(Le Figaro, March 30, 2013) – In a review about the book “Turkey and the Armenian ghost: on the traces of Genocide”, co-authored by Laure Marchand, correspondent for “Le Figaro” and Guillaume Perrier, correspondent for “Le Monde”, Pierre Rousselin highlights the fact that while the world stands just two years before the centennial commemoration of the Armenian Genocide in 2015, Turkey seems incapable of coming to terms with her past. Rosselin wonders whether the Centennial will incite Turks and their government to confront their history.
The book is a study conducted on the field with numerous interviews, testimonials and visits to churches, villages and sites that have survived destruction, sacrilege and oblivion. Escapees, forcibly converted to Islam, and “justs” who saved persecuted victims are given the chance to speak through this book. The two journalists describe how the Turkish authorities refused the use of the word “genocide” and the historical concequences of this crime. Rousselin writes that irrespective of what one may think about the Armenian Cause, one thing is clear; the determination of the Turkish state to minimize the scope of their “problem”. The “Le Figaro” columnist underlines that at a time that Turkey aspires joining the European family which is built exactly on working with history, Turkey should revisit the subject of the Genocide.
The book also explains why the Armenian Cause remains in the heart of the Franco-Turkish relations.
Watch the interview of Marchand and Perrier to France 24 (in french).
Laure Marchand et Guillaume Perrier, auteurs de “La Turquie et le fantôme arménien”
