Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Answerap Biology Lab 5

Armenian Genocide / Armenian Genocide: Flora Munushian Mouradian

© Gomidas Institute, 2005


Witness to Genocide
Or how a survivor of the Armenian genocide has made peace with the past, and why the U.S. has yet to do the same

by Jake Armstrong

Pasadena Weekly , 15.07.2010


Out of 400 kilometers, Mouradian Munushian Flora and her family walked, the dead and dying at their feet, while almost an entire nation was approaching oblivion.
This forced exodus from Turkey was full of atrocities and to the end, this girl of 14 years will share - Turkish soldiers trying to remove her and her sister, the disappearance of his brother at the hands of these same soldiers, the death of his grandmother during marches to Syria and camps filled with thousands of starving Armenians.
His chances of surviving were so slim that Flora's parents decided to abandon her and her sister, on their way, in a Syrian town unknown, it will be sold to a harem, before s' flee the U.S. while her mother and father were forced to go over 100 miles, ignoring forever what would become their teenage daughter.
Flora Mouradian lived to tell his story and it is now part of all who enter in the Archives of Congress to bring the leaders of the United States to remove the political obstacles of increasingly complex prevents United States formally recognize the Armenian genocide, during which a half million human beings perished in the hands of the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1923. This recognition, highlight the descendants of Armenian Genocide survivors, would have enough clout to force the current government of Turkey - an ally of the United States, the strategic position in a volatile region - to repair and bring some comfort to a culture that is lived so long denied peace.
"What other countries will be most powerful to stand up and say that this has happened and must be punished, acknowledged? "Asks Katie Kusherian, a resident of Glendale, who presented three witnesses on the fight of his family in Democratic Representative Adam Schiff of Pasadena, who leads the project. "Otherwise, the souls of the dead will not be at peace, as well as ours. "

" A pain that never sleeps "

The memories of this death march, which began in 1915, after the Young Turks were reformists and nationalists came to power in the Ottoman Empire, haunt Flora Mouradian since his arrival in Boston, a member of a growing Armenian diaspora fleeing persecution will continue until 1923 under Turkish nationalist, xenophobic equally ethnically than its predecessors, the Young Turks. Ignored for decades, his pain explodes when Flora tries to relate her ordeal to her young daughter, Kay Mouradian.
"The Hunger is a pain that never sleeps "motherly words, which remembers Kay Mouradian, who now lives in South Pasadena.
But only in 1984, beginning a series of skirmishes with death cathartic, that Flora Mouradian finally overcome deep feelings of self-pity and sorrow of having lost years might have been the most enjoyable of his life. It was also then that his daughter realized the benefits of registering the tragic experience of his mother.
At 83 years, diagnosed seriously ill after heart infarction, Flora went to live in Pasadena with her daughter to live, according to his doctor, his last days. Kay imagined that those days are few; Dementia Flora had already made his friends and family of strangers in his mind, and tremor prevented him from eating, while his health had declined during the previous years.
But gradually and inexplicably, Flora became more alert, lively and, as reported by his daughter, the "dark shadow" that so much death and suffering had given rise, suddenly vanishes. The tremors stopped, it renewed his friendships with those she was unable to recognize a few months earlier, and hardness that this tragedy had forged in his heart began to fade. "I find it simply impossible to explain. As if all the trauma that he had fallen had completely disappeared. "Says Kay.
But soon after health problems led again to the hospital Flora. One night, she seemed to leave this world, she turned again, this time with a cryptic prophecy: "Do you know why I am still there? - She asked her daughter. Because if I died, nobody can! Then she suggested he write a book about his life. Soon after, Kay began to retrace the desert road that their ancestors had traveled during their forced deportation.
One of the stories that passed to his daughter Flora, begins in Aleppo, Syria, where his mother and his father abandoned her and her sister, before marching to their deaths likely. This is where the young Flora, aged 14, was sold to a wealthy Turkish merchant, who made the new recruit to his harem. But when was going, a young boy pleaded Flora Armenian street to tell her sister what had happened. The same evening, her sister dressed in Muslim and brought it out of the harem, then housed in a Syrian family, until she left the United States.

"The bastards! "

doing research for a book on the fight of his mother, Kay sought to Aleppo in 1988 near his family who took him to his mother after she escaped from the harem. She then learned that his mother was back in hospital the fourth time.
When Kay arrived at the hospital, his mother was lying sideways on her bed in the cardiac unit. "I do not know why I'm not dead! "She murmured.
few days later, Kay was amazed to find his mother sitting upright on her hospital bed, bawling in Turkish, a language she had not been used for 50 years before returning to English.
"They stole my studies! They stole my family! You know what it is ? I'm mad! - Flora screamed. The bastards! "
doing so, the Turks seemed to atone and Flora find a peace that lasted until his death in South Pasadena in 1989, says her daughter.

Doomed to repeat

Glendale and Pasadena home to one of the largest Armenian communities in the country and, for years, Adam Schiff, who represents the area, trying to convince Congress of the need to officially classify the murder of one and a half million Armenians as genocide, as France, Belgium, Russia, Italy, Canada and over twenty other countries have done. But legislation that could achieve this goal becomes the prey of the political process whenever it is launched, largely because of strong political relations in this country with Turkey, a key ally in the Middle East that, until 'to now deny that the massacres and death marches ever held.
Adam Schiff hopes that the recent actions of the Turkish government supports Iran - which he says complicate diplomatic efforts of the United States to reduce capacity Nuclear Tehran - his complicity in the recent murderous attack on the flotilla to Gaza and its Humanitarian changing feelings towards Israel will finally break the grip of diplomacy, in terms of recognizing that most historians regard as a crime against humanity.
"If we have to assert our moral primacy in the struggle for human rights, we can not afford to sort out to recognize the genocide, says A. Schiff. Each year, the Turkish lobby fights recognition by spending millions of dollars. Yet the recent Turkey's decision to bind to Iran, his attempt to block sanctions against the Iranian nuclear program and his advocacy of repression by the clerical regime on its own people could lead more members of Congress to reconsider their willingness to support its campaign of genocide denial. "
Currently, in what he calls an effort to educate his colleagues on the importance of recognizing the genocide, Schiff incorporates the stories of Flora Mouradian and other survivors in the national memory.
But if the conduct Ankara does not earn him maybe no new friends in Congress, the position of Turkey as a trading partner of the U.S. ally and NATO member, the place sufficiently strong position to continue to deny the genocide, despite recent developments, according to Levon Marashlian, a professor of history at Glendale Community College, author of several articles on Armenian-Turkish relations in the local and foreign press.
"I'm not sure the real tensions that exist are sufficient to overcome these other factors, he said. Turkey is still considered to Washington as an important ally, and his image has declined somewhat, but we are far from a failure on all fronts. "
Katia Kusherian, call the association at the Glendale Renaissance, which transmitted the stories about the deportation of his family Tigranakert ancient capital of Armenia, noted that the failure of quasi-permanent a bill recognizing the genocide is a constant disappointment for the Armenians of the region, who want their adopted country to recognize the atrocities that led many of them where they are. "I hope justice with a capital letter J, it says. Armenians all hope that this time is the charm. We have been disappointed year after year. We can not ignore justice, ignore the truth for political reasons. It is a moral matter and a country without morals sank. "
It is unclear exactly what will happen if the United States recognizes the genocide, but some hope it will bring the return of property and territory that the Turks took over. "The dream of thousands of Armenians is that we recover all the lands and give them the name again Armenia, but I doubt that it happens one day. "Says Kay Mouradian.
However, as a retired teacher, Mouradian notes that it would prefer to see Turkey a foundation supporting university student aid Armenian: "We lost the best and brightest of us and it will took 96 years for the Armenian elite reborn! "
She said it could also heal the rift between Turks and Armenians in the Middle East and clarify misunderstandings impeding greater cultural unity. "Citizens common in Turkey have no idea what happened at that time. They see the Armenians as negative people. "

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Source: http://www.pasadenaweekly.com/cms/story/detail/witness_to_genocide/9011/
Translation: © George Festa - 02.2011

Blog Kay Mouradian : http://kaymouradian.com


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