The discovery of a mass grave in the town of Sampsouda (Turkish Samsun) on the coast of the Black Sea (Pontus) containing what are believed to be the bones of Greeks massacred by the Turks during the Greek persecution has served to highlight the question of the international recognition of the Pontian holocaust once again.
According to a well known Turkish newspaper the bones, which were discovered during the construction of a school in the Turkish town Yasilar, were thrown into a nearby river by the Turkish workers.
It is well documented that countless atrocities were committed against the local Greek population in Asia Minor by the Turks and that entire Greek villages were burnt to the ground and their inhabitants exterminated.
The genocide of the native Greek population of Asia Minor, which conservative estimates place at around 600,000 victims, was systematically undertaken between the years 1914-1918 and 1919-1922 by the New Turk and Kemalist nationalist movements and culminated with the expulsion of the survivors to Greece. At least half of the Greek population of Pontus was butchered during these ethnic cleansing campaigns.
Not surprisingly, Turkish officials have refuted claims that the remains belong to a mass grave and argue that the bones were actually part of a cemetery belonging to a church, the burnt out remains of which are nearby.
The genocide of the Greeks of Asia Minor and Pontus is still not acknowledged by the international community.
Source: Pontos and Aristera [March 27, 2008]
