ARMENIAN MASSACRES

series of brutal campaigns conducted against the Armenian subjects of the Ottoman Empire by Sultan Abdlhamid in 189496 and by the Young Turk government in 191516. There were about 2.5 million Christian Armenians within the Ottoman Empire by the late 1880s. The Armenians in the eastern provinces, encouraged by Russia, began promoting Armenian territorial autonomy. As the movement grew, various political groups were organized, culminating in the formation of two revolutionary parties called Hnchak (The Bell) and Dashnaktsutyun (Union) in 1887 and 1890, respectively. At the same time, Abdlhamid, intent on suppressing all separatist sentiments in the empire, aroused nationalistic feelings and resentment against the Armenians among the neighbouring Kurds. The resulting persecution by Kurds, coupled with a drastic increase in taxes, gave the Armenian radicals two pretexts to rise in revolt. When the Armenians in Sasun refused to pay the oppressive taxes, Turkish troops and Kurdish tribesmen killed thousands of them and burned their villages (1894). In the hope of calling the attention of the European powers to their cause, the Armenian revolutionaries staged another demonstration two years later: they seized the Ottoman Bank in Istanbul. The repression of this action was again sanguinary; more than 50,000 Armenians were killed by mobs of Muslim Turks who were apparently coordinated by government troops. The last and worst of the massacres occurred during World War I (191418). Armenians from the Caucasus region formed volunteer battalions to help the Russian army against the Turks. Early in 1915 these battalions organized the recruiting of Turkish Armenians from behind the Turkish lines. In response, the Turkish government ordered the deportation of about 1,750,000 Armenians to Syria and Mesopotamia. In the course of this forced exodus, about 600,000 Armenians died of starvation or were killed by Turkish soldiers and police while en route in the desert. Hundreds of thousands more were forced into exile.