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==Criticism==
==Criticism==
The President of the Armenian Academy of Political Research, Professor Alexander Manasyan, in reviewing ''Black Garden'', wrote that de Waal "supports the point of view which is steered by the propaganda machine of [[Baku]]" and "carries out Azerbaijani position by distorting the essence of the problem, masterfully going around all the unfavorable to Azerbaijani position facts and events, skillfully offering lie as believable truth".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://ichd.org/?laid=1&com=module&module=static&id=378 |title=Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict: on the Frontlines of the Information War, or the Last "Accord" of the Year |last=Manasyan |first=Alexander |date=19 February 2007 |website=[[International Center for Human Development]] |access-date=30 September 2007}}</ref>
The President of the Armenian Academy of Political Research, Professor Alexander Manasyan, in reviewing ''Black Garden'', wrote that de Waal "supports the point of view which is steered by the propaganda machine of [[Baku]]" and "carries out Azerbaijani position by distorting the essence of the problem, masterfully going around all the unfavorable to Azerbaijani position facts and events, skillfully offering lie as believable truth".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://ichd.org/?laid=1&com=module&module=static&id=378 |title=Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict: on the Frontlines of the Information War, or the Last "Accord" of the Year |last=Manasyan |first=Alexander |date=19 February 2007 |website=[[International Center for Human Development]] |access-date=30 September 2007}}</ref>

The book was also criticized by Karen Vrtanesyan, an Armenian expert for the [[Ararat Center for Strategic Research]], as "a banal propaganda but not an objective research on Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict."<ref>"Studies on Strategy and Security", compiled and edited, with an introduction and commentary by Dr Armen Ayvazyan, Yerevan, Lusakn, 2007, 684 pp. , p. 657</ref> Vrtanesyan concludes that "''Black Garden'' is not an unbiased work, neither can its author be considered a neutral observer."<ref>Vrtanesyan, Karen. [http://ararat-center.org/index.php?p=11&l=eng Thomas de Waal, “The Black Garden”: In Search of Imagined Balance/Abstract].</ref>


[[Tatul Hakobyan]], an independent Armenian analyst and journalist, wrote that de Waal has quoted [[Serzh Sargsyan]] out of context in the ''Black Garden'' regarding the latter's comments about the [[Khojaly Massacre]].<ref>{{cite web|last1=Hakobyan|first1=Tatul|authorlink1=Tatul Hakobyan|title=Խոջալուի մասին Սերժ Սարգսյանի խոսքերը Թոմաս դե Վաալը ենթատեքստից դուրս է մեջբերել|url=https://www.aniarc.am/2020/02/26/khojalu-serzh-sargsyan-thomas-de-waal/|website=aniarc.am|language=hy|date=26 February 2018}}</ref>
[[Tatul Hakobyan]], an independent Armenian analyst and journalist, wrote that de Waal has quoted [[Serzh Sargsyan]] out of context in the ''Black Garden'' regarding the latter's comments about the [[Khojaly Massacre]].<ref>{{cite web|last1=Hakobyan|first1=Tatul|authorlink1=Tatul Hakobyan|title=Խոջալուի մասին Սերժ Սարգսյանի խոսքերը Թոմաս դե Վաալը ենթատեքստից դուրս է մեջբերել|url=https://www.aniarc.am/2020/02/26/khojalu-serzh-sargsyan-thomas-de-waal/|website=aniarc.am|language=hy|date=26 February 2018}}</ref>

Revision as of 01:43, 7 May 2021

Thomas de Waal
De Waal at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington DC, 20 June 2013
Born
Nottingham, UK
NationalityBritish
Alma materBalliol College, Oxford
OccupationJournalist
Notable workBlack Garden (2003)

Thomas Patrick Lowndes de Waal (born 1966) is a British journalist and writer on the

Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War
.

Life and career

Thomas was born in

Anglican priest Victor de Waal. He is the brother of Africa specialist Alex de Waal, barrister John de Waal, and potter and writer Edmund de Waal
.

Through his grandmother, Elisabeth de Waal née Ephrussi, Thomas de Waal is related to the

Odessa. He had done some research on the family's Russian branch, and helped in the researches on family history by his brother Edmund de Waal which led to the publication of the book "The Hare with Amber Eyes
".

Thomas de Waal graduated from Balliol College, Oxford, with a First Class Degree in Modern Languages (Russian and Modern Greek).

He has reported for, amongst others, the

Moscow Times, and The Times.[1] He was a Caucasus editor at the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) in London until December 2008, and later as a research associate with the peace-building NGO Conciliation Resources. Currently he is a senior associate in the Russia and Eurasia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, specialising primarily in the South Caucasus region.[2]

He is the co-author of Chechnya: Calamity in the Caucasus (New York, 1998) and author of Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War (New York, 2003).[3]

In 2006 the

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia denied an entry visa to De Waal, who was due to attend in Moscow the presentation of a Russian version of his book on the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh, citing a law that says a visa can be refused "in the aims of ensuring state security."[4] De Waal believes that his visa denial was retaliation for his critical reporting about the Russian war in Chechnya.[5][6] De Waal wrote the introduction to Anna Politkovskaya
's first book in English, A Dirty War.

Reviews

De Waal's book on the Nagorno Karabakh conflict was generally well received. According to the journal Foreign Affairs's review of Black Garden, de Waal "offers a deeper and more compelling account of the conflict than anyone before.... one likely to exercise give-no-quarters partisans on both sides."[7] Transitions Online analyst Richard Allen Greene added: "This book will undoubtedly infuriate partisans on both sides of the conflict. But for anyone who wants a thorough, sympathetic, readable, and fair account, it provides an essential introduction to a war that has left two countries in what De Waal aptly calls 'a kind of slow suicide pact.'"[8]

Time magazine reviewer Paul Quinn-Judge called Black Garden a "brilliant book," and added further that "De Waal's book will infuriate blind partisans on both sides, but for anyone who truly wants to understand what happened in this part of the Caucasus, it will not be surpassed for many years. He is cautious, meticulous and even-handed, and the breadth of his research is remarkable".[9]

Parameters journal review states: "Thomas de Waal, noted British journalist and specialist on the Caucasus, has ...[produced] a book that is both a poignant chronicle and a lucid, evenhanded analysis of the intricacies of this conflict".[10] Neal Ascherson in his review of Black Garden in The New York Review of Books refers to de Waal as "a wise and patient reporter", and the book as "admirable and rigorous".[11]

Criticism

The President of the Armenian Academy of Political Research, Professor Alexander Manasyan, in reviewing Black Garden, wrote that de Waal "supports the point of view which is steered by the propaganda machine of Baku" and "carries out Azerbaijani position by distorting the essence of the problem, masterfully going around all the unfavorable to Azerbaijani position facts and events, skillfully offering lie as believable truth".[12]

The book was also criticized by Karen Vrtanesyan, an Armenian expert for the Ararat Center for Strategic Research, as "a banal propaganda but not an objective research on Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict."[13] Vrtanesyan concludes that "Black Garden is not an unbiased work, neither can its author be considered a neutral observer."[14]

Khojaly Massacre.[15]

Bibliography

References

  1. ^ Russia bars UK reporter on security grounds by Oliver Bullough
  2. ^ Thomas de Waal – Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Archived 27 February 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  3. ^ Institute for War and Peace Reporting. Caucasus programme staff bios.
  4. ^ British journalist denied entry visa, CJES/IFEX, July 2006[permanent dead link]
  5. ^ The St Petersburg Times, "Activists, Reporters Also Called a Threat" by Carl Schreck, 8 August 2006 (Issue # 1193)
  6. ^ De Waal, Thomas. "Opinions: Barred by Moscow" Prospect Magazine, July 2006, issue 124.
  7. ^ Foreign Affairs. Review by Robert Legvold Archived 4 July 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  8. ^ "Transitions Online. Garden of Discord". Archived from the original on 2 March 2007. Retrieved 1 October 2007.
  9. Time Magazine
    .
  10. ^ Parameters, US Army War College Quarterly – Spring 2005
  11. ^ The New York Review of Books. In the Black Garden by Neal Ascherson. 20 November 2003, full text at the website of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia
  12. ^ Manasyan, Alexander (19 February 2007). "Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict: on the Frontlines of the Information War, or the Last "Accord" of the Year". International Center for Human Development. Retrieved 30 September 2007.
  13. ^ "Studies on Strategy and Security", compiled and edited, with an introduction and commentary by Dr Armen Ayvazyan, Yerevan, Lusakn, 2007, 684 pp. , p. 657
  14. ^ Vrtanesyan, Karen. Thomas de Waal, “The Black Garden”: In Search of Imagined Balance/Abstract.
  15. ^ Hakobyan, Tatul (26 February 2018). "Խոջալուի մասին Սերժ Սարգսյանի խոսքերը Թոմաս դե Վաալը ենթատեքստից դուրս է մեջբերել". aniarc.am (in Armenian).

External links

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