Hans Rustad 
Den som interessererer seg for kurderne kan ikke unngå å vite noe om tyrkisk nasjonalisme. Men at armenerne er blitt og blir diskriminert på samme måte, vet de færreste. Det er ikke bare fortiden man slåss om, også dagens armenere blir «for-tyrket».
Drapet på Hrant Dink er et ekko av det ottomanske rike og folkemordet på armenerne, en aggressiv tyrkisk nasjonalisme, og et «glemt» kristent folk. Det er også historien om undertrykkelsen av og utslettelsen av en kultur i en av de tidligste kristne befolkninger.
Hvis man lytter til de tyrkiske reaksjonene fatter man ikke dybden i motsetningene. Statsministeren og ledende personer var raskt ute og fordømte drapet. De sa det var et angrep på Tyrkia og «tyrkiskhet». Det er problematisk, for det er nettopp det Dink ble anklaget og stilt for retten for: å ha krenket «tyrkiskhet» ved å skrive om det armenske folkemordet.
Men det er ikke bare historien om folkemordet som har vært tabu, også armensk kultur har vært bannlyst, i likhet med kurdisk. Hvor dypt dette stikker og hvor tragisk det er, får man inntrykk av ved å lese armenernes egne ord:
For example, perhaps we could meditate on why it is that in his passport, his name is written «Firat» rather than «Hrant.» (The former being a Turkish name, while the latter is clearly Armenian.) Or maybe it would serve us to think about why one of his brothers was referred to in one of yesterday’s newspapers as «Orhan,» when in fact his two brothers are called «Hosrof» and «Yervant.» (Same thing; the first name is Turkish, while the latter two are Armenian.) Yes, it would behoove us to think about these things.
In yesterday’s Radikal newspaper, a Turkish citizen of Armenian extraction was talking about his youth, noting «When I was a child, when my mother called me in the park, she would use my Turkish name.» I wonder why?
Other newspaper articles, examining Dink’s life, have noted that despite the fact that he scored high points as a soldier, he was never made into a «sargeant» as a young man. One newspaper even noted that Hrant Dink had cried because of this. But why was it that Hrant was never seen as worthy for a pair of epaulets?
Yes, the newspapers and television programs have revealed to us all in the wake of Hrant Dink’s death that he was raised in an Armenian charity school, and even met his wife there as a youth. And many of us read these details of his life story with wet eyes. But I am sure that as we read these details, very few of us recalled that it was the Turkish Republic which, at one point, stopped the donations of money from Armenian wills which were the only funding for these charity schools, and that the charity schools then had to shut down due to lack of funding.
Det minner meg om en armener som levde i Vest-Europa og var tilbake som tolk for en NATO-gruppe. På et offentlig toalett dro han kjensel på stenene på pissoaret: det var armenske gravstener som var brukt.
Hrant Dink sa i et intervju før han døde:
«In European legal culture, the individual is protected from the state. In Turkey it’s just the opposite, the laws protect the state from the individual. Of course, that’s downright un-European.»
Dink has the following to say on the genocide of the Armenians. «The Turks are convinced there was no genocide, and they’re going to remain convinced of that. Both sides should ask why the other thinks the way it does, and try to develop an understanding for that point of view. The Turks loath genocide, and can’t imagine their fathers being capable of doing such a thing. And the Armenians also feel beholden to their fathers. The Turks have to understand that that’s an open wound. When both sides realise the other is basically trying to protect their forefathers, we’ll have come a step closer to a solution. It doesn’t help to dig up mass graves with Turkish victims and then say to the Armenians they should do the same if such graves exist.»
