The Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA) was a Marxist-Leninist guerrilla organization that operated between 1975 and 1983 with the stated intention to "compel the Turkish Government to acknowledge publicly its alleged responsibility for the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians in 1915, pay reparations, and cede territory for an Armenian homeland."[1] In particular, the ceded territory would be the area promised to the Armenians by US President Woodrow Wilson, named "Wilsonian Armenia" at the Treaty of Sevres, which never came into effect).[2] The group also operated under other names such as The Orly Group and the 3 October Organization.[2]
Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia | |
|---|---|
| Leader | Hagop Hagopian and Hagop Tarakciyan |
| Founded | 1970's |
| Headquarters | Armenia, Lebanon |
| Ideology | United Armenia |
| International affiliation | None |
History
The ASALA was founded in 1975 in Beirut, Lebanon during the Lebanese Civil War by Hagop Hagopian (Harutiun Tagushian) with the help of sympathetic Palestinians.[2] The group's activities were primarily assassinations of Turkish diplomats and politicians in Western Europe, in the United States and the Middle East.[2] Their first acknowledged killing was the assassination of the Turkish diplomat, Danış Tunalıgil, in Vienna on October 22, 1975. A failed attack in Geneva on October 3, 1980, in which two Armenian militants were injured resulted in a new nickname for the group, the 3 October Organization. The ASALA's eight point manifesto was published in 1981.
Continuous attacks prompted Turkey to accuse Cyprus, Greece, Syria, Lebanon, and the Soviet Union of provoking or possibly funding the ASALA, though nothing of this sort was ever found to be true.[3] With the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 the group lost much of its organization and support. Sympathetic Palestinian organizations including the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) withdrew their support and passed materials to the French intelligence services in 1983, detailing ASALA operatives.
The ASALA's most famous attack was on August 7, 1982 in Ankara at the Esenboğa International Airport, when its members targeted civilians for the first time. Two militants opened fire in a crowded passenger waiting room. One of the shooters took more than 20 hostages while the second was apprehended by police. Altogether, nine people died and 82 were injured. The surviving militant Levon Ekmekjian condemned the ASALA in the aftermath of the attack and appealed to other members to leave and stop the violence. The Esenboga attack also precipitated a split in the group over tactics, between the Nationalists (ASALA-Militant) led by Hagopian and the 'Popular Movement' (ASALA-Mouvement Révolutionnaire) led by Monte Melkonian. While Melkonian's faction insisted on attacks strictly against Turkish officials and the Turkish government, Hagopian's group disregarded the losses of unintended victims and regularly executed dissenting members.
On July 15, 1983, the ASALA carried out another devastating attack at the Orly Airport near Paris, in which 8 people were killed. The attack gave the group a new nickname, the Orly Group. Afterwards, French forces promptly arrested those involved.[4]
By 1986, the ASALA virtually ceased all attacks. Hagop Hagopian, one of the group's founders, was assassinated on a sidewalk in an affluent neighborhood in Athens, Greece on April 28, 1988. His assailants, Hovsep A., Vartan G., Garabed K., and Albert "Sultan-Minas", were all ASALA members and lieutenants of Hagopian. His body was riddled with several bullets while he was walking with two women at 4:30 in the morning.[5] Tarakchian died of cancer in 1980. Assassinations of former members continued in Armenia into the late 1990s.[6] According to Turkish sources, the ASALA was repressed by a series of attacks by the Turkish National Intelligence Organization (MIT), some carried out by Abdullah Çatlı, leader of the ultra-nationalist Grey Wolves, which worked in cooperation with the MIT and with Gladio "stay-behind" NATO secret paramilitary organizations.[7] Throughout its history, the ASALA assassinated 32 Turkish diplomats and embassy staff, including wives and children.[citation needed]
Although they publicly distanced themselves from the ASALA,[8] Turkey's Armenian community came under attack by Turkish nationalists in reaction to the attacks. This became apparent after the assassination of Ahmet Benler, the son of Ambassador Ozdemir Benler on October 12, 1979 by Armenian militants in the Hague. The reaction to the attack led to the bombing of the church of the Armenian Apostolic Patriarchate in Istanbul on October 19 in retaliation.[9] "During that period," Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink once said in an interview with Vatan, "we, Armenians in Turkey, used to go around with our heads hanging low."[10]
See also
External links
Non-partisan sources:
- Groups Listed as Terrorist in Prior Editions of "Patterns of Global Terrorism": ASALA Profile. United States Department of State Publication 10321
From an Armenian perspective:
From a Turkish perspective:
References
- ^ U.S. Department of State. "Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA)". Retrieved 2007-01-26.
- ^ a b c d Paul M. Pitman. Turkey: A Country Study. The Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, p. 354.
- ^ Paul M. Pitman and the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress. Turkey: A Country Study, p. 283.
- ^ The Associated Press. French Hold Armenians In Orly Airport Bombing. October 9, 1983
- ^ Melkonian, Markar. My Brother's Road: An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005 p.187
- ^ Melkonian, My Brother's Road, pp. 277-278
- ^ Template:Tr icon "Ağca basit bir kukla değil" (PDF). Cumhuriyet. January 2006.
- ^ Paul M. Pitman and the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress. Turkey: A Country Study, p. 355.
- ^ Dr. Tessa Hofmann, Armenians In Turkey Today, the EU Office of Armenian Associations of Europe, 2002.
- ^ Hrant Dink Interview with Vatan Newspaper, 02.10.2005