Letter to the Editor
[ 2009/06/29 | 23:25 ]Dear Editor:
Like many Armenian Americans, I am unhappy that our organizations hosted the recent public tour by the U.S. Ambassador to Armenia, Marie Yovanovitch.
Nevertheless, trying to make the most of the situation, I attended her presentation at the Armenian Cultural Foundation in Massachusetts.
As expected, Yovanovitch largely evaded the audience’s pointed questions and comments.
From having spoken to Armenians who atte nded Yovanovitch’s public presentations elsewhere, such as in New York City, I know that similar scenarios unfolded there.
Even worse, the Armenian American press failed to critically and frankly assess Yovanovitch’s opening remarks, questions from the audience, and her replies. Such press outlets include Armenia Now, the Armenian Weekly, the Armenian Reporter, the Armenian Mirror-Spectator as well as the email newsletters of the Eastern U.S.A. Diocese and Prelacy.
Unfortunately, even HETQ, the investigative journalism website in Armenia, merely republished an article from the Glendale News-Press about Yovanovitch’s visit to Southern California.
What separated HETQ from some of the outlets mentioned above, however, is that it didn’t censor critical reader comments posted under their online articles. While most of us recognize that Armenia suffers from a democracy and free-speech deficit, few of us have said publicly that our Diaspora media and organizations suffer from the same ailment.
I am forwarding HETQ’s reader comments about Yovanovitch to our Diaspora organizations, media, and clergy because there are many questions they need to answer. Among the very first is: why did American Armenian organizations agree last year to the U.S. Senate’s confirming Yovanovitch even though she and the State Department were as evasive on the genocide issue as John Hoagland, the previous failed nominee, had been?
Given Yovanovitch’s and the U.S.’s dishonesty about the genocide, and the obvious fact that she was going to give evasive replies regarding a host of issues on her present tour, why did Armenian organizations even agree to host her? If their reasoning was that she needed to hear what we had to say, she undoubtedly already knew that from reading the Armenian press and news releases since assuming her ambassadorship.
Frankly, this tour was an honor and privilege that neither the State Department nor the ambassador deserved.
Armenian organizations held private meetings with Yovanovitch. What, may we ask, was the outcome of these meetings, or are our organizations once again practicing the same lack of transparency for which they criticize the Armenian government? They are accountable to the communities they claim to represent and serve, or haven’t they noticed?
Ultimately, we must reject the vassal mentality that has been ingrained in us after centuries of Ottoman occupation. If we don’t take a harder line in defense of Armenian rights in the post-genocide age, we have only ourselves to blame — and not the Turkish government — for jeopardizing our survival as a nation, on or off our native lands.
I direct you to HETQ, where outspoken Armenians have their say:
http://hetq.am/en/diaspora/12188/
Sincerely,
Lucine Kasbarian
New Jersey, USA
lucinekasbarian@aol.com
June 30th, 2009 at 01:05
I don’t see anything good that came out of the visits by Yovanovitch, unless frustration is a good thing.
What are Armenian American political organizations going to do to follow up? Nothing, I think.
June 30th, 2009 at 01:07
Dear Lucine Kasbarian,
What did you really expect from a State Department bureaucrat who is following the line of the Obama Administration?
After all she is the ambassador of the United States, not Armenia.
Are you that naieve to have believed that she would spell out, in black and white, why the current White House, like all the U.S. administrations before it, tow the same line regarding Armenian issues, except for some cosmetic changes. Dis you expect a truthful explanation of U.S. strategic interests in the region?
Armenians in the U.S. would do better to reform their own backyard and so-called representatives before crying foul when it comes to official reps of the White House.
And what did you expect “Hetq” to do? Rely on the American-Armenian press for a realistic description of Ambassador Yovanovitch’s visit and the ire of some individuals like yourself?
You, yourself, state that the American-Armenian press failed miserably in this regard.
Perhaps if Diaspora Armenians contributed more to “Hetq” and other independent news media in Armenia they could afford to have permanent reporters in the U.S and Europe and thus do the job that the local Armenian press should be doing.
June 30th, 2009 at 18:36
Bravo. I think that the response to the tour should have been that we are all busy praying for the souls of our martyred ancestors – feel free to join us.
June 30th, 2009 at 19:36
Thank you for your comments, Torkom, with which I fully agree.
The most honest appraisal of events filed so far can be read in a report published by Asbarez yesterday afternoon:
http://www.asbarez.com/2009/06/29/yovanovitch-evades-the-community/
July 1st, 2009 at 08:05
It’s beginning to look like a Shakespearean tragedy.
Thank you Lucine for your insightful letter.
July 3rd, 2009 at 05:32
Thankfully, here is another article telling it like it REALLY is:
http://www.asbarez.com/2009/07/02/yavan-oghloo/
July 3rd, 2009 at 18:15
ArmeniaNow wishes to correct an error made by your Letter to Editor writer Lucine Kasbarian.
The writer characterizes ArmeniaNow as an “Armenian American” press. Not true. ArmeniaNow has always been based in and produced in Armenia exclusively by Armenian reporters, editors, photographers, translators, designers, IT administrators and overseen by an American Editor in Chief who has lived in Armenia long enough to understand why someone from New Jersey is frustrated that Washington diplomacy cannot exist with the truth we all wish would be spoken. However: Ambassador Yovanovitch REPRESENTS HER GOVERNMENT. She would be derelict in her pledge to Americans (such as Ms. Kasabian, I presume) if she represented any position other than what she has sworn to uphold.
July 4th, 2009 at 01:45
Dear John,
Armenia Now may be based in Armenia physically but its soul is in the States.
But hey, nothing wrong with that.
Otherwise, your comments are well taken.
July 4th, 2009 at 07:54
I’m responding to John Hughes who said “Yovanovitch REPRESENTS HER GOVERNMENT [and] would be derelict in her pledge to Americans … if she represented any position other than what she has sworn to uphold.”
Pure baloney.
Amb. John Evans acknowledged the genocide and had to resign as a result. The US foreign services officers organization was about to give him an award for speaking up. At the last minute, Bush put pressure on the organization to withdraw the award. Thus, Evans’ peers thought he was correct to do as he did, even if they were forced to withdraw the award.
When presidential advisor Sandy Berger said “Armenian genocide” (this was under President Clinton, as I recall), he was not fired, just chastised. Thus, there is leeway. It is not as if the G word is officially forbidden. It all depends on context.
A US ambassador is not a slave, for heaven’s sake. I’m an American and know that even if Hughes does not.
John Hughes would, apparently, have us believe that if the policy of the US president were to cover up the Holocaust (when it was happening in the 1940’s, or let’s say in the present day, or for a *future* Jewish Holocaust), then an ambassador, or other US official would be bound to follow that policy. No one would agree that such should be the case. Not even Hughes and his simplistic “Yovanovitch was just following orders,” (per the Nuremberg trials, that was not a valid defense).
I want to point out the double standard there. If we assume that it was somehow US policy to not acknowledge the Holocaust (again, past — or some future Holocaust somewhere, such as in Iran), then it would – surely in the minds of Hughes and people who believe like him – never, ever be OK for a US government official to deny that Holocaust – BUT it is somehow Ok for a US government official to deny the *Armenian* genocide. This double standard is built in to some people’s minds and is hard to dislodge. It’s called brainwashing. I hope ArmeniaNow’s other journalists are not afflicted too.
July 5th, 2009 at 17:12
Against your previous writer’s charges of brainwashing, I suggest he or anyone else read this before stringing me up.
http://armenianow.com/?action=viewArticle&AID=3816&CID=3650&IID=1239&lng=eng
July 7th, 2009 at 14:46
I sympathise with the general views expressed here about Genocide recognition but all critics of the US Ambassador in Armenia (who does an excellent job) should direct their criticisms to the US Government directly. Ms. Yovanovich is a ‘diplomat’ for God’s sake, and is employed to express US Government views not her own (as do all foreign diplomats in Yerevan). Once she has left Government service then she is free to express her personal views and not before. If she does express such views then she is likely to be relieved of her post which will achieve nothing. Sorry but that is the way it is. Don’t blame the messenger!
July 7th, 2009 at 22:25
With all due respect to Mr. Papworth, Armenian Americans are well aware that the ambassador does not necessarily create policy. Did Papworth read my comment above about brainwashing – Holocaust vs. Armenian genocide? Would Papworth even for one second defend an ambassador who was helping Holocaust denial even if that were US policy to deny? No, he would not.
I suppose that no one can be blamed except Obama himself, and perhaps even *he* is not to blame since he is ultimately controlled by, let’s see, (1) God Himself, and, of course, (2) poor Obama can’t do much because of “political realities” and (3) His Secretary of State advised him to not recognize the genocide etc.
We Armenians will heap our dismay on anyone we choose, Mr. Papworth. Spare us the lectures, please. Are you a Brit, by the way?
This is what we Americans do: All elected and appointed officials are fair targets for criticism, regardless of whether they themselves formulated the policy in question or not. Any American – even a child – who follows politics knows, for example, that the White House spokesperson comes in for criticism. Advisors and aides – not just in government but in business – come in for criticism. Staff at all levels, except perhaps the very lowest, come in for criticism for what they do and say, regardless of whether they made a particular policy or not.
Frankly, I am getting tired of hearing from non-Americans, expatriots, foreigners, illegal immigrants, Brits, and other assorted aliens who are trying to tell Armenian Americans whom we can and cannot criticize and who know zip about the American system.
July 14th, 2009 at 01:22
Why is Armenia Now listed on a United States Government website?