This spring, the Armenian community in the Netherlands placed a monument in the graveyard in Assen in commemoration of the victims of the 1915 genocide. The commemoration was met with great resistance from Turks in Holland and Turkey. Because speaking of genocide, none of it is true, proposes spokesperson Yusal of the National Federation of Turkish Associations in Holland. Six months later Lejo Siepe went back to Assen for Human and made a sequel of his previous radio-documentary on this "Armenian case". by Lokien de Bie

NIKOLAI Romashuk (48) had imagined it differently. Three years ago he collected money from his compatriot Armenians living in Assen to make a long kept wish come true: erecting a monument "in commemoration of the innocent Armenian victims of the 1915 genocide". In a letter to Assen municipality, where some two-hundred Armenians live, he asked for permission to erect a monument in a public place. Internally Assen authorities rejected the request. Accidently an initial letter that was sent to Romashuk did approve. This approval could not be turned back anymore. Cause for rage among the Turks in Holland, who see the monument as intensely provocative. They protested, intimidated, and threatened. E-mail bombs from home and abroad caused the municipal electronic postbox to collapse. Extremist Grey Wolves sent letters saying they would travel to Assen with two-hundred followers.

The threat had an effect. The two-meter high monument, made of volcanic stone from Armenia, has arrived, but not on the spot that Romashuk had in mind, and with another, much more neutral inscription. "In commemoration of our ancestors 1910-1920" is now carved in it. Because speaking of genocide, none of it is true, proposes Yusal on behalf of the National federation of Turkish Associations in Holland, "for protection Armenians were transported at the time to neighboring countries where they all arrived well." The Turkish federation began a procedure to prevent the placing of the monument. The jugde dismissed the arguments.

Few cases in the historiography of the twentieth century are as loaded and controversial as the Armenian genocide. The facts: when the Ottoman Empire got involved in a war with Russia in 1915, the front was in Anatolia, in the east of Turkey, where many Armenians lived. In the winter of 1914/15 the Turks lost the battle and Russians were able to advance. At that moment the former Turkish government decided to deport all present Armenians, who were considered dangerous collaborators, in masses to Syria and Mesopotamia. deportation, that led to genocide. Approximately six hundred thousand people died of hunger, thirst, disease or abuse. Or they were killed by the escorting army and police. Between 1915 and 1922 an estimated one million Armenians were killed and 400 thousand died in prison camps. A few hundred thousand were driven into exile.

The hope of the survivor part of the Armenian people for the creation of a national state was nullified when the republic Turkey was announced in 1923. The designated "independent" state (of the Soviet Union) was taken away from Armenians within two years. Even recognition of the cruel fate was not given to them. Because although by now among historians there is a consensus that a genocide was committed against the Armenians, (supported with evidence like photos and eye-witness accounts), Turkey does not want to recognize it to this day. And a number of countries that for political and/or economic reasons want to keep Turkey a friend (among which the Netherlands) want it equally less. Turkey insists that the Armenians at the time were victim of war circumstances. The measures to export Armenians from their territories served exactly to protect them, because a part of their militant compatriots conspired with the Russian army. Thereby deaths fell, sure, but of a deliberate, organized mass murder on a minority is out of question. No genocide. The present international relations allow Turkey to persevere that attitude. Yet the ten thousand descendents of Armenian refugees, spread across the world, and the eighty thousand Armenians in Turkey are waiting for apologies from the Turkish government.

"But apologies are not a matter for discussion," says Erik J. Zürcher, professor of Turkish linguistics and literature at the University of Leiden. "It is not realistic to make the present Turkish Republic responsible for the murders of 1915. The Turkish government could, however, express finding the events tragic." This is not to be expected. Turkish pride and fear for an Armenian claim to "Wiedergutmachung" come in the way of normalization. Recognition could mean that confiscated land has to be returned and compensation payed. In Dutch politics Member of Chamber Leen van Dijke of the Christen Unie is the only one who stands up so strongly for Armenian interests. He reproaches opportunism among the governmental parties. "The purple coalition recoils from a judgement in fear of reactions from the Turkish community in the Netherlands. The European Parliament recently announced that recognition of the genocide is a precondition for Turkey's accession to the European community. Why should we not follow?" Six months after the ceremonial unveiling, the tumult around the monument in the Assenese graveyard has still not died down. The Turkish Islamic Cultural Federation has appealed to a higher court against the verdict of the authority's judge, who earlier authorized the placing of the monument. The Council of State will pass a judgement soon. The Turkish community continues to hold on to her vision of history. "The monument has become a place of pilgrimage for the Armenians," says A. Tonca, chairman of the Turkish Islamic Cultural Federation, an umbrella organization that fosters 143 mosques in Holland. "And that is unfair, we feel accused of an event that in our opinion never occurred." Nikolai Romashuk, who was received as an hero on invitation of the Armenian community in America last summer, is optimistic despite the counteractions. The monument is there, in Assen. Indeed dedicated in commemoration to the Armenian ancestors of Nikolai Romashuk, who died between 1910 and 1920. But all Armenians in Assen and surroundings understand that it is at the same time a monument commemorating the one and a half million Armenians who fell victim during the genocide of 1915. Romashuk is not out to provoke the Turkish community. It is not bitterness that drives him, but frustration over the denial of the murder on his people. For years when he was young he read what was written on the board every school day: "If our children forget the Turkish atrocities, the world will curse them." Nikolai Romashuk: "We want to commemorate, collectively. Because we cannot forget.
That has been imprinted on us."

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