Arsineh Khanjian has also sent the following letter to the Turks via Istanbul’s Agos Armenian Weekly: “It was exactly a year ago in April. I was in Istanbul, and my Turk friend, J. M. told me that she was going to read an excerpt from the book In Ruins by an Armenian writer of the Ottoman era Zabel Yesayan during her radio program. It was going to be dedicated to the memory of the 1.5 million Armenians who were killed by the Turkish government during WWI. To reconcile, my Turk friend suggested that we each read the parts about the tragic history of my nation in Armenian and Turkish. As we were walking to the radio station, I noticed that there were many Turkish flags in the city. My Turk friend explained to me that April 23^rd is an important day and is called “Day of National Sovereignty and Children’s Day”. On this occasion, children sit on the benches of the National Council and “govern” the country. When we reached the radio station, 8-10-year old children ran ahead of us with their teachers. They were visiting the radio station to celebrate. Their laughter was contagious and one could see the joy in their eyes. J. and I left and entered the booth. We quickly started reading Yesayan’s short stories about the 1909 massacres in Adana. I was all into sharing my experience with unknown listeners who were following the broadcast of terrible images. I tried to hide my emotions as I mentioned the details of the horrors that my people and my ancestors had seen. When J. started reading the line ��?I saw mothers who had suffocated their children so that their voices wouldn’t reveal their hideouts’ the group of children entered the other room silently in order to listen to our recording. I looked at J. for a moment. She was confused and troubled. She was horrified because she didn’t know what they were going to heart. J. looked at me, at the children and stopped. I’ll always be grateful to God for that great moment. I was shocked as I noticed how those innocent children will always bear the burden of all that happened to the Armenians, and the future generation will inherit the acts perpetrated by their ancestors. Some of these children were descendants of the criminals, indifferent people or those who deny the history and who eliminated the children of my ancestors. No parent, nanny or government can demand the right to protection when he or she or it advocates denial, brutality, misinformation and falsehood. Nobody has the right to spread darkness for the sake of nationalism and the ideas of the nation. It’s going to be hard for these children because the only way they will be able to save themselves, be free and have dignity will be to come to grips with their past that their ancestors passed on to them. My grandfather, Aristakes was born in Erzrum. In 1915, when he was five years old, he bore his father’s head on little knees after a Turk soldier had killed him in front of the boy’s eyes. Later, my grandfather’s sons were named after the eliminated members of the family, including the mother (Mary), father (Grigor), brother (Nshan) and sister (Zabel). Zabel was my mother.

Armenian translation by Araz Gaimagamian

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