!� face="Verdana" size="2">I recently attended two meetings with the Turkish community in Zurich for discussions on the Armenian allegations. As is the case in the Netherlands, the problems of the Turkish community in Switzerland are becoming more severe. Among the Swiss is a growing tendency to harbor xenophobic, even racist, feelings against Turks. The 'just as you have committed genocide against the Armenians you are now massacring the Kurds' kind of claims have obviously taken root in Switzerland. They are 100 percent sure that these claims reflect undeniable facts.

Gündüz Aktan
  I recently attended two meetings with the Turkish community in Zurich for discussions on the Armenian allegations. As is the case in the Netherlands, the problems of the Turkish community in Switzerland are becoming more severe. Among the Swiss is a growing tendency to harbor xenophobic, even racist, feelings against Turks. The “just as you have committed genocide against the Armenians you are now massacring the Kurds” kind of claims have obviously taken root in Switzerland. They are 100 percent sure that these claims reflect undeniable facts.

  Since the Swiss authorities opened investigations into Perincek and Hallacoglu, official contacts between Turkey and Switzerland seem to have ceased. In other words, the stance taken by Switzerland has reached the point where it can seriously damage bilateral relations.

  Switzerland has, along with a number of other countries, displayed an interest in the Armenian problem since the relocation of Armenians. Sometimes this interest takes on an extreme nature. The Swiss government announced that it does not share the views expressed in the resolution the Swiss Parliament has adopted and the communiqué it has issued. However, in Switzerland and in any other country in a similar position, the government simply saying “I'm no part of that” does not solve the problem. Everybody knows the government adopts such an evasive stance so as not to compromise Swiss interests.

  It is as if there is a division of labor among the institutions, establishments and parliaments. With the audacity that comes from collective responsibility -- or, to put it differently, irresponsibility -- parliaments take whatever decision they like on this issue. Meanwhile, certain journalists who use the Armenian allegations to bolster the Kurdish separatist demands are campaigning intensely, taking refuge in “democracy and freedom of expression.” Similarly, associations, institutes and certain people at universities keep writing on this subject as if they were obsessed with it.

  In the face of this bombardment, people come to believe everything they hear. Under the circumstances the government saying “I'm not involved in that” does not prove meaningful. It should take a stance and try to prevent further deterioration of bilateral relations. The present situation gives the impression that as in Germany a number of handpicked individuals and associations are carrying out a planned psychological operation.

  Naturally, there are other reasons, too. Switzerland is a state created by three national minorities coming together. In the past it always feared disintegration. In fact that fear lies behind Switzerland not wanting to become an EU member. For this reason it considers it important for its internal balances to support minority rights everywhere in the world.

  There may also be another, primary, reason: the xenophobia and racism that are growing in Switzerland. In the latter part of the 1990s, due to the pressure exerted by America and the Jews, Switzerland admitted that it had committed crimes against the Jews during World War II, and it had to pay out large amounts of compensation.

  For this reason, as all the other countries that had taken part in the Holocaust in some manner, Switzerland is trying to prove that acts of genocide have been committed everywhere in the world at various junctions of human history. In other words they are trying to turn genocide into something “banal.” The Armenian genocide claims also provide the Swiss with a good opportunity to vent their racist sentiments harbored towards the Turks. In a way they are telling Turkey, “Admit your crime just as we have done.”

  In this context one has to refer also to a certain psychological mechanism at work here. They “displace” their own racial hatred toward the Turks by saying, “Turks harbor racial hatred towards the Kurds.” And they bolster that conviction by saying, “Turks did the same thing to the Armenians, anyway.”

  Meanwhile, they obviously want to deny the fact that behind any act of genocide there would necessarily be racist sentiments such as anti-Semitism. When they incorporated part of the Genocide Convention into Article 264 of the Swiss Penal Code, they chose to omit two key words: “as such.” Yet, it is precisely this phrase that indicates annihilation of a given group just for “being a member of that group.” (In fact the French too had done the same thing.) Thus, now they claim that there can be genocide without racism.

  Under the circumstances one could say that Swiss society displays serious symptoms of an illness. It would not be so hard to get rid of that. Rather than parroting the Armenian theses, let them initiate a joint study with us. We can study the archives together and hold meetings. The Armenians as well could take part in these studies if they so wanted. And we would see the extent of their knowledge on the subject.