While, dumbfounded, indignant and upset by the appalling assassination of a professor, then those perpetrated in this church in Nice, the French people wonder about the springs of this barbarism and the means to put an end to it, another drama is being played out 3,500 kilometers from our country, where the same barbarism is in action.
In Karabakh - in Artsakh, according to its Armenian name - one also decapitates.
For the past month, the Armenians have been waging a dramatically unequal, desperate fight there against a Turkish-Azerbaijani coalition supported by hundreds of jihadist mercenaries.
The affair does not come down to a distant territorial conflict for a few acres of pebbles lost in the middle of the Caucasus.
It concerns us all.
The Armenians are fighting the same enemy.
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Jean-François Colosimo: "Nagorno-Karabakh, support the Armenians and refuse indifference"
Like the attack on a professor, on a church - beyond the intrinsic abomination of crimes -, the offensive launched against the Armenians by Azerbaijan, at the initiative of Turkey, has the same symbolic dimension. For centuries in fact, perhaps since the rainbow over Mount Ararat which announced the end of the Flood, the Armenians have been a bridge between civilizations, across time and geography.
In the fifth century, for their belonging to the first Christian nation, as guardians of the Tomb of Christ, the Armenians received their own neighborhood in Jerusalem.
Their language is said to include all known phonemes, which is why Armenians are gifted in music and often polyglot.
Is it predestination or their history that forged their ability to communicate with other peoples?
In the fifth century, for their belonging to the first Christian nation, as guardians of the Tomb of Christ, the Armenians received their own neighborhood in Jerusalem, alongside Jews, Muslims and other Christians.
This district still exists.
The geographical position of Armenia means that it has suffered successive domination and influences - Greeks, Romans, Parthians, Persians, Mongols… In the 11th century, its progressive annexation by the Byzantines, then its conquest by the Turks, constrained part of its population in exile.
Wherever they are, generation after generation, the Armenians have integrated themselves into various nations, without forgetting their roots, without forgetting their country gradually amputated.
They gave emperors to Byzantium, viziers to the caliphs of Egypt, ministers to the kingdom of Persia, military leaders to the Rajahs of India, diplomats to the Ottomans, glorious generals to the empire of the Tsars.
Even deprived of a nation-state since the fourteenth century, the Armenians, posted at the crossroads with Asia, have always played in history the role of mediators between West and East.
Even deprived of a nation-state since the 14th century, generation after generation, the Armenians, stationed at the crossroads with Asia, have always played in history the role of mediators between West and East, between peoples of languages, cultures. and of different religions, on the silk and spice routes, in the Middle East or in the Indies of the 17th and 18th centuries.
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Nagorno-Karabakh: "Turkish imperialism constrains the rights of the Armenian people"
They knew how to live in peace with Catholic or Orthodox Christians, Shiite or Sunni Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Mazdeans… Their large diaspora lives in Moscow or Los Angeles, in Tehran or in Marseille and Paris, in Beirut or in Buenos Aires, Warsaw or Montreal.
It constitutes a network with immutable threads between continents, between countries, which endures beyond conflicts and political regimes.
Among all these links, there is one, privileged, with France, attested from the 6th century.
He never denied himself.
Among all these links, there is one, privileged, with France, attested from the 6th century.
It has never denied over time, Armenian ambassadors in the delegation sent by Caliph Haroun-al-Rachid to Charlemagne, merchants invited by Colbert to Marseille to revive trade with the Orient, Roustam, the Armenian Mamluk, Napoleon I's bodyguard, to the Armenian Legion which fought valiantly under the French flag in the Middle East between 1916 and 1920 and to the tens of thousands of refugees who chose France, a homeland of heart, after the tragedy of 1915.
1915: a million and a half Armenians disappear, victims of a Turkey in the grip of ultra-nationalist hysteria.
For almost two thousand years, Armenians have been guardians, watchmen.
So, when a people-bridge is threatened, it is the dialogue between all the peoples which dries up, it is a fracture in the history of the world which is announced.
1915. One and a half million Armenians disappear, victims of a Turkey in the grip of ultra-nationalist hysteria, despite the indignation of a large part of Europe and the United States.
The indifference that follows - due to the geopolitical upheavals of the time - makes Hitler say on the eve of the Shoah, while he is devising his terrifying plan of Aryanization, "
Who remembers the massacre of the Armenians?"
A people-bridge between peoples, a people victim of an imprescriptible crime against humanity which will be at the origin of the creation of the legal term of genocide.
Is it possible to let a dictator announce that he is going to put an end to the “remains of the sword”, in other words the descendants of the survivors of 1915?
In this very serious hour when our most essential humanist values are being damaged, now every day, is it possible to let a dictator announce that he is going to put an end to the “
remains of the sword
”, in other words the descendants of the survivors? from 1915?
In this grave hour when the very foundations of our Republic are under attack, can we be content with a few protests when a young democratic republic, for which France has always been an inspiration, faces two dictatorships?
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"Turkey organizes its hold on the Islam of France"
Recent events have led President Macron to take a firm stance against Turkey.
But France must raise its voice higher in the concert of nations to protect the Armenians of Artsakh, defend their right to self-determination on a land they have inhabited since ancient times.
If it betrays this centuries-old alliance, if we let this bridge burn, if we do not have the courage to stand up on the outside against this plague of fanaticism that is hitting us inside, what will we say to our children?
That we just light candles and place flowers?
The 42 authors who signed this column are:
Jerome Attal
Stephane Bern
Emmanuelle de Boysson
Nathalie de Broc
Pascal bruckner
David Camus
Mireille Calmel
Virginie Carton
Francoise Chandernagor
Paule Constant
Marie-Do Chaize
Francois de Closets
Vincent Crouzet
Xavier darcos
Didier Decoin
Marina Dedeyan
Arnaud Delalande
Olivier Delorme
Carole Duplessis-Rousée
Catherine School-Boivin
Franck Ferrand
David foenkinos
Sophie Fontanel
Lorraine Fouchet
Franz-Olivier Giesbert
Catherine Hermary-Vieille
Alexandre Garden
Michele Kahn
Yann Keffelec
Philippe Labro
Thibault de Montaigu
Erik Orsenna
Gilles Paris
Jean-Marie Rouart
Bernadette Pecassou-Camebrac
Patrick Poivre d'Arvor
Michel Quint
Tatiana de Rosnay
Gilbert Sinoué
Akli Tadjer
Valerie Toranian
Tigrane Yegavian.