Robert Fisk Suggests Compiling List of Ottoman Turks who Saved Armenians During 1915 Genocide

“Armenians should honor those Turks who saved Armenian citizens during the Armenian Genocide. Dialogue can start also from there, because they too were Turks living in the Ottoman Empire,” said The Independent columnist and Middle East correspondent Robert Fisk, speaking to Turkish daily Radikal in Turkey.

“I wrote about the Armenian Genocide in my book [The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East] and now it’s being translated into Turkish. Yes, I know there is a risk that Turkish readers might focus only on these chapters without giving importance to the others. But I have to say, there are more Turks now speaking freely about their Armenian relatives and grandparents. So I recommend compiling a list of Ottoman Turks who saved Armenian citizens during the 1915 genocide. And I’m recommending this to not only Armenians but also Turks. They are obliged to honor these people because they rescued the consciousness of Turks. After all, both Germany and England confessed their genocides and nothing happened [to them]. Turkey is a brave country,” he said.

Fisk mentioned that to speak about and remember the Armenian Genocide will not make Turkey an EU member, but, according to Fisk, it has to be  in the “must list” of conditions for Turkey’s ascension into the EU.