The murder of Hrant Dink forces Turkey into self examination

Christian Makarian considers that Turkey is carrying out a "self-examination" the day after the funeral of the journalist Hrant Dink on Tuesday, January 23rd, attended by tens of thousands of Turks. "Upon the news of the assasination, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared, 'The bullets aimed at Hrant Dink were shot into all of us'. This democratic impulse was tempered by a nationalist inflexion when Erdogan immediately added that 'this crime was committed at a time when Armenaian accusations of genocide are being reiterated in certain countries'." Despite this hesitation from the head of State, Makarian nonetheless remains sure of one thing: "The Armenian question [has become] the very symbol of Turkey's democratisation and Europeanisation. In a way, Hrant Dink has won."

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