Turkish Atrocities Stir Britain to Act
The New York Times, May 16th 1922, page 3.
TURKISH ATROCITIES STIR BRITAIN TO ACT
She Invites Us to Join in Investigating Massacres of Greeks.
------
ASKS FRANCE AND ITALY, TOO
------
Announcement Made in Commons—State Department Has Invitation but Withholds Comment.
Copyright, 1922, by The New York Times Company.
Special Cable to THE NEW YORK TIMES.
LONDON, May 15.—Austen Chamberlain, the Government leader, announced in the House of Commons today that the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs had sent proposals to the French, Italian and American Governments for an immediate joint investigation into the grave charges brought against the Turkish Nationalities of acts of cruelty and barbarism in the treatment of the Christian minorities in Asia Minor.
Mr. Chamberlain read two telegrams from the British High Commissioner in Constantinople, dated May 10. The first runs:
“I have interviewed at great length Dr. Ward of the Near East Relief Commission, who has just arrived from Harpoot, which he left March 15. He corroborates the statements as to the treatment of minorities published May 5. The Turks appear to be working on a deliberate plan to get rid of the minorities.
“Their method has been to collect at Amasia Ottoman Greeks from the region between Samsoun and Trebizond. These Greeks are marched from Amasia via Tokat and Sivas as far as Caesarea, and then back again, until they are eventually sent through Harpoot to the East. In this manner a large number deportees die on the road from hardship and exposure. A large number of deportees who were being sent to Van and Bitlis passed through Harpoot between June and December last year.
“Now that Spring has come, these deportations have begun again. Once these gangs have passed Diarbekir, which is the last American relief station, the Americans lose all track of them; but Dr. Ward has little doubt that many deportees die in mountains east of that place.
“The Turks in preference choose Winter weather for driving these deportees into the mountains. The American Near East 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 Harpoot and Malada. Fellow-workers saw and counted 1,500 bodies on the road to Harpoot, and 2,000 deportees died on the road east of that place. Two-thirds of the Greek deportees are women and children.
“At present fresh deportation outrages are starting in all parts of Asia Minor, from the northern seaports to the south-eastern district. A Turkish official at the head of the educational department at Harpoot told Dr. Ward, as an illustration of Turkish inefficiency, that in 1915 the Turks had not made a clean job of the massacres. He said next time the Turks would take care to do their work thoroughly.
“Dr. Ward endorsed Signor Tuozzi’s statement of January last that the deliberate policy of the Turks is to exterminate the minorities. He considers that they are accelerating their activities before the peace settlement, and if action is not taken soon the problem will be solved by the disappearance of the minorities.”
Deportations in the Trebizond Area.
The second telegram read by Mr. Chamberlain was as follows:
“Further reliable information received from American relief workers shows that the whole Greek population, from the age of 15 upwards, of the Trebizond area and its Hinterland is being deported, apparently to labor battalions at Erzerum, Kara and Sar Kamash. Since the armistice proposal there has been a marked recrudescence of these deportations, which are carried out in conditions of terrible hardship and now embrace bank employes and others whose positions 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.”
Continuing his statement, Mr Chamberlain said:
“The Turks have been repeatedly warned that these atrocities, which have been going on almost continuously for over seven years, would adversely affect allied public opinion and allied policy, and repeated protests have been addressed to them. These warnings and protests, however, have been entirely without effect. His Majesty’s Government have proposed to the French, Italian and American Governments a line of common action which I can explain in no better way than by reading the following instructions telegraphed on Friday last to his Majesty’s High Commissioner at Constantinople:
“ ‘Information reported by you reveals such an appalling tale of the barbarity and cruelty now being practised by the Angora Turks as part of a systematic policy of extermination of Christian minorities in Asia Minor that His Majesty’s Government, who have in the proposed terms of peace assumed serious responsibilities for the future protection of these minorities, cannot allow such reports to remain uninvestigated, or such incidents to continue unchecked. I have informed the French, Italian and American Ambassadors of our opinion with a view to securing their cooperation in the action which I now propose, and I am requesting them to ask their High Commissioners at Constantinople to act in concert with you.
“ ‘My proposal is that each of the four powers should at once depute a carefully selected officer to proceed to Trebizond or whatever Black Sea port may be most suitable for the purpose, with a view to proceeding to such places in the interior as may best enable them to conduct the necessary investigations. The permission of the Angora authorities will have to be sought and facilities demanded. It will be difficult for them to refuse those, since it is their contention either that deportations and massacres have not taken place or they have been provoked by the conduct of the Greek and other minorities concerned. Should permission be refused, His Majesty’s Government will have to reconsider their entire attitude toward the proposals, which obviously could not be pursued with any chance of success in such conditions as I have described.
“ ‘It is inconceivable that Europe should agree to hand back to Turkish rule, without the most stringent guarantees, communities which would be liable to be treated in the manner described by competent American witnesses, whose reports, moreover, are confirmed by independent information in our possession.’ ”
Mr. Chamberlain added that there was no country whose co-operation this country would more gladly welcome that that of America.
Mr. Mills asked if Mr. Chamberlain was aware that the initiative in America was taken as the result of the determination of the Secretary of Agriculture of New York State in spreading broadcast photographs of thousands of bodies uncovered by the melting snows during his tour in Armenia.
Mr. Chamberlain replied:
“I am not personally aware of the initiative having come from the United Stated Government, but I hope they will join us.”
------
WASHINGTON, May 15 (Associated Press).—The request of Great Britain for the co-operation of the United States, as well as of France and Italy, in investigating Turkish atrocities in Asia Minor has been received, according to information given today at the State Department, but officials declined to comment on it in any way.