"Why France shouldn't legislate Turkey's past.
Historical Crimes
by Philip H. Gordon & Omer Taspinar
Only at TNR Online | Post date 10.30.06
As European nations debate the idea of accepting Turkey into their ranks, vestiges of the country's authoritarian nationalism--particularly its tendency to constrain free speech in the name of national honor and unity--have antagonized proponents of the European Union's accepted liberal values. For example, when Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk was recently prosecuted for claiming that a million Armenians were massacred by the Ottomans during World War I--in violation of a Turkish law that prohibits "insulting Turkish identity"--Europeans howled in protest until the charges were finally dropped. In recognition of his politics and his writing, Pamuk was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature...."
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