Turkish Deportations

The Times, May 16th 1922, page 21.

TURKISH DEPORTATIONS
CONFIRMATION OF "THE TIMES" TELEGRAM.
Mr. Chamberlain, replying to Mr. T. P. O'Conner (Liverpool, Scotland, N.), said: -- Confirmation has been received of the statements contained in the recent report by Major Yowell, to which, I presume, the hon. member refers. With the permission of the House I will read out two telegrams from H.M. High Commissioner at Constantinople on the subject, dated May 10. The first runs: --
"I have interviewed at great length Dr. Ward, of Near Eastern Relief Commission, who had just arrived from Kharput, which he left March 15. He corroborates statements as to treatment of minorities contained in telegram from Constantinople, published in The Times of May 5. The Turks appear to be working on a deliberate plan to get rid of minorities. Their method has been to collect at Amasia Ottoman Greeks from region between Samsun and Trebizond. These Greeks are marched from Amasia via Tokat and Sivas as far as Cresarea, and then back again, until they are eventually sent through Kharput to the east. In this manner a large number of deportees die on the road from hardship and exposure. The Turks can say they did not actually kill these refugees but a comparison may be instituted with the way in which the Turks formerly got rid of the dogs at Constantinople by landing them on an island where they died of hunger and thirst. Large numbers of deportees who were being sent to Van and Bitlis passed through Kharput between June and December last year. Now that spring has come these deportations have begun again. Once these gangs have passed Diarbekr, which is the last American relief station, Americans lose all track of them, but Dr. Ward has little doubt that many deportees die in the mountains east of that place. Turks in preference choose winter weather for driving these deportees into mountains. American Near Eastern Relief was not allowed to shelter children whose parents had died on the road. These children were driven forward with other deportees. Dr. Ward himself last year in December counted 150 bodies on the road between Kharput and Malatia. A fellow-worker saw and counted 1,500 bodies on the road to Kharput and 2,000 deportees died on the road east of that place. Two-thirds of Greek deportees are women and children.
"At present fresh deportation outrages are starting in all parts of Asia Minor from northern seaports to south-eastern district. Turkish official at head educational department at Kharput told Dr. Ward as an illustration of Turkish inefficiency that in 1915 Turks had not made a clean job of massacres. He said that next time Turks would take care to do their work thoroughly. Dr. Ward endorsed Signor Tuozzi's statement of January last that deliberate policy of Turks is to exterminate minorities. He considers that they are accelerating their activities in this respect before peace settlement, and he stated that if action is not taken soon problem will be solved by disappearance of minorities. I am confirmed in my belief that the Turkish protests now being received in regard to alleged Greek excesses are designed to divert attention from Turkish atrocities. Another American of high character and standing, who came with Dr. Ward, states that Dr. Gibbon, formerly a professor at Robert College, who has just been visiting Greek front, and went into Turkish lines, reports that Greeks have behaved well in Afiun Karahissar-Aidin sectors; also that Musulman population seen quite content with Greek rule in these districts."
The second telegram is as follows:--
"Further reliable information received from American relief workers, dated April 25, shows that whole Greek population from the age of 15 upwards of Trebizond are and its hinterland is being deported apparently to Labour battalions at Erzerum, Kars and Sarikamysh. Since Armistice proposal there has been marked recrudescence of these deportations which are carried out in conditions of terrible hardship, and now embrace bank employees and others whose position had hitherto exempted them. There are numbers of Christian women and children in deplorable straits in Trebizond who have been driven out of their villages. I have also received other reports, dating back to September 1921, of deportations of Armenians from Zeitum."
The Turks have repeatedly been warned that these atrocities, which have now been going on almost continuously for over seven years, would adversely affect Allied public opinion and Allied policy.