#2 The article contains a detailed denunciation of the lack of religious freedom that afflicts the Christian minorities living in Turkey today. And before that is a recollection of the massacre of the Armenians and the expulsion of the Greek Orthodox: the two terrible acts of “cleansing of the non-Turkish and non-Muslim element” from which contemporary Turkey was born.
This is a fair assessment as far at the Armenians are concerned. They got screwed. However, as is later indicated in the article, this is NOT in fact a fair or accurate representation of what happened to the Greek Orthodox.
After the end of the war between Greece and Turkey, in 1922, the Turkish government, having won the conflict, established within the peace treaties – with the agreement of the Western powers – that an exchange of populations take place. In this way, most of the Greek Orthodox had to leave Turkey, which they considered their land, and to move to Greek territory, where they did not even speak the language. It has been determined that 1,344,000 Greek Orthodox Christians were deported to Greek territory, and that 464,000 Greek Muslims were transferred to Turkey.
....and the result of this agreement, which was known as the Treaty of Lausanne, was that about 2 million people didnÂ’t suffer the usual Balkan fate of genocidal annihilation at the hands of their ethnic cousins. Additionally, some 250,000 Bulgarians were peacefully shifted from Greece and Turkey to Bulgaria. In one of its few acts of utter competency, the League of Nations supervised the entire exchange to the overall satisfaction of the parties involved.
Was it ethnic cleansing? Yes. Was it “genocide?” No. Did is save untold lives and prevent a second Balkan War? Yes. Is there something to be learned from the Treaty of Lausanne? Yes. Sometimes it is better for everyone if you separate, take a breather, and don’t try a brave multicultural experiment. |