List of Turkish diplomats assassinated by Armenian militant organisations explained

This is a list of Turkish diplomats and other officials assassinated by Armenian militant organisations. The Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA) and Justice Commandos of the Armenian Genocide (JCAG) were Armenian nationalist militant groups^[1] that targeted Turkish diplomats and officials in Europe, the Middle East, and North America in a series of bombings, shootings, and other attacks.^[2] The group aimed to draw international attention to the Armenian genocide and to pressure Turkey to acknowledge the killings as a genocide.^[3] The attacks resulted in the deaths of dozens of people, including Turkish diplomats, embassy staff, and bystanders, and injured many more.^[4] The group's actions were widely condemned by the international community including the Reagan administration that labelled the assassinations as terrorism.^{[5] [6] [7]} In the following years, the international community's response led to a wave of arrests and extraditions of ASALA members.^{[8] [9]} The ASALA and JCAG attacks and the Armenian genocide remain highly sensitive and controversial topics in Turkey,^[10] and discussions of the events are often met with strong emotions and heated political debates.^[11] Despite this, the attacks serve as a reminder of the ongoing tensions and historical wounds that continue to affect Armenian-Turkish relations to this day.^[12]

List of ambassadors

Ambassador	Status	Diplomatic mission	Assassination date	Ref.
İsmail Erez	Fully accredited	Paris, France	24 October 1975	^[13] ^[14] ^[15]
Daniş Tunalıgil	Fully accredited	Vienna, Austria	27 October 1975	^[16]
Taha Carım	Fully accredited	Vatican City	9 June 1977	^[17]
Beşir Balcıoğlu	Not active	Madrid, Spain	2 June 1978	^[18]
Galip Balkar	Fully accredited	Belgrade, Serbia	9 March 1983	^[19]

List of high-ranking diplomats

Diplomat	Title	Diplomatic mission	Assassination date	Ref.
Mehmet Baydar	Consul general	Santa Barbara, California	27 January 1973
Bahadır Demir	Consul
Oktar Cirit	First secretary	Beirut, Lebanon	16 February 1976	^[20] ^[21]
Şarık Arıyak	Consul general	Sydney, Australia	17 December 1980	^[22] ^[23] ^[24]
Kemal Arıkan	Consul general	Los Angeles, California	28 January 1982
Orhan Gündüz	Honorary consul general	Los Angeles, California	4 May 1982

List of security officials

Individual	Military rank	Title	Diplomatic mission	Assassination date	Ref.
Talip Yener	N/A	Driver	Paris, France	24 October 1975	^[25]
Engin Sever	N/A	Security attaché	Sydney, Australia	17 December 1980
Cemal Özen	N/A	Security attaché	Paris, France	24 September 1981
Atilla Altıkat	Air Force Colonel	Military attaché	Ottawa, Canada	27 August 1982	^[26]

List of general staff

Diplomat	Title	Diplomatic mission	Assassination date	Ref.
Yılmaz Çolpan	Tourism counsellor	Paris, France	22 December 1979	^[27]
Galip Özmen	Administrative attaché	Athens, Greece	31 July 1980	^[28] ^[29] ^[30]
Reşat Moralı	Labour attaché	Paris, France	4 March 1981
Tecelli Arı	Religion officer	Paris, France
Mehmet Savaş Yergüç	Secretary	Geneva, Switzerland	9 June 1981
Erkut Akbay	Administrative attaché	Lisbon, Portugal	7 June 1982	^[31]
Bora Süelkan	Administrative attaché	Burgas, Bulgaria	9 September 1982
Dursun Aksoy	Administrative attaché	Brussels, Belgium	14 July 1983	^[32] ^[33] ^[34]
Erdoğan Özen	Labour attaché	Vienna, Austria	20 June 1984
Evner Ergun	United Nations officer	Vienna, Austria	19 November 1984

List of family members

Individual	Relation	Diplomatic mission	Assassination date	Ref.
Necla Kuneralp	Spouse of incumbent ambassador	Madrid, Spain	2 June 1978
Ahmet Benler	Son of incumbent ambassador	The Hague, Netherlands	12 October 1979	^[35]
Neslihan Özmen	Daughter of incumbent administrative attaché	Athens, Greece	31 July 1980
Nadide Akbay	Spouse of incumbent administrative attaché	Lisbon, Portugal	11 January 1983	^[36]
Cahide Mıhçıoğlu	Spouse of incumbent charge d'affaires	Lisbon, Portugal	27 July 1983	^[37]
Işık Yönder	Spouse of a secretary	Tehran, Iran	28 April 1984	^[38]

Further reading

• Book: Peterson, Merrill D. . "Starving Armenians" : America and the Armenian Genocide, 1915-1930 and after . University of Virginia Press . Charlottesville . 2004 . 0-8139-2267-4 . 52901294.
• Book: Howard, Douglas A. . The history of Turkey . Greenwood Press . Westport, Conn. . 2001 . 0-313-00240-1 . 50321768. 161.
• Book: Singer . Amy . Neumann . Christoph K. . Somel . Selçuk Akşin . Untold histories of the Middle East : recovering voices from the 19th and 20th centuries . Routledge . Abingdon, Oxon . 2011 . 978-0-203-84536-3 . 658189067. 27.
• Book: Hoffman, Bruce . Inside terrorism . New York . 2017 . 978-0-231-17476-3 . 971893153. Columbia University Press. 71.
• Book: Jessup, John E. . An encyclopedic dictionary of conflict and conflict resolution, 1945-1996 . Greenwood Press . Westport, Conn. . 1998 . 0-313-04676-X . 57582519. 39.
• Book: Wieviorka, Michel . The making of terrorism . University of Chicago Press . Chicago . 1993 . 0-226-89650-1 . 28111107. 256.
• Book: Göçek, Fatma Müge . The transformation of Turkey : redefining state and society from the Ottoman Empire to the modern era . I.B. Tauris . London . 2011 . 978-0-85771-968-3 . 740225800. 151.

See also

• Turkish consulate attack in Paris
• Esenboğa Airport attack
• 1983 Orly Airport attack
• List of attacks by ASALA
• List of attacks by JCAG

Notes and References

1. Francis P. Hyland, Armenian Terrorism: the Past, the Present, the Prospects, Boulder-San Francisco-Oxford: Westview Press, 1991, pp. 61–62;
2. Gaïdz Minassian, Guerre et terrorisme arméniens, Paris, Presses universitaires de France, 2002, pp. 32–34 and 106–109.
3. Web site: 21 September 2012 . Diplomat memorial stirs controversy . https://web.archive.org/web/20140301095757/http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/diplomat-memorial-stirs-controversy-1.1203032 . 2014-03-01 . 20 December 2014 . Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
4. Web site: Das Armenier-Problem, Behauptungen – Tatsachen . bot: unknown . https://web.archive.org/web/20120111110935/http://www.kultur.gov.tr/DE/belge/3-10779/eski2yeni.html . 11 January 2012 . 22 January 2022.
5. Web site: Fortier . Donald . Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Digital Library Collections, Collection: "Fortier, Donald: Files," Folder Title: "Turkish Armenian File: [US Department of State Remarks on the Armenian Genocide]," Box: RAC Box 19 ]. 16 December 2021 . Ronald Reagan Presidential Library . 8–10; 42.
6. United States Department of State. Patterns of Global Terrorism Report: 1989, p 57
7. Michel Wieviorka, David Gordon White. The making of terrorism. University of Chicago Press, 1993.,, p. 256
8. Web site: Beaver County Times - Google News Archive Search . 2021-09-24 . news.google.com.
9. Book: von John E. Jessup . An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Conflict and Conflict Resolution, 1945–1996 . 1998 . 0-313-28112-2 . 39–40, 543, 841. Bloomsbury Academic .
10. Book: Rubin . Barry M. . Chronologies of Modern Terrorism . Rubin . Judith Colp . 2008 . M.E. Sharpe . 978-0-7656-2206-8 . en.
11. Book: Gottschlich, Jürgen . Beihilfe zum Völkermord: Deutschlands Rolle bei der Vernichtung der Armenier . 2015 . Ch. Links Verlag . 978-3-86153-817-2 . de.
12. Book: Morris, Benny . The thirty-year genocide : Turkey's destruction of its Christian minorities, 1894-1924 . 2019 . Dror Zeʼevi . 978-0-674-91645-6 . Cambridge, Massachusetts . 1044768992.
13. Web site: Incident Summary for GTDID: 197510220001 . https://web.archive.org/web/20181030234049/https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/search/IncidentSummary.aspx?gtdid=197510220001 . 2018-10-30 . 2018-10-30 . UMD Global Terrorism Database . National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism . en.
14. Web site: Armenians Web Portal . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20110521012021/http://www.armenians.com/asala/events.htm . 21 May 2011 . 27 October 2010.
15. Web site: 25 October 1975 . Observer Reporter . 28 September 2012.
16. Cindy . C. Combs . W. Slann . Martin . 2007 . Encyclopedia of Terrorism . Infobase Publishing . 394 . 978-1-4381-1019-6.
17. Web site: Incident Summary for GTDID: 197706090001 . https://web.archive.org/web/20181031000739/https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/search/IncidentSummary.aspx?gtdid=197706090001 . 2018-10-31 . 2018-10-31 . UMD Global Terrorism Database . National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism . en.
18. Web site: Incident Summary for GTDID: 197806020002 . https://web.archive.org/web/20181031000845/https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/search/IncidentSummary.aspx?gtdid=197806020002 . 2018-10-31 . 2018-10-31 . UMD Global Terrorism Database . National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism . en.
19. https://books.google.com/books?id=55BZmIJ9xd8C&dq=Assassination+of+Turkish+ambassador+in+Yugoslavia&pg=PA53 Terrorist Group Profiles
20. Web site: Turkey remembers diplomat killed in Beirut in 1976 - Turkey News . 2021-09-24 . Hürriyet Daily News . 17 February 2020 . en.
21. Şehit Diplomatlarımız (1973-1994). Ankara: Bilgi Yayınevi. 2000. .
22. Web site: Assassination of Turkish Consul-General and his bodyguard - NSW Police Public Site . 2021-09-24 . police.nsw.gov.au.
23. Web site: Molloy . Roger Collier, Paul Molloy and Susan . 2020-08-13 . From the Archives, 1980: Political murder in a quiet Sydney street . 2021-09-24 . The Sydney Morning Herald . en.
24. Web site: Cormack . Lucy . 2020-08-13 . 'Calculated act of terror:' Police divers find clues in 40-year-old assassination mystery . 2021-09-24 . The Sydney Morning Herald . en.
25. https://books.google.com/books?id=RIwBFpBi5noC&dq=%C4%B0smail+Erez+JCAG&pg=PA68 Barry Rubin, Barry M. Rubin, Judith Colp Rubin, "Chronologies of modern terrorism
26. Web site: 2012-09-21 . Monument honoring Turkish diplomat opens in Ottawa . https://web.archive.org/web/20181031001853/http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/monument-honoring-turkish-diplomat-opens-in-ottawa--30657 . 2018-10-31 . 20 December 2014 . Hürriyet Daily News.
27. Web site: Incident Summary for GTDID: 197912220006 . https://web.archive.org/web/20181031001107/https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/search/IncidentSummary.aspx?gtdid=197912220006 . 2018-10-31 . 2018-10-31 . UMD Global Terrorism Database . National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism . en.
28. News: 1980-08-01 . Turkish Envoy Is Slain in Athens . en-US . The New York Times . 2021-09-24 . 0362-4331.
29. Web site: Turk killed in Greece The Spokesman Review - Google News Archive Search . 2021-09-24 . news.google.com.
30. Melkonian, Markar (2008). My Brother's Road: an American's Fateful Journey to Armenia. I.B. Tauris & Company, Limited. pp. 84–85. .
31. News: Reuters . 1982-06-08 . AROUND THE WORLD; Turkish Envoy in Lisbon Is Killed by Gunman . en-US . The New York Times . 2022-01-14 . 0362-4331.
32. News: Upi . 1983-07-15 . AROUND THE WORLD; Turk Slain in Brussels; Armenians Claim Deed . en-US . The New York Times . 2022-01-14 . 0362-4331.
33. Web site: The Montreal Gazette - Google News Archive Search . 2022-01-14 . news.google.com.
34. Web site: Sarasota Herald-Tribune - Google News Archive Search . 2022-01-14 . news.google.com.
35. Web site: Incident Summary for GTDID: 197910120003 . https://web.archive.org/web/20181031001017/https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/search/IncidentSummary.aspx?gtdid=197910120003 . 2018-10-31 . 2018-10-31 . UMD Global Terrorism Database . National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism . en.
36. News: Ap . 1983-01-11 . Turk Wounded in June Attack By Armenian Terrorists Dies . en-US . The New York Times . 2022-01-14 . 0362-4331.
37. Web site: Ermeni terör örgütleri 31 Türk diplomat ve yakınını şehit etti . 2023-03-28 . www.trthaber.com . 22 October 2022 . tr.
38. Web site: Zonguldaklı ASALA Şehidi . 2023-03-28 . Zonguldak Pusula Son Dakika Haberleri . tr.