Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Woland]

Here's a link to the NYTimes article on the capture of the suspect in the murder:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/21/world/europe/21turkey.html?hp&ex=1169355600&en=cf5f785b70340095&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Hrant Dink was a real voice of moderation, a man working to help Turkey face up to its past without destroying itself. He increasingly was a target for Turkish nationalist outrage over the past year. His conviction under Article 301 for supposed insults to Turkishness was an embarrassment to most, but a success for the nationalists.

The only good news I can see in this is the strength of both official and public reaction against the murder, which mirrors the resposnse to the bombing of the synagogues in Istanbul in 2003. All leading public figures have spoken out against this act. Turkish citizens have marched to the newspaper offices, carrying pictures of Dink, chanting, "We are all Armenian! We are all Hrants!" Hopefully, this can be turned into momentum for continuing Dink's work on reconciliation.

This murder was likely instigated by members of one of two right-wing nationalist groups affiliated with the Nationalist Action Party, the Grey Wolves or the Idealists (a youth branch of the Grey Wolves). The use of a teenager to carry out the murder reflects borrowing of tactics used in conservative families to carry out honor killings. The Nationalists have taken advantage of difficulties with the EU and the ineffectualness of the official opposition party to raise their profile politically the last few years. But the violence associated with them really reflects a desperate backlash against the increasing liberalization of the Turkish public. I can imagine that this will be used as an argument against Turkey being admitted to the EU, but I think the response and the real context of Turkey today argue for admission.

One sad note in the article is that the murderer was turned in by his own father. I can't imagine watching the news on tv and seeing my child kill someone.

Saddest of all is that someone who was doing good to try to bring people together and to resolve problems is gone.

[cbclark4]

al Jazeera

The suspected killer of a prominent Turkish-Armenian journalist has confessed to shooting Hrant Dink because he had insulted Turkish people, broadcaster it was reported on Sunday.

"I read on the internet that he said 'I am from Turkey but Turkish blood is dirty' and I decided to kill him ... I do not regret this," Ogun Samast told interrogators shortly after he was arrested in Samsun on the Black Sea coast, CNN Turk said.

Samast, 17, was arrested on Saturday and confessed to the murder in an initial interrogation in Samsun before he and several other suspects were transferred to Istanbul, the state news agency Anatolian said.

Police declined to comment, but said interrogations in Istanbul were continuing.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/234A494E-8FF1-47D7-945E-D8CA2F741637.htm

cbc

[Woland]

[thepeel]

The dude who killed him shouted "I killed the infidel!" while running away. Nationalists in Turkey are secular.

I think we can chalk this up to but-hurt crazy religious types with thin skins.

[Adventurer]

[Rteacher]

Turkey persists in denying that what happened to Armenians amounted to genocide. My grandmother survived but lost two of her kids to starvation after women and young children - separated from their husbands and older sons - were forced to march in the desert to concentration camps. Photos documenting conditions they faced can be viewed here: http://www.armenian-genocide.org/photo_wegner_view.html?photo=bandaged_feet.jpg&collection=wegner&caption=Starvation+claims+two+boys
http://www.armenian-genocide.org/photo_wegner.html

It is estimated that three-forths of the total Armenian population of two million people were killed as a result of decisions and policies enacted by the political party in power during the Ottoman Empire, the Committee for Union and Progrss (CUP) aka "Young Turks" and also by the Turkish Nationalists, who represented a new political movement opposed to the Young Turks, but who shared a common ideology of ethnic exclusivity.

More historical background on this issue - from an Armenian perspective but widely accepted as accurate - can be found at this website from which I'll quote briefly:

...The Armenian people was subjected to deportation, expropriation, abduction, torture, massacre, and starvation. The great bulk of the Armenian population was forcibly removed from Armenia and Anatolia to Syria, where the vast majority was sent into the desert to die of thirst and hunger. Large numbers of Armenians were methodically massacred throughout the Ottoman Empire. Women and children were abducted and horribly abused. The entire wealth of the Armenian people was expropriated. After only a little more than a year of calm at the end of W.W.I, the atrocities were renewed between 1920 and 1923, and the remaining Armenians were subjected to further massacres and expulsions. In 1915, thirty-three years before UN Genocide Convention was adopted, the Armenian Genocide was condemned by the international community as a crime against humanity...
http://www.armenian-genocide.org/genocidefaq.html
Another picture of women marching in the desert with their young children:
http://www.armenian-genocide.org/photo_wegner_view.html?photo=deportees_walking.jpg&collection=wegner&caption=Family+of+deportees+on+the+road

[Ya-ta Boy]

[ddeubel]

[thepeel]

I wrote

[thepeel]

Both the "crazed nationalist" and my "lone nutjob" ideas now seem to be wrong. This is increasingly looking like planned, islamic violence.

[Woland]

[Ya-ta Boy]

Hmmm...Let's see what Merriam-Webster says:

Secular:

1 a : of or relating to the worldly or temporal <secular concerns> b : not overtly or specifically religious <secular music> c : not ecclesiastical or clerical <secular courts> <secular landowners


Sect:

1 a : a dissenting or schismatic religious body; especially : one regarded as extreme or heretical b : a religious denomination
2 archaic : SEX 1 <so is all her sect -- Shakespeare>
3 a : a group adhering to a distinctive doctrine or to a leader b : PARTY c : FACTION

Sectarian:

1 : of, relating to, or characteristic of a sect or sectarian

Since you've brought it up two times these last couple of days, I'm wondering--very mildly wondering--what my age has to do with this topic.

[thepeel]

What are you talking about tata?

I said

[ddeubel]

Here is just another example, from the anals of another American ally. An exampleof how horrific is the abuse and mistreatment of journalists, the world over. But I am sure the U.S. government, like so many other expedient leaning govts, will just echo platitudes and do nothing substantial -- chuckling at their buffets, how she probably had it coming.......

[bucheon bum]

dd, dude, you're annoying.

it is the type of post right above this one that people such as myself tune you out.