TURKISH TYRANNY.

Timaru Herald, Volume LX, Issue 2184, 11 September 1896, Page 3

TURKISH TYRANNY.

♦ A telegram horn Constantinople of July 22nd says :— The Turkish authorities have taken an important new departure on the Armenian question. Nazim Pasha, the Police Minister, summoned the members of the Armenian clerical and lay counoils, twenty-eight m all, to attend at the central police station. The chairman having remonstrated against being treated like criminals, Nazim Pasha consented to receive them at his konak. About twenty members of the councils attended yesterday, and Nazim Pasha charged them with entire responsibility for all the trouble and bloodtshed of the laßt year m Asia Minor. He informed them that the Council of State had decided that every member of the Armenian councils would be held personally responsible, and' punished with the utmost rigour of the law m the event of any future troubles either m the capital or provinces. He read an Irade of the Sullan confirming this decision. The Armenians protested against the monstrous injustice of these irregular proceedings, and clem.and.yd. a wsHtea

JLfe . XX* lO£FDt [ communication. They also offered their resignations. Nazim Pasharefusedevery- , thing. The councils held a meeting on ; their return to the Patriarchate, and decided to make an official protest against the unjustifiable proceedings, and send the same to the Sultan. They will also send copies to the embassies of the Powers. The whole Armenian community is m a state of terror at the possible result of this evidence of the Sultan's desire to prepare a road for further severe action against the Patriarch and the clerical and lay councils.