A windswept hilltop here in southeastern Anatolia has become the
site for a reunion that once would have been unthinkable, as thousands
of Assyrians from across the region have converged to openly celebrate
their New Year in Turkey for the first time.
Like many other expressions of minority ethnic identity, the
Assyrian New Year, or Akito, had been seen by Turkey as a threat. But
this year, the government, with an eye toward helping its bid to join
the European Union, has officially allowed the celebration by the
Assyrians, members of a Christian ethnic group that traces its roots
back to ancient Mesopotamia.
Yusuf Begtas, one of the celebration’s organizers, said that
because most of Turkey’s tiny Assyrian population – about 6,000 people
in all – lives in a heavily Kurdish region that has seen frequent
clashes between the Turkish government and Kurdish militias, strong
assertions of Assyrian ethnicity have long been politically impossible.
But Turkey’s political culture has been changing rapidly.
“Turkey is showing itself to the E.U.,” Mr. Begtas said. “When we
asked the authorities for permission to celebrate this year, we knew it
wouldn’t be possible for them to deny us now. Turkey has to show the
E.U. that it is making democratic changes.”
The festivities here on Friday were the culmination of a
celebration that started on March 21, the first day of the Assyrian New
Year. Behind Mr. Begtas, on a raised stage near the wall of the Mar
Aphrem monastery, a balding baritone sang in Syriac, the Assyrians’
language, a Semitic tongue similar to Aramaic.
He was followed by a group of girls wearing mauve satin folk
costumes, dancing in lines with their arms linked. They were cheered on
by an audience of about 5,000, including large groups of visiting
ethnic Assyrians from Europe, Syria and Iraq.
Iraq, where Akito is celebrated openly, has the world’s largest
population of Assyrians, about a million. Most of Turkey’s Assyrians
were killed or driven away during the Armenian massacres early in the
last century, and the bullet scars on some of Midyat’s almost
medieval-looking sandstone buildings still bear witness to those times.
In recent years, Assyrians have suffered quieter forms of
persecution and discrimination. Since the 1980’s, under those
pressures, thousands of Assyrians have emigrated abroad. Kurds, with
whom Assyrians have long had a tense relationship, are now a majority
in Midyat, which until just a generation ago was 75 percent Assyrian.
Haluk Akinci, the regional governor of Nusaybin, a district next to
Midyat, suggested that the Turkish government might see allowing the
New Year celebration as a partial atonement for past persecutions.
“In the past, freedoms for minorities were not as great as they are
now,” he said, though he noted that in years past, private Assyrian New
Year celebrations had generally been ignored by the authorities. “The
Turkish government now repents that they let so many of these people
leave the country.”
After years of intense political and population pressure, the
Turkish Assyrians say, public celebrations like Akito have huge
emotional significance, and the participation of Assyrians from abroad
has become particularly meaningful.
Terros Lazar Owrah, 60, an Assyrian shopkeeper from Dohor, in
northern Iraq, said he had driven 14 hours for the opportunity to
attend the celebration. “So many of us are leaving the region,” he
said. “It’s very important for Assyrians from everywhere to get
together in one place.”
Thanks in large part to greater political freedoms granted recently
in Iraq and Turkey, the Assyrians say, a sense of pan-regional Assyrian
identity seems to be gathering strength. And though Turkey does not
have any legal Assyrian political parties, there are those who would
like to turn this rapidly developing sense of solidarity into a
political voice, even into a discussion of nationhood.
Representatives from several overseas Assyrian political parties
were present at the celebration.
Emanuel Khoshaba, an Iraqi Assyrian who represents the Assyrian
Democratic Movement in Damascus, pointed out that Midyat lies between
the Tigris and the Euphrates, the Mesopotamia that the Assyrians
believe to be their rightful homeland.
“Protecting our national days is as important to us as preserving
the soil of our nation,” Mr. Khoshaba said. “Whether they live in Iraq
or Syria or Turkey, our goal is to bring Assyrians together as a
nation.”
That is unlikely to happen. With countries in the region
increasingly wary of the flowering of Kurdish nationalism in northern
Iraq, smaller nationalist movements seem to have even less of a chance
of finding political support in the region.
Still, the relaxation of Turkish antagonism toward the New Year’s
celebration was a significant enough start for many who attended.
“It’s about coming together in spite of our rulers,” said Fahmi
Soumi, an Assyrian businessman who had traveled from Damascus to attend
the Akito festivities. “When we unite like this, there is no Turkey, no
Syria and no Iran. We are one people.”
Yorumlar kapatıldı.