House of Representatives - June 15, 2005

Ambassador Evans deserves the award

Mr. Speaker, 

The U.S. Ambassador to Armenia, John Evans, recently received an award from the American Foreign Service Association for constructive dissent that is intended to "foster creativity and intellectual courage within the State Department bureaucracy."

Last year, the winner was critical of the Iraq war.

Ambassador Evans' constructive dissent was calling the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians at the hands of the Ottomans in 1915 genocide. 

Our national policy towards the 1915 events calls it a tragedy, but not genocide.

So Turkey was very upset, as were a number of "very serious people" at the State Department. 

And this award, intended to encourage dissent, was revoked.

Obviously, the State Department was concerned about upsetting our ally, Turkey, though the facts seem to support the ambassador here. 

The sad thing is that an award intended to encourage dissent has now reinforced the powers that be. 

It seems the State Department is okay with dissent from the policy of a Republican President in Iraq, but it opposes dissent from a policy that denies the truth.

So much for intellectual courage.