"ARMENIAN CARD"

Simultaneously with Az-erbaijan, Armenia also marked its national holiday - "the Day of the First Republic" on 28 May, with all the protocol ceremonies befitting such a historic date and, of course, with a speech by President Serzh Sargsyan.

According to the well-established tradition of many years, on this occasion, the head of state is supposed to speak about the achievements in the economy and social policy, set tasks, etc. But the president of Armenia behaved differently. He went to Sardarabad, which was renamed "Sardarapat", the site of a battle with the Turkish army in 1918, where he again began to talk about the war with Turkey, "genocide", etc.

Of course, each state is free to choose its own "historical priorities" and to interpret the key dates of its history. However, Serzh Sargsyan's "festive" speech gives cause for reflection about the scale of hatred against Turkey at the official level in Armenia based on those same conversations about the "genocide of 1915". However, in the one hundred years, the old postulates have already become outdated, and even in Armenia, many perceive this iconic historical tragedy as an age-old story. However, judging by the many indirect signs, this cult is getting a solid "information recharge" in Armenia today.

First of all, it is impossible not to draw attention to some of the nuances of the coverage of the Syria events in the Armenian media. That the focus is the fate of the Armenian community of Syria was expected. But local analysts have gone as far as building an entire logical chain: Turkey allegedly supports the Syrian opposition solely for its militants to "kill Armenians" and malicious Turkish emissaries almost set a price for each slain ethnic Armenian.

Simultaneously, Yerevan "spin doctors" are carefully and systematically fomenting the situation around the Armenian community of Turkey. At the present time, there are at least 60,000 ethnic Armenians in Istanbul alone (and this is without the Armenian "guest workers" who left Armenia to work in Turkey in recent years). The Armenian Apostolic Church has its own patriarchate here. Several Armenian newspapers are published in Istanbul, and there are schools and many commercial and private enterprises owned by ethnic Armenians.

Despite this, in recent years Yerevan has constantly attempted to create tensions around the Armenian community of Turkey. First, unprecedented attention was paid to the murder of two elderly Armenian women in Istanbul. Then it turned out that it was an ordinary crime, and besides that, the criminal himself was an ethnic Armenian. The next outburst of emotions was timed to coincide with a new event: in one of the local Armenian churches an unknown man opened indiscriminate fire during a service. No one was killed and wounded, but the Armenian media made an unimaginable fuss about it. It all ended when the Turkish police established that the shooter was a mentally unstable person and turned out to be an ethnic Armenian once again.

The Armenian media have now turned to the "case of Sevan Nisanyan": this Turkish journalist of Armenian origin has repeatedly spoken to the media with provocative statements. He first undertook to study the topic of "Armenian genocide" and then claimed that the Turks and Muslims in Anatolia are "accidental" and "non-indigenous" people and that "historically" this land belongs to Christians (i.e. Armenians) ... But since he failed to gain proper fame outside of Turkey, Nisanyan took up the trouble-free topic. He wrote in his blog that insulting the Prophet Muhammad cannot be a crime - this is "freedom of speech". Not content with mere reasoning, Nisanyan insulted the prophet. Turkish justice reacted immediately. The Prosecutor General's Office requested 1.5 years' imprisonment for Nisanyan, and the court sentenced him to 13 months in prison.

However, even the most desperate supporters of Nisanyan were forced to admit that the verdict of the Turkish court fits into the earlier decision of the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. After analyzing several "precedents", they came to the conclusion that freedom of speech is very good and very valuable, of course, but insulting religious feelings is, first of all, unacceptable, and secondly, can and must be punished. It is too sensitive and painful an issue to be neglected. So Nisanyan did not have much of a chance for protection from international human rights groups after the verdict of the ECHR. In response, Armenian lobbyists, including the United States, not to mention journalists of Armenian newspapers and websites, launched serious activities. The calculation is clear: one has only to read a title like "A Turkish court jails an Armenian for insulting Islam", and the reaction of the liberal community will be quite predictable.

It is quite obvious that this is a systematic policy of "fomenting the situation". Let the 60,000 Armenians in Istanbul and tens of thousands of their compatriots in other cities of Turkey live quietly, socialize with neighbours, attend church on Sundays and hotly argue in the cafe who's playing better - Fenerbahce or Galatasaray, at the Internet age, you can always find one or two people who want to "gain fame" through provocations. And promoting it all is a matter of technology.

It is surprising that this so-called "rat race" found an unexpected response in Turkish "elite groups", which noticed some "European trends" and began to show their sympathy for "Armenian dissidents" - with some touch of sweet opposition. And now the Turkish blogosphere is breathlessly discussing posts by a certain Aret Vartanyan, who assures all of his love for Turkey and then with intonations very familiar to them Azerbaijani audience, begins to sob how "European" and "Christian" Istanbul was before it began to be dominated by "various incomers"...

The history of Turkey has already seen something like this. However, Armenian circles prefer to ignore it today, but the fact remains that the Young Turks were one of the first to "flirt" with the Armenian leaders, overthrowing Sultan Abdulhamid II in 1908 and carrying out European-style reforms in the Ottoman Empire. These reforms also directly affected the situation of minorities - non-Muslims were officially given equal rights with Muslims. In those days, it was a very progressive step - in the US, for example, the Indians were granted civil rights only in 1924. But the Armenian leaders, with whom European politicians were already actively flirting at the time, clearly wanted more, and above all "territorial autonomy", which would open the way for the establishment of an Armenian state in Turkish lands.

And now it seems that Armenia, which still has Agri Dag (Mount Ararat) located in Turkey on its coat of arms and which does not even think of giving up its territorial claims against Turkey, is ready to play the previous scenario once again, where "exemplary victims" like Nisanyan and Turkish "elite groups" have their own roles, even though not all the "players" are initiated into the subtleties of the plan.