Istanbul trials of 1919–1920
The Istanbul trials of 1919–1920 were
The government of
The leadership of the
These trials and fatwas also served as means for Mehmed VI to express his disapproval of the accused and legitimize his position, both in relation to his domestic situation with the Muslims in his empire, in the face of the Western powers that emerged victorious in World War I, and to anti–absolutist politicians.[5]
Since there were no international laws in place under which they could be tried, the men who orchestrated the massacres escaped prosecution and traveled relatively freely throughout Germany, Italy, and Central Asia.
The Turkish courts-martial were forced to shut down during the resurgence of the
Background
World War I
Following the reportage by US Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire
In view of these new crimes of
In the months leading up to the end of
On 30 October 1918, an armistice was signed between the Ottomans, represented by the Minister of the Navy Rauf Orbay, and the Allies, represented by British Admiral Sir Somerset Gough-Calthorpe. The armistice essentially ended Ottoman participation in the war and required the Empire's forces to stand down although there still remained approximately one million soldiers in the field and small scale fighting continued in the frontier provinces into November 1918.[16]
Surrender of Constantinople
In November 1918, Britain appointed
A French brigade later entered Constantinople on 12 November 1918, and British troops first entered the city on 13 November 1918. Early on December in 1918, Allied troops occupied sections of Constantinople and set up a military administration.The US Secretary of State
On 2 January 1919, Gough-Calthorpe requested from the Foreign Office authority to obtain the arrest and handing over of all those responsible for the incessant breaches of the terms of the Armistice and the continued ill-treatment of Armenians. Calthorpe got together a staff of dedicated assistants, including a notable anti-Turkish Irishman, Andrew Ryan, later Sir, who in 1951 published his memoirs. In his new role as the chief Dragoman of the British High Commission and Second Political Officer, he found himself in charge of the Armenian question. He proved instrumental in the arrest of a large number of the (later to be) Malta deportees. These fell broadly into three categories: Those still breaching the terms of the armistice, those who had allegedly ill-treated Allied prisoners-of-war and those responsible for excesses against Armenians, in Turkey itself and the Caucasus. Calthorpe asked for a personal interview with Reshid Pasha, Ottoman Minister of Foreign Affairs, to impress on him how Britain viewed the Armenian affair and the ill-treatment of POWs as "most important" deserving "the utmost attention". Two days later Calthorpe formally requested the arrest of seven leaders of the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP). While between 160 and 200 people were arrested, another 60 suspected of participating in the massacre of Armenians remained at large.[18]
Courts-martial
Establishment
The courts-martial were established on 28 April 1919 while the
The
At that time Turkey had two competing governments in
Procedure
The court sat for nearly a year, from April 1919 through March 1920, although it became clear after just a few months that the tribunal was simply going through the motions. The judges had condemned the first set of defendants (Enver, et al.) when they were safely out of the country, but the Tribunal, despite making a great show of its efforts, had no intention of returning convictions. Admiral Sir Somerset Gough-Calthorpe protested to the Sublime Porte, took the trials out of Turkish hands, and moved the proceedings to Malta. There an attempt was made to seat an international tribunal, but the Turks bungled the investigations and mishandled the documentary evidence so that nothing of their work could be used by the international court.[27]
According to European Court of Human Rights judge Giovanni Bonello, 'quite likely the British found the continental inquisitorial system of penal procedure used in Turkey repugnant to its own paths to criminal justice and doubted the propriety of relying on it'. Or, possibly, the Turkish government never came round to hand over the incriminating documents used by the military courts. Whatever the reason, with the advent of power of Atatürk, all the documents on which the Turkish military courts had based their trials and convictions, were 'lost'.[18] Admiral John de Robeck replaced Admiral Gough-Calthorpe on 5 August 1919 as "Commander in Chief, Mediterranean, and High Commissioner, at Constantinople".[27] In August 1920, the proceedings were halted, and Admiral John de Robeck informed London of the futility of continuing the tribunal with the remark: "Its findings cannot be held of any account at all."[28]
An investigative committee started by Hasan Mazhar was immediately tasked to gather evidence and testimonies, with a special effort to obtain inquiries on civil servants implicated in massacres committed against Armenians.[29] According to genocide scholar Vahakn Dadrian, the Commission worked in accordance with sections 47, 75 and 87 of the Ottoman Code of Criminal Procedure. It had extensive investigative powers, because it was not only limited to conduct legal proceedings and search for and seize documents, but also to arrest and imprison suspects with assistance from the Criminal Investigation Department, and other State services.[30] In a course of three months, the committee managed to gather 130 documents and files pertaining to the massacres, and had them transferred to the courts-martial.[31]
Turkish courts-martial also had some cases of high-ranking Ottoman officials, who were assassinated by agents of the CUP in 1915, for disobeying criminal orders of the central government to deport and eliminate the Armenian civilian population of the Ottoman Empire.
Verdicts
On 8 April 1919, Mehmed Kemal, former Kaymakam of Boğazlıyan, Yozgat, was sentenced to death and hanged on 10 April 1919.[32] Prior to their executions, every condemned individual received a fatwa issued by the Shaykh al-Islam in the name of Mehmed VI, in accordance with the legal requirement that no Muslim could be put to death without such a decree from the Sultan-Caliph.[5]
These legal proceedings and accompanying fatwas also functioned as vehicles for Mehmed VI to manifest his dissent towards the condemned individuals and justify his position, both within the context of his domestic affairs concerning the Muslim population within his empire and in response to the Western powers that had emerged victorious in World War I.[5]
Abdullah Avni, the commander of the gendarmerie in Erzincan was sentenced to death during the Erzincan trials and hanged on 22 April 1920.[32]
Behramzade Nusret, the Kaymakam of Bayburt, was sentenced to death on 20 July 1920 and hanged on 5 August 1920.[32]
On 5 July 1919, the court reached a verdict which sentenced the organizers of the massacres, Talat, Enver, Cemal and others to death.[1][2] The military court found that it was the intent of the CUP to eliminate the Armenians physically, via its Special Organization. The pronouncement reads as follows:[33]
The Court Martial taking into consideration the above-named crimes declares, unanimously, the culpability as principal factors of these crimes the fugitives
Council of the Union & Progress, representing the moral person of that party;... the Court Martial pronounces, in accordance with said stipulations of the Law the death penalty against Talaat, Enver, Cemal, and Dr. Nazim.
The courts-martial officially disbanded the CUP and confiscated its assets and the assets of those found guilty. Two of the three Pashas who fled were later assassinated by Armenian vigilantes during Operation Nemesis.
Detention in Malta and aftermath
Ottoman military members and high-ranking politicians convicted by the Turkish courts-martial were transferred from Constantinople prisons to the
According to European Court of Human Rights judge Giovanni Bonello the suspension of prosecutions, the repatriation and release of Turkish detainees was amongst others a result of the lack of an appropriate legal framework with supranational jurisdiction, because following World War I no international norms for regulating war crimes existed, due to a legal vacuum in international law; therefore contrary to Turkish sources, no trials were ever held in Malta. He mentions that the release of the Turkish detainees was accomplished in exchange for 22 British prisoners held by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.[35][18]
Punishment
At the
Purging of evidence
According to a leaked diplomatic cable from 2004, ambassador Muharrem Nuri Birgi was effectively in charge of destroying evidence during the 1980s. During the process of eliminating the evidence, ambassador Birgi stated in reference to the Armenians: "We really slaughtered them."[36] Others, such as Tony Greenwood, the Director of the American Research Institute in Turkey, confirmed that a select group of retired military personnel were "going through" the archives. However, it was noted by a certain Turkish scholar that the examination was merely an effort to purge documents found in the archives.[citation needed]
Controversy
Those who deny the Armenian genocide have questioned the translations into Western language (mostly English and German) of the verdicts and accounts published in newspapers. Gilles Veinstein, a professor of Ottoman and Turkish history at Collège de France estimates that the translation made by former Armenian historian Haigazn Kazarian is "highly tendentious, in several locations".[37] Turkish historians Erman Şahin and Ferudun Ata accuse Taner Akçam of mistranslations and inaccurate summaries, including the rewriting of important sentences and the addition of things not included in the original version.[38][39][40]
See also
References
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- ^ ISBN 0812216164.
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- ^ Akçam, Taner (1996). Armenien und der Völkermord: Die Istanbuler Prozesse und die Türkische Nationalbewegung (in German). Hamburg: Hamburger Edition. p. 185.
- ^ from the original on 31 December 2023. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
- ^ Power, Samantha. "A Problem from Hell", p. 16-17. Basic Books, 2002.
- ISBN 978-1610693646. Archivedfrom the original on 16 March 2023. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
- ISBN 978-1845452575. Archivedfrom the original on 31 December 2023. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
- ^ 106th Congress, 2nd Session, House of Representatives (1915), Affirmation of the United States Record on the Armenian Genocide Resolution, The Library of Congress, archived from the original on 14 April 2016, retrieved 7 December 2007
{{citation}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link). - ^ 109th Congress, 1st Session, Affirmation of the United States Record on the Armenian Genocide Resolution (Introduced in House of Representatives), The Library of Congress, archived from the original on 15 December 2018, retrieved 7 December 2007
{{citation}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link). - ^ H.RES.316, Library of Congress, 14 June 2005, archived from the original on 3 July 2016, retrieved 7 December 2007. 15 September 2005 House Committee/Subcommittee:International Relations actions. Status: Ordered to be Reported by the Yeas and Nays: 40–7.
- ^ "Crimes Against Humanity", British Yearbook of International Law, 1946, p. 181.
- ^ Original source of the telegram sent by the Department of State, Washington containing the French, British and Russian joint declaration, Armenian Genocide, archived from the original on 14 April 2016, retrieved 7 December 2007.
- ^ William S. Allen, The Nazi Seizure of Power: The Experience of a Single German Town 1922–1945, Franklin Watts; Revised edition (1984).
- ^ William A. Schabas, Genocide in International Law: The Crimes of Crimes, Cambridge University Press, 2000, pp. 16–17
- ^ a b Findley, Carter Vaughn. Turkey, Islam, Nationalism, and Modernity. Yale University Press, 2010, p. 215
- ^ a b Lewis, Bernard. The Emergence of Modern Turkey. Oxford University Press, 1968, p.239
- ^ a b c d Turkey’s EU Minister, Judge Giovanni Bonello And the Armenian Genocide – 'Claim about Malta Trials is nonsense' Archived 2 May 2020 at the Wayback Machine. The Malta Independent. 19 April 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2013
- ^ Gunnar Heinsohn: Lexikon der Völkermorde. Reinbek 1998. Rowohlt Verlag. p. 80 (German)
- United States Government Printing Office. Retrieved 21 January 2013
- ^ Armenian Genocide Survivors Remember Archived 26 July 2017 at the Wayback Machine. Queens Gazette. Retrieved 21 January 2013
- ^ Dadrian, Vahakn N (1991), "The Documentation of the World War I Armenian Massacres in the Proceedings of the Turkish Military Tribunal", International Journal of Middle East Studies, p. 554.
- Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Oxford Journals, p. 31, archivedfrom the original on 9 July 2012, retrieved 5 October 2007.
- ^ Detlev Grothusen, Klaus (197). Die Türkei in Europa: Beiträge des Südosteuropa-arbeitskreises der… (in German). Berghahn Books. p. 35.
- ISBN 978-0-8050-7932-6, p. 296
- ISBN 978-0-8050-7932-6, p. 351
- ^ ISBN 978-1597974967, p.211-212
- ISBN 1-57181-666-6.
- ISBN 978-0-85771-757-3.
- ISBN 1-57181-666-6. Archivedfrom the original on 31 December 2023. Retrieved 26 October 2016.
- ^ Kevorkian, Raymond (2015). "The Origins and Evolution of the Armenian Genocide". Armenian General Benevolent Union Magazine. 25 (1): 15.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-85745-286-3.
- ISBN 978-1412813518. Archivedfrom the original on 31 December 2023. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
- ^ Türkei By Klaus-Detlev. Grothusen.
- ^ a b Bonello 2008.
- ^ Barsoumian, Nanore (10 September 2011). "WikiLeaks: Stepping Out of Ottoman Archives, Diplomat Says 'We Really Slaughtered Them!'". The Armenian Weekly. Archived from the original on 22 September 2015. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
- ^ "Trois questions sur un massacre", L'Histoire (in French), April 1995.
- ^ Şahin, Erman, "A Scrutiny of Akçam's Version of History and the Armenian Genocide", Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs (PDF), p. 308, archived from the original (PDF) on 1 December 2010, retrieved 24 October 2010.
- ^ "The Armenian Question", Middle East Policy (Review Essay), vol. XVII, Spring 2010, pp. 149–57, archived from the original on 3 March 2016, retrieved 17 November 2010.
- ^ Ferudun Ata, "An Evaluation of the Approach of the Researchers Who Advocate Armenian Genocide to the Trials Relocation," in The New Approaches to Turkish-Armenian Relations, Istanbul, Istanbul University Publications, 2008, pp. 560–561.
Bibliography
- Akçam, Taner (1996). Armenien und der Völkermord: Die Istanbuler Prozesse und die Türkische Nationalbewegung (in German). Hamburg: Hamburger Edition. p. 185.
- ISBN 978-0-06-019840-4.
- ISBN 978-99932-7-224-3. Archived from the originalon 10 July 2018. Retrieved 5 March 2015.
- ISBN 978-1597974967.
- ISSN 1476-7937. Archived from the originalon 9 July 2012.
- ISBN 978-0521787901.
- Ata, Ferudun (2018). The Relocation Trials in Occupied Istanbul. Offenbach am Main: Manzara Verlag. p. 357. ISBN 9783939795926.
- Uluç, Gürkan (2024). Understanding the Armenian Question: Malta Tribunal (1919-1921). Offenbach am Main: Manzara Verlag. p. 304. ISBN 9783911130004.
External links
- Verdict of the Courts-Martial (In Ottoman Turkish) Archived 6 August 2016 at the Wayback Machine
- Names of those condemned (In Ottoman Turkish) Archived 6 August 2016 at the Wayback Machine