19.09c
Երեվան
հնգ, մյս 07
“Incirlik,” or fig orchards. This land that is now found in Turkey, which is presently host to one of NATO’s most important bases in the Middle East, was a popular summer retreat for Cilicia’s Armenians, and in particular among Adana’s more affluent classes. These facts are attested in recent online statements given by American-Armenian attorney Vartkes Yeghiayan. Yeghiayan, who successfully pursued lawsuits against New York Life and other life insurance companies on behalf of the descendants of the Armenian citizens of the Ottoman Empire, has now set his sights on Incirlik.
That base, which also holds a special significance for Turkey’s relationship with the United States, is today on the docket of California’s state courts. The case was filed principally against Turkey’s Central Bank and Ziraat Agricultural Bank, which was founded in the 1850s. The case demands that the banks pay compensation to those individuals whose ancestors owned lands in Incirlik until 1915 and who during the genocide were uprooted and exiled to the deserts of Dayr al-Zur.
The rest you all know, but we do know about attorney Vartkes Yeghiayan’s and his colleagues’ bold step, thanks to which the legal façade of the Armenian Genocide will be strengthened. We have become a nation that likes to talk big and pat itself on its back and it is more vital for us to speak, lecture, and give orders. We came full circle during the hundredth anniversary of the Armenian Genocide and we still struggle to this day to invest serious efforts in the legal-court field.
The efforts of Yeghiayan and other Yeghiayans are a good fact to take into account.
That step gives us hope that our issue is not characterized by the convening of pretty gatherings and assemblies, that it will move forward, in serious, synchronized steps that give due consideration to the nation.
That is what Incirlik aspires to do.
But are there any listeners?
