Turkish Daily News
A Turkish scholar arrested in Armenia
Sunday, July 31, 2005
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=19498

The political implications of this situation are worrying intellectuals
everywhere. Armenian-Turkish dialogue is already fragile and beset with
nationalist propaganda launched continuously from both sides.

Elif SAFAK

We, a group of Turkish intellectuals, are sending a letter to Armenian
President Robert Kocharian. The letter concerns Yektan Türkyilmaz, a Turkish
citizen and academic in the United States who has been held by the National
Security Service, which is still referred to as KGB headquarters, in Yerevan
since June 17.

Türkyilmaz is doing his Ph.D. in cultural anthropology at Duke University.
He can speak Turkish, Ottoman Turkish, French, English and Armenian. He has
received several prestigious awards for his academic work, including the
John Hope Franklin Institute Fellowship and the International Dissertation
Field Research Program Award from the Social Science Research Council. Most
recently he was undertaking research in the Armenian National Archives and
significantly, he was the first Turkish citizen to have been given access to
these archival sources. He had ventured to study a very difficult and thorny
theme by undertaking critical ethnographic and archival research on
Anatolian culture and demography. He particularly focused on a highly
turbulent period extending from the 1900s to the 1940s by managing to stay
equally distant from and objectively independent vis-à-vis the competing
nationalist projects that had once pummeled the region and are still alive
today. By using Armenian, Turkish and English sources, his research was
developed upon a multilingual, multicultural and interdisciplinary ground,
nourished by the crossroads of the disciplines of anthropology, geography
and history.

Needless to say, very few Turkish scholars have hitherto dared to delve
into similar subjects. Even when they did, very few went this far. More
importantly, though he has chosen a highly politicized and polarized theme
as his dissertation topic, Türkyilmaz is first and foremost an independent
scholar and an objective researcher.

As part of his academic work Türkyilmaz had been collecting books, both as
a researcher and a bibliophile. He would buy books from second-hand
bookstores, an entirely and unquestionably legal purchase. Apparently, this
passion for books was to become an unforgivable sin. Failing to realize he
would need permission to take books out of Armenia, he was arrested at
Yerevan Airport. In addition to the books in question, all his research
material and CDs were confiscated.

Türkyilmaz unknowingly violated an old law. He did not know it was a crime
to take books out of Armenia; no one had warned him about this. He did not
know that he had to "declare" all books over 50 years of age at customs.
Armenian authorities could have confiscated his books or asked him to pay a
fine, but instead he is being held in prison and treated like a nuclear
weapons smuggler. Below is Article 215 of Armenian Criminal Code that forms
the very basis of Türkyilmaz's arrest and indictment.

"Contraband of narcotic drugs, neurological, strong, poisonous, poisoning,
radioactive or explosive materials, weapons, explosive devices, ammunition,
fire-arms, except smoothbore long barrel hunting guns, nuclear, chemical,
biological or other mass destruction weapons, or dual-use materials,
devices, technologies that can also be used for the creation or use of mass
destruction or missile delivery systems thereof, strategic raw materials or
cultural values for the transportation of which special rules are
established, is punishable with imprisonment of between four to eight years,
with or without confiscation of the relevant property."

Understandably, Türkyilmaz made a mistake by failing to get special
permission for the books in his suitcase. But obviously he is not a drug
dealer or nuclear weapons smuggler. He is a scholar, an independent-minded
researcher whose only mistake was to take the research material he was
studying along with him on his flight back from Armenia. Even if he did make
a mistake, he did so unknowingly, there is a huge disproportion between the
crime he committed and the price he is being asked to pay.

The political implications of this situation are worrying intellectuals
everywhere. Armenian-Turkish dialogue is already fragile and beset with
nationalist propaganda launched continuously from both sides. Against this
delicate background there are very few scholars who have been able to put
critical, objective research in front of ideological or political agendas.
There are not many people capable of bridging the tormenting gap between
Armenian and Turkish cultures. I sincerely hope and respectfully urge
Armenian authorities and the Armenian president to intervene in order to
bring this sad and unexpected episode to an amicable end.

Armenian-friendly Turks and Turk-friendly Armenians have already had their
share of sorrow. We have already had enough grief in our common history. We
all need Türkyilmaz to be freed.