Correspondence Istanbul - The latest victim of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is an inoffensive sculpture. The monument of humanity, "a high statue of a hundred feet erected on the heights of Kars on the border with Armenia to encourage reconciliation between the two countries, has been called the last weekend of "monstrosity" by the head of government, visiting the region.The reflection is surprising in a country scarred by thousands of statues of Mustafa Kemal, the revered founder of the Turkish Republic. But Kars is less than the aesthetics of the monument as the location chosen is at issue. "They built a strange thing, a monstrosity next to the mausoleum of Abu Hasan Harakani," a figure of Turkish Islam of the eleventh century, regretted Mr Erdogan.
The mayor of Kars, a member of the AKP (Justice and Development), "will soon do its work" service this "affront" and turn it into a "pretty park", ordered the first authoritative Minister. The demolition of the unfinished work seems inevitable. This sculpture, designed by Mehmet Aksoy, represents "a human being halved.
Both parties are in a position of confrontation against each other, made enemies. They again become a single person with Stretched" says Turkish artist, which compares her man to stone Buddhas of Bamiyan, blown up by the Taliban. His achievement was decided in 2005 by former mayor of Kars, Naif Alibeyoglu, strong supporter of reconciliation with Armenia.
Hundred thousand people had signed its petition calling for the reopening of the border, closed by Turkey in 1993 in retaliation for the occupation by Armenian troops in Nagorno-Karabakh, a province of Azerbaijan. A century later, the genocide of Armenians in Anatolia in 1915 and its denial by Turkey continues to block the path to reconciliation.
In 2009, the signing of a roadmap for the reopening of the border, under the sponsorship of Switzerland, had been led to expect a reconciliation, but the process is now frozen. "This statue was my call for peace", said Mr. Alibeyoglu today. But the initiative has angered Turkish nationalists, opposed to any form of repentance, and the National Commission of Monuments, which had authorized the construction, has reversed itself.
"This is a statue of Armenia. Turkey has nothing to be ashamed of anything," he shouted this week Oktay Aktas, the local leader of the ultranationalist party (MHP). Came several times in Kars in recent months, including a prayer provocative in the cathedral of Ani, the capital destroyed an ancient Armenian kingdom, the leader of the MHP, Devlet Bahçeli, Erdogan has pushed the nationalist outbidding in six months of the elections.
Guillaume Perrier Article published in the edition of 19.01.11
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