PM’s remarks worry Armenian migrants in Turkey

Thursday, March 18, 2010

ISTANBUL - Daily News with wires / Vercihan Ziflioğlu contributed to this report from Istanbul.

The Turkish prime minister’s recent suggestion that undocumented citizens of Armenia may have to be deported has raised fears among Armenian workers living in Turkey.

Many migrants send the money they earn in Turkey to their families in Armenia, supporting that country’s economy.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s comments to journalists in London on Tuesday came after a U.S. Congressional committee and the Swedish parliament accepted claims of “genocide” regarding the incidents of 1915. The prime minister claimed that there are 100,000 undocumented Armenians working in Turkey and that Ankara has so far tolerated them.

“So what will I do tomorrow? If necessary, I will tell them ‘come on, back to your country’... I’m not obliged to keep them in my country. Those actions [on genocide resolutions] unfortunately have a negative impact on our sincere attitudes,” Agence France-Presse quoted him as saying.

According to a study by the Eurasia Partnership Foundation, there are anywhere between 6,000 and 70,000 people from Armenia residing in Turkey. A journalist from the weekly Agos estimated the number of Armenians working in Turkey at between 12,000 and 14,000, based on Ministry of Labor statistics.

Speaking to daily Radikal, Karina, an Armenian citizen working in Istanbul’s Kumkapı district, said she is worried about the statement. Karina, who declined to give her surname, has been living with a tourist visa in Turkey for the past five years. “Deportation will be bad for me economically and socially,” she said.

Making a living

Others speaking to daily Radikal also said they had to work in Turkey to make a living.

Armen, who also refrained from giving his surname, said he has a life in Turkey and does not want to leave that behind. “Even if the police come to me with a knife in their hands, I will not leave here,” he said. “I am married. My children are with me and we are all right here.”

According to recent research, there are around 800 children who were born in Turkey to Armenian parents who live undocumented in the country. These children are in a legal limbo, citizens of neither nation.

“If I am deported, I will find a way to return to Turkey,” said Giyma Harutunyan, who has been living in Turkey for the past five years.

Yura Sarkisyan, 70, who is involved in the “shuttle trade,” told Radikal: “It is the politicians who make this thing complicated. There is no good in bringing up events that happened a long time ago. We do not want to leave. We are thankful to all the Turkish people.”

Some undocumented Armenians, however, said they would leave if they were no longer wanted in Turkey. A.N., 37, identified only by her initials, said she loved Turkey and has lived here for four years now, daily Hürriyet reported Thursday. “But if they want, we will leave. We are here because the chance to find a job in Armenia is small. This is our country’s fault,” said A.N., who works as a salesperson in Istanbul’s Aksaray district.

M.H., 43, also identified only by her initials, has worked as babysitter for four years in Turkey. She said plans to go back to Armenia within one or two years. “People should not suffer due to politics. We have a life here,” she said.

The other side of the coin

T.Z., 28, identified only by her initials, told Hürriyet she was a student of Russian literature before she came to Turkey. “I work in a textile firm here,” she said. “My husband lives in Armenia. I want him to come here, too.”

T.Z. said the prime minister’s statements irked her. “Hundreds of thousands of Turks are working in Europe illegally,” she said. “Turkey should not forget that.”

Haygazun Alvrstyan, an academic from Yerevan State University, told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review on Thursday that Erdoğan’s statements are a disturbing reminder of history. “[They again want] Armenians to be deported. It is a shame that this statement is made by a prime minister,” he said.

The academic added that there are only about 10,000 Armenian citizens in Turkey, saying Erdoğan is exaggerating the figure in order to “coerce the European Union and the U.S. not to approve resolutions on genocide claims.”

Siranuys Dvyoan, a professor in Armenia, said undocumented workers are not just Armenia’s problem, noting that Turks work in various countries in a similar fashion. “Turkey is trying to display Armenia as a poor country in the world,” she said.

Tevan Poghosyan, from the Yerevan-based International Center of Human Development, said Erdoğan is trying to distract attention from the genocide issue.