turkish people, Laz, gypsy, Abhaz, Georgian. Tscherkesian, Arabic, Armenian, Greek and other ethnic groups living together on the basis of equality of rights and with their own free will in the Union of Soviet Republics of Workers and Labourers.

Long live the people`s brotherhood !
Long live proletarian internationalism!

MLCP
Turkey/Northern Kurdistan
International Bureau