Obituary
“Ben giderim adım kalır
Dostlar beni hatırlasın
Düğün olur bayram gelir
Dostlar beni hatırlasın
Can kafeste durmaz uçar
Dünya bir han konan göçer
Ay dolanır yıllar geçer
Dostlar beni hatırlasın
Can bedenden ayrılacak
Tütmez baca yanmaz ocak
Selam olsun kucak kucak”
– A poem by Aşık Veysel (1894 – 1973)
by Sevgin OKTAY, Representative of The Light Millennium to the United Nations Department of Global Communications
Loosely translating from his recent poem in Turkish on the above right colon, Şükrü Server Aya chants “I go, my name remains; may friends remember me.” Later he says ”soul doesn’t stay in a cage, it flies away.” Indeed, he passed away 26 January 2019 at the age of 89. Perusing over many articles written about him since, both in Turkey and elsewhere, he can rest in peace in that he shall be remembered forever as the Giant “One Man Army” who stood fast against the allegations of a so-called “Armenian Genocide” by writing a book of 499 pages -with a brilliant title of “Genocide of Truth.” In passing away, he also passed on most emphatically of what could be more genocidal than twisting the truth?
Şükrü Server Aya was born in a town called Galati, Romania in 1930. The name of the town means “castle” in a particular Turkish dialect. His family had moved from Trabzon in the 19th century to a seaport named Sulina situated in present Moldova at the mouth of Danube river flowing into the Black Sea. At that time, people living in Sulina were mostly of Turkish descent. When in 1939 the Russians occupied Beserabya, Romania, his family packed up for good and escaped to Trabzon, Turkey by a Turkish flag carrying cargo ship. Following his primary, junior and high schools, he entered Robert College In Istanbul. But having lost his father in a sea accident, he decided to work and support his family. Later he returned to Robert College where he graduated in 1953.
After his graduation, he formed his business and started international commerce and for close to 50 years, he traveled around the world, made money and as he advanced in age, he finally dissolved his business and instead of having a nice retirement like going fishing,and telling tall “Maine” tales, he thought a lot about tall “Armenian” tales and wondered how true was the alleged “Armenain Genocide.” He, in fact, had had many Armenian firends from school, business and daily life in Istanbul from whom he never had heard any such accusations. Did his ancestors commit genocide? Or was it an unfounded allegation?
He searched relentlessly, literally day and night, and wrote hundreds of articles reaching more than a thousand, based on sources in libraries, museums all over the world, and mostly stressing the findings from Armenian sources. After so many years of arduous research, he believed in his “bones”-which he told me in English- that the Armenian allegations were nothing more than fabrications, forgeries, which he put not only in words but also showed actual falsified documents in several books he wrote. Perhaps, all his work may be best summarized by what he used to quote from “The Reno Evening Gazette,” going back to November 1915:
“[Their purposes] are to mislead Christian Charity for The Relief of supposed victims of the unspeakable Turk … are raising money to support themselves. Professional Beggars who have bled their own countrymen … if this country does not want to appear, FOOLISH before the whole world… we refuse to be DUPED by impossible tales”.
Şükrü S. Aya refused to be DUPED! May he rest in peace.