When one runs a search for Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, one is rarely at a loss to find his association with the Armenians. For example, a Nov. 14, 2003 ANCA press release tells us:

Don't Quit till you make 'em say ANCA!

Dr. Alfred De Zayas, the recipient of the ANC Scholarly Excellence Award, was lauded for his groundbreaking report regarding the applicability of the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide to the Armenian case. According to his findings, the UN Convention applies retroactively to the Armenian Genocide, making the Turkish state fully responsible for reparations. Based in Geneva, Switzerland, Dr. De Zayas teaches international law at several European and North American universities.

And here lies Dr. De Zayas' main value; under the guise of his "expertise" of international law, he goes out of his way to tell us that the 1948 U.N. Convention may be applied retroactively, that the Convention defines the Armenian experience as a genocide, and that reparations deserve to be in line. He suspiciously does not get into the countless other historical episodes of "Man's Inhumanity to Man" from many years past that may equally be subject to the same rules that he opines about; no, he concentrates almost exclusively on the Armenians. Is it any wonder that he is the Armenians' Wet Dream, tackling their obsession from a "legal" standpoint, as Alfred De Zayas does?

He served as a senior lawyer with the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (for 22 years, according to the ANCA document), an organization that does not recognize the Armenian experience as a genocide. Now think about that: the very organization that made the rules for what constitutes a genocide refuses to consider what happened to the Armenians as a genocide (despite deceptive maneuvers by pro-Armenians to say otherwise), yet this man still insists that the Armenian experience must fall under the genocide category. And he was a lawyer for the United Nations. What is going on here? Are we to conclude that the U.N. is wrong? Or should we begin to think this man is doing some weasely legal maneuvers to serve his own agenda?

 

 De Zayas got into the meat of the topic with his "The Genocide against the Armenians 1915-1923 and the relevance of the 1948 Genocide Convention," as featured on his site.

Before we examine De Zayas' facts and figures, take a look at that title. Yes, he is actually suggesting, without shame, that this supposed intentional plan of genocidal extermination went as late as 1923, years after the Ottoman government had ceased to remain a viable force. (The Sultanate was abolished in 1922, and the Sultan fled in a British boat.) It appears the man's racist attitude in portraying the Turks as evil incarnate at every turn is allowing him to accuse the modern Republic of Turkey with the extremely serious charge of genocide (despite his attempting to rationalize contradictory "successor state" theories, as you'll read below; if De Zayas truly feels modern Turkey was guilty with the crime, why feel the need to justify the responsibility of successor states?), and this "legal expert" is doing so without offering any proof whatsoever. (He also has no proof for Ottoman Turkey's guilt, but how especially irresponsible and unethical of him to implicate modern Turkey.)

He begins his "Historical and legal introduction" with "For centuries, the Armenian population of the Turkish Ottoman Empire was subjected to mistreatment and despotism, particularly in the Armenian homeland." Legal introduction? There ought to be a law against this lie that the genocide scholars keep repeating, with no reservation or shame. No. The Ottoman-Armenian population were known as the "Loyal Millet," so prosperous, that when Napoleon asked his French ambassador (Sebastiani) in "Constantinople" whether it would be possible to stir them up (during plans of invasion against the Ottomans, 1798-1799), the ambassador replied that the Catholic Armenians of Syria and Palestine were "so content with their lives here that a revolt is impossible."

"[M]ore than 150,000 Armenians were killed" in 1896 mainly because of "the resultant ethnic and religious fanaticism deliberately fuelled by the Sultan's policies." (The actual figure was closer to 20,000. It would have been zero, if the Armenians did not rebel.) No mention of the terror groups that the Armenians formed, the purposeful massacres and violence they caused in the hopes of European intervention. No. All of a sudden, after centuries of relative prosperity and contentment, the Turks decided to go on a murder spree.

De Zayas rubs salt in the wound by claiming 30,000 casualties in 1909 Adana, when even Armenians from the period estimated some 10,000 less. His source: Vahakn Dadrian. How appropriate for a "scholar" like De Zayas to completely take the word of a notorious Armenian propagandist, whose scholarly ethics boil down exactly to what Prof. Guenter Lewy concluded.

De Zayas informs us that a series of "massacres and deportations... took the lives of some 1.5 million Armenians." Fact: Some 1.5 million pre-war Armenians, according to neutral sources such as the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica. Fact: One million Armenian survivors, according even to Armenian hard-liners such as Vahakn Dadrian. Simple mathematics: 1.5 million minus one million. Does that equal 1.5 million to you? (Fortunately, you probably don't have a Ph.D., like Alfred de Zayas.)

Alfred de Zayas, in Yerevan

Alfred de Zayas actually gets into the specifics of the dead-horse Treaty of Sèvres, signed by an occupied puppet Ottoman administration! Does this human rights champion pretend ignorance of the purpose of that treaty, to eliminate the Turkish nation? (He actually writes... this is truly unbelievable... that: "the Treaty remains eloquent evidence of the international recognition of the crime of 'massacres' against the Armenian population of Turkey." Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Alfred de Zayas has actually sunk as low as to tell us this racist and inhuman treaty provides "evidence" of the massacres... and in an "eloquent" fashion, yet.)

Since Alfred de Zayas is an "expert" on international law, he should be the first to point to this treaty's legal worthlessness. The signing of the original Armistice (aboard the HMS Agamemnon, with Hussein Rauf, the Minister of Marine) guaranteed Ottoman Turkey's frontiers, and Admiral Calthorp, who represented the British government, gave assurances in writing that the integrity of Turkish borders would not change.

The Sèvres clauses De Zayas brings up, not incidentally, such as the establishment of criminal trials and the return of Armenians to their homes were actually fulfilled. Armenians were returning in droves to their homes even before the 1918-end decree allowing them to do so, as observed by missionaries and other hostile foreign agents. So much so that 644,900 Armenians were in what was left of the empire by 1921, according to the Armenian Patriarch. (In 1918 war-end, the Patriarch claimed 1,260,000 survivors still in what was left of the empire. The Patriarch's own death toll — 840,000, as exaggerated as it was — didn't reach the stratosphere as De Zayas' propagandistic figure.)

The troublesome thing here is that we can almost excuse De Zayas for his ignorance, because he is no historian. (Oops! Keep reading, as to what he says about that.) However, this is not rocket science here; anyone can do a little research to get at the heart of the matter. (And it is the duty of those known as "scholars" to do so.) What are we to conclude? That De Zayas is totally inept, or that he knows the truth but only reports selective "facts"?

In typical propagandistic form, De Zayas writes: "No international criminal tribunal as envisaged in Article 230 was ever established." This tribunal was well underway between 1919-1921. The reason why it never went all the way through was because the British — as determined as they were to eradicate the Turkish nation, under their leader, Lloyd "the Turks are a human cancer" George — were pressured to find the genuine evidence, and simply could not. This was, of course, the Malta Tribunal.

At least De Zayas mentions the unmentionable, and refers to Malta. But look at the reason why it failed: "[T]he British government was ultimately blackmailed into releasing them in 1921-22 in exchange for British officers."

(Our wondrous scholar has the date wrong; the tribunal process ended in 1921. What he fails to ask is why Malta wasn't over and done with by 1919-20, as the puppet Ottoman kangaroo courts were, if the evidence was so clear. The answer is that the British were feverishly trying to find the evidence, and there simply was no evidence. When the British desperately resorted to the U.S. State Archives, the British ambassador's office in Washington reported that everything boiled down to "personal opinions," i.e., hearsay.)

If anybody maintained prisoners as hostages, it was the British, as the British Archives themselves spell out. (English Judge Sir Lindsay-Smith said as much, when asked by Sir H. Rumbold: "[A]n abortive trial would do more harm than good," and that the only alternative was "to retain Turkish deportees at Malta as hostages." [FO 371/6504/E. 10023] More.) What De Zayas is doing is dutifully taking the line of Vahakn Dadrian and those like him, trying to find a convenient way to weasel out of the real facts. Here is Dadrian's version.

De Zayas then gets into Dadrian's bread and butter, the 1919-20 Ottoman kangaroo courts. It's embarrassing that an "expert" on "international law" can't tell the difference between legitimate courts and a court forced through an occupying enemy, with the threat that if the criminals don't surface, the Turks would be treated harshly at the Peace Conference. If there was any real "blackmail," it was these false courts.

Getting beyond the realm of his "history," now De Zayas gets down to the legal nitty-gritty. He writes: "In the classic Oppenheim/Lauterpacht textbook on 'International Law', Professor Hersch Lauterpacht noted that the Convention was not only forward-looking but that it had a primary retrospective significance." Here is the relevant line: "Thus, as the punishment of acts of genocide is entrusted primarily to the municipal courts of the countries concerned, it is clear that such acts, if perpetrated in obedience to national legislation, must remain unpunished unless penalized by way of retroactive laws."

Now note how De Zayas is grasping for straws desperately. Firstly, this is an opinion by a legal expert, and not the law. Secondly, Professor Hersch Lauterpacht could well have been referring not to past examples of genocide, but those in the future that escape punishment (and there certainly have been plenty of examples since the Convention has been adopted). That only makes sense; otherwise, are we going to take Italy to court for what the Romans did in Carthage?

Thirdly, what about the basic legal concept of Nullum Crimen? A law must be in place before the crime is recognized.

(Later, he feebly attempts to address this, by referring to a clause stating: "Nothing in this article shall prejudice the trial and punishment of any person for any act or omission which, at the time when it was committed, was criminal according to the general principles of law recognized by the community of nations." But criminal in what sense? If enemy forces declare the Turks were behaving as monsters [as the Entente Powers declared in May 1915], and they do so for propagandistic purposes... and later, when they have the upper hand at Malta and can't prove their own allegations... then what course can be pursued? Certainly, it's a crime in any age, when helpless people are deliberately slaughtered. However, we need guidelines before we can establish the crime. [Example: an American regiment slaughtered hundreds of innocent Vietnamese at My Lai. Should we simple-mindedly conclude they were acting on orders from the U.S. government, and that the USA had the "intent" for extermination?] And these are the conditions as set in the 1948 Convention, conditions which go against the Armenian episode: "intent" must be proven, and there must be no political alliances.)

Fourthly, and what the above ties in with, is that the crime must be proven. Even the United Nations, the body that wrote the rules on genocide, has not recognized the Armenian matter as a genocide.

Note how De Zayas is twisting so much to serve his agenda. Like Dadrian, he is making us think people made statements that could have had an altogether different meaning, and chooses excerpts and quotations while totally ignoring other realities.

When he boldly opines, "It is precisely because of its erga omnes quality that the crime of genocide cannot be subject to prescription, and that State responsibility for the crime, i.e. the obligation of the genocidal State to make reparation, does not lapse with time," note how hollow such a declaration becomes when he neglects to apply the principle to all the many historical examples that were plain examples of extermination policies. Is De Zayas after the British, French, Belgians, and so many other nations that misbehaved so ruthlessly in their pasts? For example, is he on Russia's back for what the Russians did to the Circassians? Or to the Crimean Tatars? And what of the Chechens?

Why is De Zayas only passionate about the Armenians? (I'm making this statement through an Internet search, where I basically noticed his Armenian concentration. This is not to say he may not have paid lip service to other historical examples. Clearly, however, there is a gross imbalance, regarding his Armenian interest.)

Most troublingly, as he did with the Greek Cypriots, why is there no mention about the extermination efforts of the Armenians? We even saw their misbehavior in recent history, with Karabakh. (Now there's an example where the U.N. was in agreement, regarding the wrong-doers.) The Armenians systematically wiped out their Muslims during the establishment of the post-WWI republic, and they were behind the deaths of some half-million Ottomans, in the implementation of "Death and Exile."

What's going on here?

To further build his case that there must be retroactivity, De Zayas cites statements from the Supreme Court of Israel in their ruling against Eichmann, and U.S. courts' support of the extradition to Israel of John Demjanjuk. If we can put aside the special and sensitive nature of the Holocaust (Eichmann was a dead duck, no matter what), here we arrive at an interesting cul de sac.

It is not the nation that can be taken to court for genocide. It is individuals. (And if a nation could be taken to court, for argument's sake, should it be the nation — the Republic of Turkey — that overthrew the one — the Ottoman Empire — allegedly performing the crime?)

He later gets into "The principle of State succession," trying to find examples to support what he desperately wishes to demonstrate, by providing parallels such as Serbia assuming responsibility for Yugoslavia, and Germany for the Nazi regime. If we remember our history, can these constitute as true parallels? Serbia was the dictating force in Yugoslavia, and wound up being what was left of Yugoslavia. [Indeed, when everyone else except Montenegro broke away, Serbia was still called "Yugoslavia" until 2003.] In other words, the state did not change here, it just grew smaller; and Germany's new state was imposed by victorious outsiders. There was no overthrowing in either case.

Crete handed to Greece by Europe, in 1897

De Zayas gives another example, that of Greece bearing a wrong committed by "autonomous" Crete. This regards the "Lighthouse Arbitration (France v. Greece)" case from 1956. "Greece was obligated to compensate for Crete's breaches, because Greece was the successor State," De Zayas wrote. Anyone who knows the history of Crete is aware the Cretans were chomping at the bit to declare "Enosis" (union) with Greece, throughout the uprisings of the 19th century. When the Ottoman military was kicked out "bag and baggage" in 1898, leaving the Cretan Turks at the mercy of the murderous Greeks (what does the reader suppose happened to these unfortunate Turks? Clue: As an example, when Greece invaded Crete in February 1897, 80 Muslim villages in the center of the island were entirely destroyed . Perhaps De Zayas will instruct us that there is no retroactivity to this mini-genocide), does anyone believe the Allied forces set up on the island were not at one with Greece? Although "Enosis" was officially established in 1908, for all intents and purposes, Crete's decade-long "autonomy" was in name only. The 1897 British cartoon above makes this plain to see. The woman (Europe) is throwing a bone (Crete) to her dog (Greece). Greece, in reality, was not the "successor state," but the state all along. A far cry from the Republic of Turkey, which overthrew the Ottomans, made a break with the past and practically wiped out Ottoman history in the minds of the Turks.

Just like biased Christian Europeans were anxious to please their Grecian lap dog then, the same strategy exists with Cyprus, today. (Imagine! They even made Greek Cyprus a member of the European Union, even though Cyprus isn't part of Europe... to further turn up the heat against Turkey.) Turkey had 345 years of the island's ownership after conquest from the Venetians, and before that, practically everyone owned Cyprus (Assyrians, Sumerians, Phoenicians, Egyptians, Persians, Romans, Arabs) except for Greece. The British took advantage of the Sick Man and came in temporarily, refused to get out as per the arrangement (what does "international law" say about that, and is there a statute of limitations to bar the Brits from being taken to court, unlike the 1948 Convention's supposed retroactivity?), and illegally annexed the island come WWI. The only reason why there is a Greek presence on Cyprus is because, unlike the murderous Greeks of Crete, the Turks were tolerant. Suddenly, Cyprus has come to be accepted as a Greek possession by bigoted Christian nations, the Turks on the island are not acknowledged as in existence, and biased parties such as De Zayas do their utmost to maintain the deception and injustice. It is truly an unconscionable situation.

This man actually gets into "Continuation of the Crime of Genocide: the destruction of historical monuments." Appalling. If Turkey had the mind to willfully destroy these monuments, not one would be standing.

Examples such as "Among the Turkish acts of memory-destruction can be listed the suppression of the name 'Armenia' from official maps and the changing of the names of Armenian villages and towns in Asia Minor, which continued late into the 1950s," now fall into the category of "genocide."

(What is he talking about, suppressing the name "Armenia" from official maps? I hope he's not foolish enough to be talking about present-day Armenia, where certainly that nation would be acknowledged in maps. And there was no nation called "Armenia" before WWI's end, except in the minds of wishful thinkers.)

Has anyone bothered to tell this man that as the years progress, change is inevitable? There is a difference between evilly implementing "memory destruction" and having to bow to the tide of progress and evolution. If the Armenian presence is primarily gone in eastern Anatolia, what responsibility is there to preserve what went on in a bygone time... especially after many years. Armenia and Greece made haste to eradicate all mention of the Turkish presence from their lands. The Turks certainly did not do the same. But after a time, the neighborhood must adapt, according to present-day realities; let's get real, here.

What nation does this? Does Israel have maps with "Palestine" on them? Does the United States record the nations of the Indians in their maps?

Is this supposed to be "genocide"?

De Zayas curiously writes: "Yet another form of continuing the genocide is by negating its historical reality, as if the 1.5 million Armenians of Anatolia had never existed." Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Here, he appears to be admitting the truth, that there really were 1.5 million pre-war Armenians as the total population. Earlier, he stated the mortality was 1.5 million. That means, in his "scholarly" mind, there would have been zero Armenians left.

Absolutely incredible.

And look at this:

"Another form of continuing the genocide is by rehabilitating the murderers. In March 1943 the mortal remains of the principal architect of the genocide, Ittihad Interior Minister Talaat Pasha, were ceremonially repatriated from Germany to Turkey..."

He has a point with the example of Dro ("rehabilitated" in Armenia, 2000) as a chief architect of the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Muslim and other Ottomans, but Talat Pasha was no murderer. His telegrams stressed the safeguarding of the Armenians, he dined and played backgammon with Armenian party leaders, and those who really knew him gave a very different picture (A German eyewitness wrote in 1921 that "Talaat was a statesman, not a murderer"; even Morgenthau spoke well of Talat in his private letters and diaries). How does De Zayas prove Talat was the "Hitler"? Let's reproduce the footnote provided by the "scholar":

50. Walker, op. c i t. , p. 37. David Marshall Lang quotes in his book “The Armenians. A People in Exile” London 1981, p. 27, the telegraph which Talaat, addressed to the Governor of Aleppo on 15 September 1915: “You have already been informed that the Government has decided to exterminate entirely all the Armenians living in Turkey. No-one opposed to this order can any longer hold an administrative position. Without pity for women, children and invalids, however, tragic the methods of extermination may be, without heeding any scruples of conscience, their existence must be terminated.”. Also reported in the Daily Telegraph, London 29 May 1922.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen. Alfred De Zayas actually points to Andonian's forged words to convict Talat Pasha! (And to make it worse, he even refers to a newspaper account from 1922's "enemy" London to verify it.)

This is totally unacceptable. Even most Armenian "scholars" know better these days than to stray into Andonian territory.

He then sinks to the level of quoting from Ambassador Morgenthau's "Story" book, relating the infamous insurance story, where Talat asks for the Armenians' money because the Armenians are all dead. Here is what lies at the base of that story. Does the truth matter to Alfred de Zayas?

Getting further into the "red herring" of "The Genocide Convention and the principle of non-retroactivity," our scholar embarrassingly puts the Treaty of Sèvres on the same plane as the London Agreement of 1945. He refers to the opinions of lawyers. Finally, he safely concludes: "[T]he Genocide Convention of 1948 can be applied retroactively." Whoopee!

"While non-retroactivity is a principle that has pragmatic value, it is frequently abandoned in international treaties..."  Alfred de Zayas is desperate to make his case, and will point to anything to bolster his agenda.

He concludes with, "Bringing the genocide against the Armenians before the International Court of Justice." If any party needs to be brought to court, it should be Armenia... to force them to prove their defamatory claims, based on propaganda. That goes equally to the totally prejudiced supporters in the genocide industry.

(But what if the judge in that courtroom would be someone like De Zayas? In an interview related below, De Zayas vouches for the integrity of the judges at the Hague. Hopefully, there are honorable judges who can retain their objectivity. Unfortunately, the prejudice against Turks is so thick in Europe, and anti-Turkish propaganda has been so relentless, chances are the judges could be ready to throw the book at the Turks from the get-go.)

 

 The interviewer asks:

"The Turkish government justifies the release of the Turkish prisoners by Britain in Malta, stating that after researching the issue the British government and the international community could not find any kind of documentation or proof that Turkey committed genocide against Armenians and were forced to release these prisoners. How realistic is this approach or denial by the Turkish government?"

Alfred de Zayas replies:

 "The statement, or rather the position, of the Turkish government is a political position. Like so many political statements, it cannot be taken seriously. It is preposterous. The facts are there. We know exactly how it came to be—it was an exchange for the hostages and nothing else."

Fascinating!

Let's correct this putative scholar with the reminder that the above is not simply the "position of the Turkish government," but the position of any objective researcher who bothers to read the British archives. (That is, not just the parts that are comfortable.)

Alfred de Zayas actually says, "The facts are there," in his perpetuation of the lame "hostages" excuse. Just one example, among so many others, as the British Foreign Office themselves put it, "Our difficulty is that we have practically no legal evidence and we do not want to prepare for proceeding which will be abortive" [FO 371/6502/E. 5845]

But to a man like Alfred de Zayas such clarity as to why the Malta process was stalled in its tracks become "nothing else."

"That would not prejudice the fact that the Turkish courts-martial already recognized the existence of genocide and not only tried and convicted Turkish officials but executed three of them. So this is an ex post facto, and a rather weak, argument by the Turkish government. I think most people will just dismiss it."

Let us not forget, referring to these 1919-20 kangaroo courts that De Zayas points to so cheerfully: during the Malta process the British themselves had rejected the findings of these kangaroo courts.

Could you imagine hiring Alfred de Zayas as your own lawyer, when he values the garbage that even the enemies of the Ottomans could not make use of?

 

 The interviewer asks:

"The Turkish government also argues that Hitler did not make those statements about the Armenians. During your research on the German archives, did you come across documentation of this statement?"

Alfred de Zayas replies:

"I did not research this particular issue in the German archives, although I have spent months in German archives studying related matters. I did not address this particular topic because it is very well known. The quotation has been documented by many authors and very frequently. So, I did not feel the necessity to repeat the research that has already been done on that particular quotation."

And this sums up the difference between a real scholar and one who is content to accept surface claims. There have been scholars (including even the rare Armenian one, Dr. Robert John; the Armenian interviewer is being untruthful with the implication that it is only "the Turkish government" making this argument) who have researched the Hitler Quote extensively, backing up their findings with true scholarship, but these wouldn't make a difference to someone like Alfred de Zayas. If it supports the "Armenian genocide," then it must be made to appear as though it were a real fact.

I am at a loss to understand how people like Alfred de Zayas could allow themselves to be so completely partisan. Isn't it incredible?

"I think Armenians would do well to join forces with other victims, what I would term as “unsung victims.” Take the 200,000 Greek Cypriots who were expelled from their homeland in northern Cyprus in 1974 by the Turks, an action that was condemned repeatedly by the European Court of Human Rights."

Hey, don't get me started on Cyprus again.

(Hold it, I can't resist. According to the CIA Fact Book, there was a total of 265,000 displaced. That means, if our scholar is correct with 200,000 Greeks, there were 65,000 Turks who were also displaced. I wonder if the "European Court of Human Rights" recognized the "human rights" of these people. I guess we don't need to ask why De Zayas does not care about them.)

(Perhaps the Armenians can also join forces with other victims who are truly "unsung," such as the nearly one million Azeri refugees who were expelled in 1992 by... the Armenians. Alfred de Zayas, if you're reading this, please make a note to suggest this idea, the next time you are invited to Yerevan.)

The problem is, the deck is stacked all over with those who have accepted anti-Turkish propaganda so exclusively. We've got all of these prejudiced people in a body such as the European Court of Human Rights, content with looking at only one side of the issue and never bothering to scratch beneath the surface, and then one in their ranks could point to them and say, see? They agree with me, too.

"The rights do not lapse with time—after all, the descendants also suffered trauma. Let’s not forget that if I were a Jewish descendant of survivors of the Holocaust or an Armenian descendent of survivors of the Armenian Genocide, I would be suffering trauma because I would realize what happened to my people. And that is very heavy burden to take through life."

Well, that's the point where you'd need to "get a life." What an absolutely simplistic way of looking at this picture. As if these genocide stories are not constantly reinforced, Armenian-Americans, as far removed from Armenia as can be, would have reason to be "traumatized."

More importantly, once again, our human rights champion does not care one iota as to the sufferings of the Turks under the hand of the Armenians. The picture must be maintained as strictly black and white, where the innocent Armenians were solely victimized, and the evil Turks were the victimizers.

Why would anyone choose to go down such a path? There is only one answer, ladies and gentlemen, aside from the cynical and speculative one where a party may be "bought" through the deep pockets of obsessed Armenians; that reason is prejudice.

Regarding attempts of dialogue between Turks and Armenians, our scholar replies that he has a "certain skepticism" because "you cannot start a dialogue on false premises. I cannot see a dialogue without an apology. I cannot see a dialogue without a recognition of the crime."

Isn't that ridiculous? If someone thinks you have injured him, and you hope to make up, are you falsely going to apologize to make him feel better? The idea of dialogue is to hope to come to an understanding. If you accept the position of your opponent at the outset knowing full well it is not the truth, then what is the sense of dialogue?

But according to De Zayas: "I don’t think that it shows any good faith. This is a farce."

There is a farce going on here, all right.

"But I consider it indispensable for Turkey—which has aspiration to enter the European Union and to be considered a civilized state..."

Oh, shut up. Who is this fellow to instruct us on what it means to be civilized?

A better definition of civility is to look at sources with no reason to lie before making irresponsible and defamatory charges of performing the greatest crime against humanity. Pointing to false evidence and committing "Rufmord" is not what I would call civilized.

"If you pretend that there was no genocide against the Armenians, that is essentially defaming the Armenians because that means the Armenians are a bunch of liars, that the Armenians have invented the genocide against themselves. That is a very serious attack against the identity and dignity of the Armenians of today."

Good grief!

Shouldn't a lawyer be the first one to insist on proving the charge before accepting it so completely?

Nobody is "pretending" that there was no genocide against the Armenians. However, what is needed among honorable people before reaching such a serious conclusion is genuine and solid evidence; not hearsay, not canards, and certainly not forgeries.

"But I don’t think that Turkey is really a strategically important country today. It was strategically important at the time of the Cold War, because it was an important checkmate of the Soviet Union. But after the end of the Cold War I see very little importance of Turkey, except if you see Turkey as a ground for American colonialism in the Middle East."

Why are we not surprised to read such a contemptuous statement as this? With the relevance that Islam has taken on in recent years, having a secular and democratic nation on one's side should be of no importance to the West, whatsoever.

There is not one thing that I have come across in Alfred de Zayas' writings where he has given the slightest attempt at fair play for the Turks. His evidence is laughable and propagandistic, he doesn't care about the "human rights" of the Turkish victims, and (to him) if there is anyone at risk of being "defamed" here, it is solely the Armenians.

The reader may form his or her own conclusions, regarding the essence of Alfred de Zayas.