Then Yetvart Danzikyan (56), the current editor-in-chief of the Armenian-Turkish newspaper Agosheard in 1996 that Armenians were working on a Turkish-language Armenian newspaper, he knew he had to be there. Not much later he was in the office of co-founder and then editor-in-chief Hrant Dink. Armenian newspapers already existed in Turkey, but a publication in Turkish was new. It is estimated that between 50,000 and 70,000 Armenians live in Turkey. This makes them the largest Christian minority in the country, most of whom live in Istanbul.
When you think of Armenians in Turkey, you think of the Armenian genocide. In 1915, during the First World War, the Ottoman government (the predecessor of the Turkish republic) had Armenian intellectuals arrested in Istanbul and hundreds of thousands of Armenians from Anatolia were deported to the Syrian desert, often in so-called death marches. Many died along the way from massacres, hunger and exhaustion. It is estimated that around 1 million people died. Most historians consider this a planned genocide and many Western countries recognize it as such. However, Turkey prefers to speak of large-scale war violence and mass death, calling it the ‘Armenian question’ instead of genocide.
The person who first openly discussed the Armenian genocide was Hrant Dink, although he consciously avoided the word ‘genocide’. According to Danzikyan, Dink was less about the word itself and more about recognizing what had happened. “If he used the word, he would hurt Turks. At the same time, he would hurt Armenians if he did not use the word,” Danzikyan says from behind his desk in the Agosoffice in the central Sisli district, on the European side of Istanbul.
Openness about the past
Dink’s openness about the past cost him dearly. In 2004 he wrote that Sabiha Gökçen, Turkey’s first female pilot and adopted child of Atatürk (founder of the Turkish republic), may have had Armenian roots. It led to strong reactions. When a journalist from the Reuters news agency subsequently asked him whether he considered the events of 1915 to be genocide, Dink replied in the affirmative. He was then prosecuted for insulting the Turkish people. In 2007 he was selected for it Agosoffice shot dead by a 17-year-old Turkish nationalist.
“After the murder of Hrant Dink, hundreds of thousands of people came to his funeral,” says Danzikyan. “Then we saw that the dialogue that Hrant always talked about actually already existed. Many more people had understood it than we might have thought.” The editors try to convey his message Agos still to be continued. “Hrant believed that Turks and Armenians could help each other deal with the past,” says Danzikyan. He helped build the newspaper from scratch and worked there about two days a week in addition to his other work. He took over management in 2015.
At his funeral we saw that the dialogue Hrant always talked about actually already existed
The newspaper is published in Turkish, because Armenian schools and churches disappeared in many places in Anatolia in the 1960s and 1970s. “As a result, many still spoke Armenian, but could no longer read or write it,” says Danzikyan. “That’s why we made a newspaper mainly in Turkish, with a few pages in Armenian.”
The editorial team works from a small office and has eight permanent employees, including both Armenians and Turks. The weekly newspaper has a circulation of around two thousand copies and focuses on themes such as minority rights, democratization and the relationship between Turks and Armenians.
Danzikyan at the editorial office of Agos, where both Armenians and Turks work.
Photo Bülent Kilic
Careful small changes
“We wanted to enter into a dialogue with Turkish society, because we noticed that Turks often knew hardly anything about Armenians and that there were many prejudices,” says Danzikyan. “The image that existed was largely formed by nationalist propaganda and fabricated stories in the media. Agos wants to go against this and build a bridge between Armenians and the rest of Turkish society.”
Agoswhich celebrates its thirtieth anniversary this year, is still trying to keep that conversation alive, and Danzikyan is cautiously seeing small changes. The fact that Turkey and Armenia are talking to each other again is a step forward, but the tensions between Azerbaijan, an important ally of Turkey, and Armenia also have repercussions in Turkey. The long-running conflict mainly concerns the Nagorno-Karabakh region, which was given to Azerbaijan last century, while mainly Armenians lived there. In the public debate about this, Armenia is constantly referred to as the aggressor. This makes Armenians in Turkey feel restless, Danzikyan notes.
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“The Armenian community here does not live in a situation where we cannot breathe or dare to go out on the streets. Churches are open, Armenian schools are open, we can make our newspaper,” says Danzikyan. “But,” he adds, “that historical burden remains. If the Turkish state were to say: yes, 110 years ago a great injustice was done to Armenians in this country, Armenians would already feel differently. It is not just about using the word genocide, but about recognizing that something terrible has happened. That would mean a lot to the Armenian community.”
