The Syrian Refugee Settlement
The origin of the Armenian problem is even more tragic than that
of the Russian; partly because the proportion of the nation affected is
incomparably higher; partly because the sufferings endured are even greater;
and partly because the whole story is a lamentable tale of promises made
by the Powers to Armenia, and left unfulfilled. The League of Nations,
as such, is guilty of no breach of faith towards the Armenians, although
the fervour of the speeches made from its forum, the generosity of the
resolutions passed there, contrast dismally enough with the minute assistance
actually afforded; but the ex-Allied Powers, particularly Great Britain
and France, owe a heavy debt to Armenia for her loyalty to them by making
the Allied cause her cause in the early part of the War, thus bringing
down upon the Armenians the wrath of the Turks and the German authorities
in Stamboul. This debt has not been honoured.
The immemorial home of the Armenians was North-Eastern Anatolia; but by 1914 there remained in this district only a large peasant population, intermingled with other races, and dominated by the fierce feudal class of Kurdish landowners. In Cilicia, on the other hand, Armenians formed a large minority; in Central Anatolia they were numerous, and in all the large towns of Turkey, notably Constantinople and Smyrna, there were big colonies of mer-
46
chants and artisans. There were scattered colonies in many foreign countries, and a large community in Russian Erivan, just across the Turkish frontier. The latter, however, differed very considerably in racial characteristics from the Turkish Armenians.
Long before the War Russia from political, and Great Britain from humanitarian motives, had pressed Turkey to introduce reforms in her Armenian districts, the natural and almost the only result being to inspire Turkey with the idea of settling this question once and for all by extermination. Frequent massacres took place before the World War (in those of 1893-6 alone some 100,000 Armenians perished), and after its outbreak Turkey, fearing that the Armenians would side against her, embarked on a series of wholesale atrocities without any parallel in modern history. The details of this blood-curdling story will be found in the 'Bryce Report.' Many Armenians, particularly the able-bodied men, were slaughtered out of hand; the rest were deported. Nearly all inner Anatolia was systematically cleared by these means; only the communities in Constantinople and Smyrna, the Catholic and Protestant millets, and a few others, were left unmolested.
The Armenian community in Turkey had numbered about 2,000,000. Of these, some 400,000, consisting chiefly of the communities in Constantinople and Smyrna and the Catholic and Protestant millets, were allowed to remain in Turkey; about 250,000 escaped into Russian Armenia. Some 40,000 women and
47
children accepted Islam and became the wives of Turks or Kurds, or were taken into their harems, the young boys as house slaves. The rest were massacred or deported under conditions which often made deportation the equivalent of slow murder by torture. On an average, about half of the deportees reached their destinations, although in individual convoys 90 per cent., 95 per cent, or even 99 per cent, perished on the way. About 600,000 pushed through or escaped to Syria, Cilicia, Palestine, Persia and Iraq, many percolating through to Egypt, Europe, the United States of America and South America. Of the 400,000 left in Turkey there now remain about 150,000, who are being slowly pressed out, as witnessed by the forcible expulsion into Syria in October, 1930, of nearly 10,000 Kurdish speaking Armenian Refugees.
Numerous public pledges were made by Allied Statesmen towards the Armenians during the War. Among the British statements may be cited those of Mr. Balfour (November 6, 1917; July 11, 1918); Mr. Lloyd George (December 21, 1917; January 5, 1918); Lord Robert Cecil (September 30 and November 18, 1918). All of these promised that Armenia should be freed from Turkish rule after the War.
About 200,000 Armenians, including many refugees, served in the Russian army. Armenian contingents assisted the British troops in Mesopotamia, and an 'Eastern Legion,' mainly composed of Armenians, served in Palestine,
48
winning the high approval of General Allenby. Its services were publicly recognised by MM. Clemenceau, Pichon and Poincare, the last-named officially promising the Patriarch of the Armenian Catholics in Cilicia that his flock should 'enjoy in all security the blessings of peace and liberty.' In all, 200,000 Armenian volunteers are said to have fallen fighting for the Allied cause during the War.
After the Armistice of Mudros (November 30, 1918), British troops occupied Trans-Caucasia, including the area of the Armenian Republic, which had established itself there after the breakdown of Russia, and comprised, besides Russian, a small slice of Turkish Armenia. The Allies stipulated fright to intervene, if necessary, in the 'six Armenian vilayets' of Turkish Armenia. In the south, Allied troops had occupied Syria, which, after 1919, was left, together with Cilicia, in the sole occupation of the French. The first French High Commissioner took the title of 'High Commissioner for Armenia and Syria' ; Armenian troops were called upon to share in the occupation of Cilicia; and by invitation of the French authorities more than 200,000 Armenians (consisting mainly of remnants of the deportees of 1915) returned to Cilicia to settle there. As Constantinople was in Allied occupation, while in May, 1919, Greece, at the invitation of the Supreme Council, occupied Smyrna with its hinterland, most of the Armenians were now temporarily free of Turkish rule.
49
In 1920 the Powers recognised the Armenian Government de facto. The League, however, refused to accept the proffered mandate, although declaring that the establishment of an independent Armenia was 'an obligation of humanity' and that it 'would not cease to interest itself in the fate of Armenia.' Armenia, as an Allied Power, signed the Treaty of Sèvres, under which Turkey recognised her independence within frontiers to be delimited by the President of the United States, and undertook obligations towards the minorities left in Turkey. Turkey, however, repudiated the Treaty of Sèvres and invaded Armenia, which appealed urgently for help. Extraordinary interest was taken in the situation by the First Assembly of the League. The Belgian Deiegate actually urged the formation of 'a single front of all the armies and navies of the World,' under an International General Staff of the League, and the Roumanian Delegate made a romantic suggestion for the dispatch of an international expeditionary force. All the League did, however, was to reject Armenia's application for membership, and pass a resolution asking that some Power should intervene to stop hostilities. To this, only three Governments replied. President Wilson offered his 'good offices and personal mediation'; Spain her 'moral and diplomatic cooperation,' and Brazil was ready to 'assist either alone or in conjunction with other Powers in putting an end to Armenia's desperate position.' President Wilson's offer was accepted, and had precisely no effect whatever.
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Meanwhile a Bolshevist revolution broke out in Armenia, and the end of a confused period of fighting and negotiation was the establishment under Russian control of the present Soviet republic of Erivan (Armenia), which includes slightly over one-tenth of pre-War Armenian territory, and less than one-fifth of the area which President Wilson, in his capacity of mediator, had awarded.
Meanwhile, the Armenian question had come up at various meetings between Turkey and the Powers, which at London (February-March, 1921) had declared that they would not 'abandon the obligation to constitute one united and stable Armenia,' and persuaded Turkey to accept the idea of a' national home' for the Armenians on the eastern frontiers of Turkey. It was undoubtedly intended, at first, that this 'home' should be independent. So, too, the Second Assembly of the League asked the Supreme Council to safeguard Armenia's future, 'and, in particular, provide the Armenians with a national home entirely independent of Turkish rule.'
When Turkey agreed to these suggestions, her military position was still weak; but in March she signed a treaty with Russia and, almost at the same time, separate agreements with Italy and France. In the first treaty, France agreed to restore Cilicia and part of Syria to Turkey. The population and bands were, however, to be disarmed, an amnesty passed, and protection and rights assured for the minorities. But hardly was this treaty
51
signed when it was repudiated, and replaced eventually by the so-called Franklin-Bouillon agreement (October 20, 1921), restoring to Turkish sovereignty Cilicia and parts of the mandated area, with an amnesty and a promise (not supported by guarantees) from the Turkish Government to recognise minority rights.
The news of the prospective evacuation produced a panic among the Armenians, most of whom had but recently settled there, on French invitation. The French authorities urged them to remain, and proclaimed the Turkish promise of an amnesty, while the Turks repeated the promise of amnesty and just treatment in the most explicit terms. The Armenians, however, after a vain appeal to the Powers to allow them to opt for a western nationality, or to indicate a place of refuge, preferred to leave their homes en masse. Some accompanied the retreating French on foot; others embarked on shipboard, and after a protracted cruise in the Mediterranean, attempting in vain to land in Egypt, Cyprus and Palestine, returned, for the most part, to the Syrian ports, a few finding refuge in Greece. Thus Syria again became the home of some 50,000 refugees, for the most part destitute.
A fresh conference held in London between the Allies and the Turks returned to the question of the Armenian national home, but in a still further modified form. But even these proposals proved abortive. The débâcle of the Greek army in September, 1922, was followed by the occupation by Turkey of all Western
52
Anatolia, and the destruction of Smyrna. The balance-sheet for the Armenians was that some 100,000 accompanied the wretched Greek refugees into Greece (whence many of them moved down to Syria); a large number more were massacred, and the able-bodied men driven away into the interior of Turkey to work in labour gangs—a fate equivalent to a sentence of lingering death. The catastrophe was followed immediately by the Greek evacuation of Eastern Thrace and by a fresh exodus of refugees into Greece and Bulgaria, which, in 1922, was harbouring some 25,000.
At the two Conferences of Lausanne (1922 and 1923) the idea of giving the Armenians a * national home' in Turkey was finally abandoned. The ultimate provision made by the Allies for the Armenians was confined to the inclusion in the Treaty of Lausanne of the ordinary provisions for the protection of minorities. These were placed, as usual, under the guarantee of the League of Nations.
It is not easy to say how many Armenians had survived this dreadful decade of war and systematic murder. An Armenian delegation which appeared at Lausanne had, indeed, stated that there remained in Turkey 148,998 Armenians in Constantinople and 131,175 in the vilayets, not counting those in the concentration camps, and 73,350 women and children in the harems. The total number of destitute Armenians outside their native soil was put at 700,000. But these figures may have been given before the final series of massacres which
53
followed the fall of Smyrna. Few details are known of these; but in December, 1922, some 50,000 Armenians arrived in Aleppo, and several thousands more in December, 1929. [*] While exact figures are difficult to obtain, the best estimate puts the distribution of Armenians in 1930 as follows:—
Armenian Republic and Russia 1,400,000Of the numbers in the Caucasus, approximately 200,000 were refugees, survivors of, perhaps, twice that number. [**]
France 36,000
Persia 10,000
Palestine 5,000
Egypt 5,000
Turkey 150,000
Syria 120,000
Greece 100,000
Bulgaria 25,000
Cyprus 2,000
Iraq 10,000
India and other Parts of the World 250,000
*. The Experts’ Report of June, 1925, however, stated that 'In Armenia there seem partly to have remained more Armenians than are [sic] generally assumed. Exact figures cannot be given, but it was, for instance, reported that there are colonies of Armenians, who are Roman Catholics, in Sivas, Kesariyo and Erzerum.'
**. The Experts’ Report gave the total migrations from Turkey to Russia during the World War as 400,000-420,000, of whom 300,000 were settled (in 1925) within the frontiers of Soviet Armenia, 100,000-120,000 in the other countries of Caucasia and in Russia proper (this figure takes no account of later losses); and a further 125,000 after the Turkish occupation of Kars and Surmalinsk.
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A result of the Smyrna débacle was that Dr. Nansen was authorised to extend the benefits of his emergency service to the Armenians; the Armenian refugees in Constantinople thus enjoyed the same relief as the Russians. The wealthy Armenians, including the Patriarchate in Constantinople and the communities in Egypt, Roumania and the West, also subscribed large sums. The British organisations, notably the Lord Mayor's Fund, were equally generous, [*] and the contribution of the United States reached the astonishing figure of 11,000,000 dollars annually for six years. The French were spending large sums on relief in Syria; Bulgaria treated her immigrants with the utmost generosity; and the Greek authorities, in their relief work, made no distinction between the Greeks and the Armenians.
All of these bodies were, however, anxious to wind up their work as soon as possible, and Greece, in particular, notified the Council in July, 1924, that she could not, for many reasons, maintain her effort. Some measure of permanent settlement seemed, therefore, essential.
Since the collapse of the attempt to force Turkey to provide a 'national
home,' the return of the Armenians to Turkey seemed out of the question.
The Turkish Government, indeed, opposed any suggestion of the return of
the Armenians en masse. Armenians leaving Turkey after the Smyrna
disaster were given
*. The Armenian Lord Mayor's Fund spent on Armenian relief £427,000, £164,000 of which were contributed by the 'Save the Children' Fund.
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passports to leave the country only, without possibility of return; and only individual permits to return were issued, and that in rare cases. Meanwhile, legislation was being passed under which the property of Armenians in Turkey was presumed to be abandoned, and allotted to Turkish refugees.
The Soviet Government, indeed, offered to receive all refugees, and to give them property either in North or South Russia; but it refused to undertake any expenditure, either for transport or settlement, and there seemed to be a general reluctance to embark on such work in Russia proper.
In the circumstances, attention was naturally focussed on the Republic of Erivan, whither one party of Armenian refugees had already been sent, although without many preliminary preparations and, as it seems, with doubtful success. [*]
In September, 1923, M. Nohra Dounghian, President of the Armenian National
Council, appeared before the League to plead the case for a large-scale
settlement of refugees in
*. These were the 15,000 Armenians from Iraq who had found themselves, at the end of 1918, in the area occupied by the British forces. The British Government maintained these refugees in camps for some time, in the face of considerable difficulties, as the Armenians, who wanted to return to Erivan, refused to accept work in Iraq. At last, in 1921, 7,200 were sent to Bakum, while most of the rest were dispersed in Iraq, Persia, Palestine or Mosul. It was stated later on the authority of the Lord Mayor's Fund that the repatriated refugees 'became self-supporting within a period of twelve months.' It was afterwards stated, however, that 'a large proportion of these refugees had died of malaria' (Minutes of the Ninth Assembly, 6th Committee, p. 34).
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Erivan. According to his statement, which was sponsored by the French delegation, 50,000 Armenians could, by irrigation of the Sardarabad steppe, be settled on uncultivated land at a cost of 4,700,000 dollars for transport, irrigation, building, and advance of first supplies. He asked that this scheme should be put in charge of a special Committee, appointed by the League and including, besides, a League representative, delegates from the main charitable societies and a liaison officer with the Soviet authorities.
As no legal security was available, the Council refused to commit itself, but on Dr. Nansen's advice, it appealed to all States Members to help the Armenians, promising to furnish 'any assistance which may be desirable' through its technical organisations.
The appeal, however, met with scanty success. Only nine Governments replied immediately, and of these five sent refusals and the remaining four were non-committal. When a further appeal was issued, the only Government to subscribe a cash sum was that of Albania, which gave 1,000 francs. The settlement scheme was again debated at length at the 5th Assembly, but no decision could be reached. The Assembly, however, invited the I.L.O. (to which the general work of refugee settlement, including, henceforward, that of the Armenians, was now transferred), with Dr. Nansen, to enquire into 'the possibility of settling a substantial number of Armenian refugees in the Caucasus or elsewhere.' Meanwhile,
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'until an Armenian National Home can be established,' every facility should be given the refugees to obtain productive work elsewhere 'so as to maintain and safeguard their national existence.' At this period, too, the legal status of the Armenians was regularised, as described elsewhere, by the issue to them of 'Nansen Certificates.'
An interesting pendant to the Assembly discussions of 1924 was furnished by a letter addressed to the British Prime Minister and signed by Mr. Asquith and Mr. Baldwin, urging that Great Britain should make a 'substantial contribution' to the (settlement) scheme for the following reasons:
'1. Because the Armenians were encouraged by promises of freedom to support the Allied cause during the War, and suffered for this cause so tragically.' (Facts in support of this statement were adduced.)58'2. Because during the War and since the Armistice, statesmen of the Allied and Associated Powers have given repeated pledges to secure the liberation and independence of the Armenian nation.' (Typical promises were cited.)
'3. Because in part Great Britain is responsible for the final dispersion of the Ottoman Armenians after the sack of Smyrna in 1922.' (The Smyrna campaign 'was initiated and protracted under the direct encouragement of the British Government.')
'4. Because the sum of £5,000,000 (Turkish gold) deposited by the Turkish Government in Berlin, 1916, and taken over by the Allies after the Armistice, was in large part (perhaps wholly) Armenian money.' (The bank accounts of the Armenians had been transferred to Constantinople in 1915, after the deportations; and Turkey then sent £5,000,000 to Berlin in exchange for a new issue of Notes [*].)
*. This money was discussed
at the Sixth Assembly, where it was pointed out that the sum actually seized
in Berlin was deposited by the German and Austro-Hungarian Governments
in 1915 to cover the first issue of Turkish currency notes. By a decision
taken at Lausanne, it was allotted to meet the claims of British, French
and Italian subjects who had suffered losses during the war through the
action of the Turkish Government in Asia Minor or in European Turkey, and
actually used to meet the pressing needs of widows and others in dire distress.
The exact position of this money is thus extremely obscure. In the Treaty of Lausanne Turkey recognised the transfer to the Allies of any claims which Germany or Austria-Hungary had against her. Whatever the technical ownership of this money may have been at the various stages of its wanderings it certainly appears as though the Armenians lost it and the Allies got it.
This £5,000,000 was not the only money belonging to Armenians which its owners were unable to recover. The Greek Delegate to the Fifth Committee stated that large numbers of refugees—Greek and Armenian—had had current or deposit accounts in foreign banks in Constantinople, which, under the Capitulations, had enjoyed exterritoriality. After the Smyrna disaster, these sums were transferred to the bank's head offices abroad, which refused to pay them on the pretext that the local government had proclaimed the attachment of these sums.
The Council, at the request of the Assembly, asked the Greek Government to supply further information, and the latter stated in February, 1925, that it hoped to conclude an agreement through the Mixed Commission for the exchange of Greek and Turkish populations. Should
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'5. Because the present conditions of the Refugees are unstable and demoralising ; and constitute a reproach to the Western Powers.'
Meanwhile, a Committee of Experts had undertaken an enquiry in Erivan,
and drawn up a report. [*] The number of Armenians
in all countries abroad was estimated at 3-400,000, including 100,000 in
Syria and 45,000 in Greece. About 14,000 refugees had already returned
to Erivan, generally at the expense of the Armenian Government, and 7,000
more were expected in the near future. About 15,000 (10,000 from Greece
and 5,000 from Constantinople) could hardly hope to be established where
they then were, and stood ' urgently in need of repatriation.' They were
described as 'anxious for repatriation,' possibly as the result of 'a certain
moral pressure.' For this purpose, settlement schemes, including reclamation
of land, would be necessary. Dr. Nansen proposed a loan for 9,000,000 gold
roubles, to be guaranteed by the Armenian Government through taxes on,
and revenues from, the reclaimed land. Two-thirds was to be spent on
this action prove ineffective, the matter would be brought up again.
On February 17,1925, an Armenian refugee petitioned the League on the subject under the Minorities Treaties, and although Turkey contested the receivability, the petition was taken up. It is not, however, clear whether any final decision was ever reached. Further petitions were submitted on several later occasions.
*. For details of these plans see the Scheme for the Settlement of Armenian Refugees : General Survey and Principal Documents (C.699, M.264, 1926. IV. Geneva, 1927).
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irrigating about 33,000 dessiatines of land near Erivan and in the Kara Su and Zangabassar districts, one-third on settling the immigrants. The Armenian Government had agreed to settle at least 15,000 refugees on the land reclaimed, and to guarantee the loan. All taxes and revenues from the irrigated land would be used exclusively for the service and amortisation of the loan.
The Vlth Assembly discussed the scheme, but was unconvinced of its technical possibility, or of the soundness of the guarantee. It therefore asked for further consultations, and the Council appointed a Commission of recognised financial experts (including M. Pams, ex-Minister of the Interior for France, and Sir Murdock MacDonald, K.C.M.G., C.B.) who carried through a technical and a financial enquiry. The engineering report showed that the irrigation scheme was 'technically sound and commercially possible' at an outside cost of 15,000,000 roubles. The financial enquiry, however, showed that no security for the loan would be forthcoming beyond the guarantee of the State Bank of the Union of Soviet Republics, the legal system in force in Soviet Armenia forbidding the assignation of special revenues, either from the land reclaimed or from other sources.
Neither the Council nor the Financial Committee was able to recommend this as a sound security, and the Council, on September 16, 1926, could do no more than re-affirm its
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platonic sympathy and promise to facilitate matters if rich Armenians were willing to subscribe the necessary money privately. The Assembly was less cautious, and persuaded the Council to set up a small Committee to investigate the possibility of raising the sum required and applying it for the settlement scheme. Dr. Nansen next suggested to the Erivan Government that it should pay for its own irrigation work, if he raised the £300,000 necessary for transporting and settling the refugees. He got a promise of £100,000 from rich Armenians, if States Members of the League would contribute the rest. Without a firm offer of this £200,060, however, the Erivan Government would not commit itself.
At the VIIIth Assembly Dr. Nansen made a very moving speech pleading for this grant. Repeated pledges, he said, had been given to the Armenians, and 'nothing has been done, nothing of any kind, to carry them out . . . I want to use this platform to make an appeal to the Members of the League, and to the peoples of Europe and of the world, that they should come forward and by their contributions help to wipe out the stain which must remain on the honour of Europe so long as nothing is done to redeem the pledges which have been made.'
Very few Governments, however, made any response to the appeal, and these few included neither France, nor any member of the British Empire. The next September, the Council
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referred the question once more to the Assembly, the Assembly to the Council. At the same Assembly instructions were given, as noted elsewhere, to wind up the whole refugee service as quickly as possible.
During the next year, no Governments came forward with further offers of assistance, and at the Xth Assembly Dr. Nansen was obliged to propose the abandonment of the scheme.
In spite of the failure of the League scheme, there has been a steady,
if small, trickle of Armenians back to Erivan ever since 1921, and this
seems likely to continue. In 1929 alone Armenia received 4,174 refugees,
of whom 371 came from Persia, about 700 from Constantinople and the rest
from Greece. About half of these were distributed to towns and villages,
or to districts where public works were under construction. The remainder
it was proposed to settle on the land under a government scheme. Certain
small settlement schemes are even now being carried forward in Erivan by
private endeavour, principally through the (American) Near East Relief,
which at least did not abandon its self-imposed task of caring for the
Armenian orphans. At the time of the last available figures (1929) this
organisation was still supervising the care of nearly 17,000 children,
in orphanages and families, and is now beginning to 'return them to society
as functioning elements.' [*]
*. The Near East and Armenian Philanthropy. New York, 1929. p. 75.
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Syria before the War harboured few Armenians; but many of the deportees of 1915 were established there.
After the French evacuation of Cilicia, and again after the Greek debacle at Smyrna, many Armenians fled southward into the French mandated area. Other smaller parties came in at later dates, some even as recently as December, 1929. In 1922, Syria harboured something like 100,000 Armenian refugees. In 1924 the figure was still put at 89,000; the refugees thus constitute a considerable proportion of the population, especially in the comparatively few areas (mainly Beirut, Aleppo and Alexandretta) where they are concentrated.
One result of this sudden intrusion of a large and unaccustomed alien element has been to engender considerable hostility between the Armenians and the local population: an unfortunate factor in the situation, but one of great importance.
When the Allies entered Syria at the close of the War, they found the remnants of the deportees in a state of inconceivable misery. In Beirut, women, children and old people were dying in the streets. A very generous effort was then made by the charitable societies (notably the Near East Relief) and the French Government to relieve the distress, and France spent large sums on repatriating Armenians to Cilicia, where it was still hoped to establish an independent Armenian State. The disasters
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of 1921 and 1922, however, undid nearly all this work. The Armenians fled back from Cilicia and Anatolia to Syria. An extraordinary story is that of the ships, loaded with 150,000 Greeks and Armenians, with some Turks who had supported the French regime, which, after the evacuation of Cilicia, 'wandered for weeks like phantom ships over the Mediterranean' to Egypt, Malta, Cyprus, and Greece, unable to find admission. Some were welcomed in Greece, but most of them eventually landed their burdens at Beirut.
The great bulk of the Armenians—at that time some 100,000—were crowded into three huge camps at Alexandretta, Aleppo and Beirut.
'The history of the succeeding years'—to quote an unofficial report—'is that of a long struggle against appalling physical conditions of over-crowding in insanitary quarters, semi-starvation, and disease.' One of the worst features was the malaria, which is endemic in Syria in all regions where there is standing water, its incidence being therefore heaviest on the plains, and particularly in such regions as the refugee camps at Alexandretta and Beirut. Indigenous residents of malarial districts seem to acquire a partial immunity; but new arrivals, especially if in an exhausted and poverty-stricken condition, fall easy victims to it. The Armenian refugee camp at Alexandretta became 'a focus for the spread of an especially virulent form of malaria to other places where Armenian refugees are found.'
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Malaria, dysentery, typhoid and tuberculosis spread with frightful rapidity among the refugees. The sanitary conditions in which they were living were, with hardly an exception, appalling. Particularly was this the case in the three great concentration camps. The healthiest seems to have been that outside Damascus, where the refugees were housed in tents. In Aleppo, too, conditions were comparatively favourable. According to the French report for 1926, the Aleppo refugees (32,060 persons, comprising 6,711 families, of which 3,799 were living in camps) were living in three camps. One, of recent construction, consisted of healthy and well-spaced stone houses, with churches and schools; the second, of older date 'presented satisfactory hygienic conditions,' while the third, established hurriedly on the arrival of the refugees, was simply described as 'plus précaire.'
Conditions in Beirut and Alexandretta were very different. The camp at Alexandretta was situated in a marshy district which gave rise to virulent malaria which decimated the refugees.
'Their miserable huts,' says the unofficial report already quoted, 'literally standing in water, are unfit for human habitation'—yet several thousands of refugees inhabit them. In Beirut there were in June, 1925, some 25,000 refugees, about half of which were crowded together in a large camp near the sea (for which they had to pay £1,200 a year rental). The over crowding and insanitary conditions were a constant menace; on one occasion, indeed,
66
there was actually a small outbreak of plague. 'The hovels,' wrote an
observer, 'for they can scarcely be called houses, were put together with
any materials at hand, such as rough boards, packing cases, disused tins,
oil-cloth and sacking. There was practically no outside assistance . .
. with all their ability and industry the camp-dwellers remained miserably
poor, and if one quarter of them were doing fairly well, the majority were
living from hand to mouth, and many were destitute.' [*]
With regard to the camp at Alexandretta, the same observer wrote—after
referring to the 'particularly virulent form of malaria, sometimes proving
fatal in two days'—'The death-rate had been very high among the five thousand
refugees, and those I saw were in a deplorable state. They were poor, underfed
and anaemic, and the swollen bodies and sickly faces of the children told
the tale of systems poisoned by repeated attacks of fever. . . . Half of
this population was so poor they could not buy the quinine which was as
necessary for them as bread.' The French Mandatory report (1926) itself,
which was far from pessimistic, wrote of these refugees that 'some 20-30
per cent, have succeeded and have definitely established themselves. Most,
say 50 per cent., are vegetating; their numbers diminish daily; they abandon
the country gradually, so soon as they save enough to emigrate. The rest—20-30
per cent. —are in complete destitution.' At Alexandretta
*. The People of Ararat. By J. Burtt, London, 1926, p. 15.
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there were 650 'necessitous families' and 440 which were 'absolutely destitute.'
Immediately after the War, a number of Armenians, mainly in Aleppo, found employment in the textile industry; but a ban upon the importation of cotton into Turkey destroyed the principal market for their products and put many out of employment. In 1926, about half the Armenian workers were either on half time or wholly unemployed.
Where a livelihood was possible for the refugees at all, it was rather at the expense of the natives. 'The people were living by picking up odd jobs, working in the city or by the trade of little shops where they dealt in cheap goods, provisions and fruit, and had to be satisfied with very small profits. . . . This unsound trading, forced on the poverty-stricken Armenians by their necessity, naturally arouses ill-will among the Syrian inhabitants of Beirut, who see their commerce slipping away from them into the hands of clever and industrious aliens. Obviously, this is sowing the seeds of racial animosity that will have a bitter harvest unless the Armenians can be put to work in industries, in less competitive trade, or preferably in agriculture.' [*]
A large proportion of the refugees were, moreover, agriculturists, so
that their concentration in and around a few large towns seemed undesirable
from every point of view. Yet little change took place in their situation
before 1927,
68
and few attempts were made to settle them on the land. If the camps were relieved of a few families which migrated under the general settlement scheme, the disturbance of 1925 tended to fill them again with refugees from the unsettled area. [*] Both the French authorities and the charitable organisations did much to relieve distress; but few measures of more permanent value were undertaken. The French administration, indeed, as late as March, 1926, frankly announced its inability to settle the Armenians on the land. [**] It appears, however, that it had been studying the possibility of a settlement scheme in the Gharb valley when its enquiries were interrupted by the Druse insurrection.
Ify that time, however, the experiences of the Greek refugee settlement
were beginning to bear fruit, together with the experiences which certain
private organisations had made in Syria itself. In 1924 Miss Jeppe had,
as told elsewhere [***], added to her reclamation
work a plan of agricultural settlement on a small scale, and with conspicuous
success. In 1926 a second Armenian village—Charb Bedros—was founded 'with
the friendly collaboration of the French Government.' It was reported that
'not only have the peasants become prosperous' and independent in a short
time, but they are
*. The employment of Armenians from Aleppo against the natives in revolt had led to a massacre of Armenians in Damascus and an exodus from that city to Beirut.
**. Minutes of the 8th session of the Permanent Mandates Commission, p. 28.
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also perfectly safe and enjoy an esteem from the Arab population which is very promising for the future.' [*]
In 1926 the French High Commissioner appealed to the League, inviting the co-operation of its Refugee Service for establishing, in collaboration with the local authorities, a definite plan for the settlement of the most destitute of the refugees, consisting of some 7,000 families from Beirut and of 30,000-40,000 refugees from the Aleppo district. The League was requested to send a mission to report on the problem and formulate a detailed plan.
The VIIth Assembly gladly adopted this suggestion, in which it saw a
possibility of settling, not only the Syrian question, but that of the
Armenian refugees in Constantinople and, in part, in Bulgaria and Greece.
The Red Cross having provided the funds, Major Johnson, of the I.L.O.,
visited Syria and drew up a report, in consultation with the French authorities.
He reported that out of some 86,000 refugees, part were self-supporting,
but some 20,000 need immediate removal, mainly from Beirut, Aleppo and
Alexandretta. To these must be added some 10,000 from the Damascus region
if the French troops were withdrawn, when the safety of the Armenians would
be endangered. In all, 40,000 refugees needed assistance, of whom 12,000
were 'in a precarious situation constituting hygienic and social, if not
political, dangers to themselves and to other
*. Records of Seventh Assembly; Minutes of 5th Committee, p. 97.
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populations with whom they come into contact, whilst 28,000 were in casual employment and living under conditions which gave rise to grave anxiety.' France was anxious to cooperate. The Lebanon Government had already voted £25,000; a similar sum might be expected from the Syrian Government, and £8,000 from charitable organisations. Large tracts of suitable land were available at low cost. The £58,000 available or promised would suffice to settle the most urgent 10,000 refugees, and this would help the absorption of the remainder if the plan was successful. The total funds required were estimated at £135,000.
France reorganised her system at the end of 1926, establishing a central office for liaison with the I.L.O., Red Cross and League refugee service, with branches in the necessitous areas. The French Commissioner agreed also to require all refugees settled to purchase the Nansen Stamp, thus bringing the plan within the scope of the revolving fund. A plan was now worked out for establishing colonies on available land on the coastal region of Northern Syria and south of Sidon.
At the same time, a Joint Armenian Committee was formed, consisting of representatives of the main charitable organisations, with Dr. Nansen as Chairman and M. Albert Thomas as Vice-Chairman. The object of the Committee was to co-operate with the French in relieving immediate distress and raising sufficient funds to carry through the larger scheme.
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At the end of a year it was possible to report satisfactory progress. The appeal for funds had met with a not unfavourable response. £5,000 (later increased to £17,500) had been subscribed by the British United Armenian Committee, and a further most generous response had come from the Near East Relief. Land has already been acquired, and the work of settlement begun.
At the time of writing, some 10,000 refugees had been settled, or were in course of settlement. Several very flourishing villages, on a proprietary basis, were already in existence. Further, an effort was being made to construct proper urban quarters at Beirut, Aleppo and Alexandretta, and to clear the camps altogether. Excellent reports were received of the colonists' industry, and there seemed no doubt that they would soon repay all advances made to them.
A particularly satisfactory feature of the situation was the fact that the attitude of the Armenians themselves had changed. More applications for land were being received than could be dealt with. It had been a complaint of the French authorities that many refugees who could have afforded to leave the squalor of the camps refused to do so; now, however, refugees were offering to purchase land themselves, paying a substantial proportion of the price cash down. So satisfactory were the prospects of rural settlement, as compared with the difficult situation in the towns, that artisans were offering to go on the land in preference to following their regular trades.
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It thus seemed possible to hope that, after years of delay, substantial progress was at last being made towards solving the problem of Armenian colonisation in Syria. The French Government believed that another three years ought to see the end of any extraordinary measures. On the other hand, only about £60,000 of the £144,000 estimated as necessary for completing the work had been subscribed, and although the French Government was continuing its subsidy, there was increasing difficulties in obtaining help from private sources. It thus seemed unlikely that the hopes which had been entertained of moving Armenians from Greece and Bulgaria to Syria would ever be realised.