National, International, Armenia, and Community News and Opinion

The Armenian Reporter | November 1, 2008
International
Mexico’s ambassador to the United States
discusses his Armenian heritage
An interview with
Arturo Sarukhán,
Washington’s
other Armenian
ambassador
In an October 9 interview with Arturo
Sarukhán Casamitjana, Mexico’s
ambassador to the United States, the
Armenian Reporter’s Washington
Editor Emil Sanamyan and intern
Lusine Sarkisyan asked him
about his unique family history, his
thoughts on Armenia, and Mexico’s
foreign policy priorities vis-à-vis the
United States.
Armenian Reporter: How does
someone of Armenian descent get
to lead one of the most important
embassies in Washington, representing
Mexico, a country of more
than 100 million?
Arturo Sarukhán: Hard work!
I’m a career diplomat. I’ve been in
the Foreign Service for 14 years.
This is my second tour duty in
Washington. I was here earlier as
chief of staff to the ambassador. I
arrived as a chief of staff to the ambassador
in 1993 and stayed on with
the next ambassador, and then [in
1998] I went back to Mexico.
How did I arrive to this specific
post? Well, I was consul general in
New York and I asked for a leave of
absence from the Foreign Service,
resigned my commission as consul
general in New York, and joined
[then presidential candidate] Felipe
Calderón as his chief foreign
policy advisor and his international
spokesperson. I then headed the
transition team on foreign policy
and became ambassador in 2007.
AR: Can you tell us your family
story, particularly the Armenian
part?
AS: My grandparents arrived
in Mexico in the early 1930s. My
grandfather was a Russian-Armenian
also named Artur Sarukhanian,
but when he arrived in Mexico
he tried to make it easier on the
Mexican authorities [and cut the
“ian”]. He was an aide to Alexander
Kerensky [head of Russia’s “Provisional
government” in 1917]. After
Kerensky was overthrown by the
Bolsheviks, he left Russia and came
to Venice, where he was trained at
the Armenian seminary.
My grandmother fled the Genocide
in 1915. Most of her family
was killed in the Genocide, but she
was able to escape to Thessaloniki
in northern Greece. From there
she went to Venice and my grandparents
met and were married in
Venice.
At the time Benito Mussolini
came to power [in Italy and was establishing
his Fascist government]
my grandfather said: “This smells
bad.”
So, they went to Mexico with
the idea of coming to Canada. My
grandfather spoke 9 languages,
English among them, but he had
read a lot about Mexico, so he decided
to stop in Mexico on their
way to Canada. They never left. My
grandparents fell in love with Mexico
and they stayed in Mexico.
That’s how I was born in Mexico.
AR: What is the Armenian presence
in Mexico?
AS: It’s a very small community.
A lot of those who arrived as a result
of the Genocide actually did
end up doing what my grandfather
wanted to do, which was move
north to the U.S. or Canada. So, a
lot of the Mexican-Armenian families
after World War II – most of
them ended up in Fresno, California.
The Armenian community in
Mexico is very small.
Armenian resilience
and unfinished
Armenian Genocide
agenda
Arturo Sarukhán Casamitjana
AR: Although at a distance from
Armenia, I imagine you over time
have followed the events in Armenia.
What is the most striking
thing about Armenia for you?
AS: I was [in Armenia] once with
my father when I was a teenager,
when it was still a part of the Soviet
Union. I have not been back to the
independent Armenia.
It is certainly what I look forward
to because it is important
to, number one, understand one’s
roots. But also, [even though] I am
a Mexican diplomat and I represent
my country in the most important
country for Mexico, which
is the United States, there is such
a thing as a global citizenry. These
pasts and origins have the ability
to connect and create networks regardless
of passport, nationality,
ethnicity, and color.
[Such networks] are the only response
to some of the challenges
that many countries like ours face.
Challenges like security in the post-
September 11 world, environmental
degradation, social-economic
development that is also just and
fair.
Armenia and Mexico have lived
next to big, powerful countries. Armenia
is near Russia and Mexico
near the U.S. We’ve both had traumatic
historical experiences with
our neighbors: Armenia with Turkey
and to certain extent Russia,
Mexico with the U.S. after the war
of 1847. So, I think there is a lot of
common ground that can be built
on by engaging.
There are two things that surprise
me. One is the resiliency of
the Armenian people and culture.
I see that at home with my father
and mother. (She is also a refugee,
but from another side of the
Mediterranean. She is a republican
refugee from the 1930s Civil War
in Spain.)
The other thing that surprises
me is how the Armenian diaspora
has not had the ability to forcefully
portray and make its case as the
Jewish-American community has.
How the resources and the capital,
manpower, and even the celebrities
– even though some of them
do it very actively – has not been
translated to a full-fledged recognition,
explanation, coming to terms
with what happened in that part of
the world.
AR: Has Mexico been confronted
with the Armenian Genocide issue
either in the context of international
organizations or directly,
and how does it perceive the issue
of genocide?
AS: I think Mexico is one of the
countries that have supported
resolutions condemning genocide.
For reasons that have to do with
geographical distance and the fact
that there is a small Armenian
community in Mexico, it is not an
issue that is on top of Mexican diplomatic
agenda.
AR: But is the Armenian Genocide
debated in Mexico?
AS: No, not really. Some people
know, some people are interested,
some people have written about it,
but again it’s not a top issue. We
don’t have the size that other countries
like Argentina, France, and
others have in terms of the Armenian
population. It’s not something
that comes from the grassroots.
AR: Uruguay, a Latin American
country, was in fact the first
country to formally adopt a resolution
on the Armenian Genocide,
in part since it does have a substantial
Armenian community. Do
Latin American countries develop
common policies on issues such as
this?
For example, earlier this year
there was a United Nations General
Assembly vote on the Karabakh
conflict, an issue of key concern
to Armenia. And Azerbaijan relied
on support from Islamic countries,
most of which basically joined in
support of Azerbaijan’s position,
while the vast majority of countries,
including Latin American ones, abstained
or did not vote.
Is there a similar solidarity
among the Latin American countries
in the UN or elsewhere?
AS: There is a Latin American
group and they usually vote en bloc,
but not always, depending on the
issue. The closer the issue is to the
core diplomatic priorities in the region
it becomes more difficult to
vote en bloc. The farther away you
The ambassador of Mexico to the
United States since January 2007,
Mr. Sarukhán was foreign policy
coordinator for presidential candidate
Felipe Calderón (who was
elected president of Mexico in
2006).
Since 1994, Mr. Sarukhán’s
diplomatic career has included
postings as Mexico’s consul general
in New York, with Mexico’s
Secretariat of Foreign Affairs, and
as Mexico’s representative at the
Agency for the Prohibition of Nuclear
Weapons in Latin America
and the Caribbean (OPANAL).
He is also a professor at the
Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo
de México (ITAM) and has taught
at the Mexican National Defense
College, the Inter-American Defense
College, and at the U.S. National
Defense University.
Mr. Sarukhán has a bachelor’s
degree from El Colegio de México
(1988) and, as Fulbright Scholar
and Ford Foundation Fellow, he
earned his master’s degree in U.S.
foreign policy from Washington’s
Johns Hopkins University School
of Advanced International Studies
(1991).
The Kingdoms of Spain and
Sweden conferred on him the
Order of Civil Merit of Isabel la
Católica, Officers Degree, and
the Order of the Polar Star, Commanders
Degree, respectively.
Mr. Sarukhán is married to
Verónica Valencia and they have
two young daughters, Laia and
Ani.
f
get, whether it is an issue of security
or development, it will change,
but there isn’t a paradigm that forces
the group to vote in block. Many
times on many issues in nations
decide to go their own way.
Immigration debate
and Mexican-Armenian
relations in California
AR: While there is a big distance
from Mexico to Armenia, Armenians
and Mexicans definitely meet
in Los Angeles. One of the major
issues on Mexico’s agenda is immigration
and how the U.S. government
treats immigrants.
The Armenian-American community,
although themselves mostly
recent immigrants, does tend to
lean to the conservative side of
the debate on Latin American immigration.
What case does Mexico
make to the U.S. on this issue?
AS: I have very good working relations
with Congressman Adam
Schiff, who comes from one of
the districts [including Glendale
and Pasadena, north of Los Angeles]
with the highest concentration
of Armenians and Mexicans. We
always joke that if one day he decides
to run for a higher office then
I would be a good candidate for his
district. He is doing a terrific job in
speaking for the issues and some of
these tensions that exist.
There are few issues today in
America which are as divisive as
immigration. And for good reason,
substantial portion of citizens of
this country feel that immigrants
have broken the law, that it speaks
to the challenge of how you improve
border security, and how you
make sure you know who the people
living on your territory are.
At the same time, it rubs against
what this country is. It’s not a coincidence
that the motto of this nation
is “E pluribus unum” [“From
many, one” in Latin]. The successive
waves of immigrants into this
nation have made this country
what it is. It’s a vital plural-ethnic,
plural-cultural tolerant society because
it is a nation of immigrants.
There are two challenges here.
Number One is that the recent
waves of Latin American migrants
who are coming to this country especially
after the last serious immigration
reform in 1986 have faced
obstacles that no previous immigrant
communities faced. That is,
they have been now undocumented
for more than 20 years. And if
you look at previous waves of immigration,
they all faced at some
point nativism and anti-immigrant
sentiment, but in a generation they
were able to successfully integrate
into the fabric of American life and
lifestyle.
You now have more than twenty
years of waves of migrants who’ve
come from Latin America and are
living in the shadows because of
the rules and lack of reforms. They
have not been able to integrate,
and at a time [of economic] uncertainty,
this feeds into a creeping
fear which exists in the American
public over globalization and free
trade, goods from China, trucks
from Mexico and undocumented
migrants.
[Secondly,] for countries like
Mexico and the U.S., it is important
to measure the impact two countries
have on one another. There
is no bilateral relationship that is
more important and more unique
for the economic prosperity, for
the social well-being and security of
two nations, Mexico and the U.S.
There is the 3,000-kilometer border
and there are 35 million Mexican-Americans
in this country, of
whom 6 to 7 million are undocumented
migrants. In fact Mexico
is the U.S.’ third-largest trading
partner. Every day there are 75,000
trucks that cross the border in both
directions. It is an extremely dynamic
relationship.
We in Mexico and you in America
need to pause and think how do
we ensure that a labor-intensive
country like Mexico and a capitalintensive
country like the U.S. can
take advantage of that geographic
proximity, human capital, to be
able to continue to compete on a
world stage, even with the likes of
China and India.
In many ways, our loss is your
gain. The fact that Mexico can’t hold
on to 200-300 thousand people a
year who can’t find better-paid jobs
in Mexico and come to the U.S. is
a huge loss to my country. Mexico
cannot grow at a rate that it needs
to grow to start breaking economic
asymmetries that exist between
Mexico and the U.S. if we are bleeding
bold entrepreneurial men and
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