{"id":1942,"date":"2016-03-02T15:24:14","date_gmt":"2016-03-02T15:24:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1942"},"modified":"2016-03-03T15:29:17","modified_gmt":"2016-03-03T15:29:17","slug":"dersim-armenians-explain-life-in-turkey-decide-to-move-to-armenia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1942","title":{"rendered":"Dersim Armenians Explain Life in Turkey, Decide to Move to Armenia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Asbarez<\/em><\/p>\n

YEREVAN (Armenpress) \u2014 Dersim Armenian Mihran Gultekin Savior believes that Turkey\u2019s policies have not changed as it continues expelling Armenians and Kurds to replace them with Turkmens living abroad.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
A group of Dersim Armenians during a press conference in Armenia. (Source: Armenpress)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Savior, who returned to his Armenians roots years ago, told Armenpress journalists the following. \u201cToday Kurds and Turks fight in Turkey, but Armenians are always under focus. Under those conditions hidden Armenians try to keep their real identity more covert. The Turkish state regularly tries to speculate the Armenian factor in this struggle. In fact, Armenians are always to blame,\u201d the Dersim Armenian said.<\/p>\n

As for the number of hidden Armenians in Turkey, Savior added that the number might be around 3-4 millions. \u201cThe reason of such a great number of hidden Armenians in Western Armenia is conditioned by the fact that they are oppressed there, and when they decide to unveil their identity, they encounter difficulties. That is why they keep it in secrecy, but when we conduct private conversations, they easily unveil their identity and say that they are Armenians,\u201d said Savior.<\/p>\n

He converted to Christianity 6 years ago and his wife, Karin Gultekin, was baptized 3 years ago in Germany. They plan to settle in Armenia.<\/p>\n

Founders of \u201cUnion of Dersim Armenians\u201d Savior and his wife plan to move and settle in Armenia. They will apply for Armenian citizenship today, on March 2.<\/p>\n

Karin explained in an interview that, \u201cWe live in a country where we were massacred, forced to accept a religion that is alien for us. We do not wish to live in Turkey. After this interview I and Mihran will apply for citizenship.\u201d<\/p>\n

Karin discussed how they were continuously targeted in Turkey. Even when they were still Muslims, everybody pointed at them saying \u201cLook, she is Armenian.\u201d After being baptized she had to relinquish her job in a restaurant where she used to work for 15 years as they said they are not going to \u201ceat from the hands of a gavur (non-Muslim).\u201d \u201cWhat is the difference? You are Muslim and I am Christian. I do not want to live an enforced life. I want to be saved from all these,\u201d Karin added.<\/p>\n

Karin and Mihran have two sons who welcome the decision of their parents to move to Armenia. \u201cBoth of my sons are baptized. One of them now studies in Germany and the other one is a journalist. Both call me and often say \u201cmother, do what you want, do not be afraid.\u201d I finally made up my mind to do that,\u201d Karin said.<\/p>\n

The day before the interview with Armenpress, Karine visited Armenian Genocide memorial complex and museum with her family memebers. It was difficult for Karin to speak, saying, \u201cIt is impossible to display the grief or talk about it. Of course, we knew about the genocide, and we had read always read about it. My mother even used to tell about the massacres\u2026 The grief cannot be forgotten. It is the only thing that cannot be swiped away from one\u2019s memory.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though Karin has not yet decided what she will do after moving to Armenia, but she confidently says, \u201cI am a hard working woman, I will do any job,\u201d and added with a smile, \u201cI will come for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the press conference that included Karine and Mihran, the writer of the film \u201cPure State of the Soul\u201d, Ughur Egemen Ires and his grandfather Harutyun Ire were also present to tell the story of their identity. \u201cPure State of the Soult\u201d is a film depicting the story of Dersim Armenian Harutyun Ires or Yeritsyan, who adopted Christianity and returned to his Armenian identity at the age of 70.<\/p>\n

It will be screened at the Yerevan State University on March 3.<\/p>\n

Egemen Ires tried to convey through the film experiences of every crypto-Armenian family, which reflects the public\u2019s perception around the issue.<\/p>\n

Harutyun Ires was born in Dersim, but in 1938, when he was a child, his family was exiled to K\u00fctahya but returned to Dersim years later.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur elders told us that while being exiled, Armenians were pushed into cars and taken away to an unknown place and brutally killed. Some survived, including my family. We were children, they hid us and we survived, \u201cHarutyun Ires said. He still has the vivid memory of his childhood and remembers seeing when his parents were secretly praying. But when they asked about it, their parents did not explain, urging them not to interfere in these issues. \u201cThen, when we went to school, people were saying \u2018These are Armenians.\u2019 We asked our parents what is an Armenian, but we were told that it doesn\u2019t concern us.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to various estimates, there are more than 1 million crypto-Armenians living in Turkey, but in because of the fear they live in, they are reluctant to speak about it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Asbarez YEREVAN (Armenpress) \u2014 Dersim Armenian Mihran Gultekin Savior believes that Turkey\u2019s policies have not changed as it continues expelling Armenians and Kurds to replace [more >>>]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1943,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-turkey","category-turkey-minority-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1942"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1942\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1944,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1942\/revisions\/1944"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}