CARRYING THE TORCH FOR THE "GENOCIDE OLYMPICS"
Blogger News Network
by The Stiletto
September 14th, 2007
On September 9th, actress and U.N. Goodwill Ambassador Mia Farrow
kicked off a symbolic torch relay on behalf of Olympic Dream for Darfur
from Dag Hammerskjold Plaza across the street from the Sudanese Mission
to the United Nations. Genocide and holocaust survivors from Darfur,
Armenia, Auschwitz, Berlin, Cambodia and Rwanda passed the torch to
each other until the relay reached the Chinese Mission to the U.N. for
a candle lighting ceremony.
The torch relay will travel through more than 30 U.S. states "to raise
awareness about the atrocities in Darfur and to urge China, as the
next Olympic host, to use its influence to end the ongoing suffering,"
according to press materials issued by Dream for Darfur. The route
includes sites of memorials for victims of crimes against humanity.
The U.S. torch relay is organized in solidarity with an international
relay launched by Farrow on August 15th – one year before the Beijing
Olympic Games begin – from western Sudan at the Darfur-Chad border
"to carry the Olympic spirit and a message of ending the violence in
Darfur all the way to China," reports Voice of America. The torch
has passed through Chad and Rwanda, and will travel through every
other country whose people have suffered genocide in modern times –
Armenia, Bosnia, Cambodia, Germany and Poland – before arriving in
Hong Kong in December.
Since 2003, more than 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million have
been driven from their villages in Darfur. Thanks in part to Farrow’s
efforts, the government of Sudan finally relented and will allow a
joint U.N.-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur, which should
be in place by the end of the year. The operation will consist of
20,000 peacekeepers and 6,000 civilian police, as well as a 7,000
African peacekeeping force already in Darfur.
"China is hosting the 2008 Olympic Games and their slogan for the
games is `One world, One dream’ but there is one nightmare – that
China is not allowed to sweep under the rug – and that nightmare is
Darfur," Farrow told reporters at the start of the international
torch relay. She explains that China’s oil interest in Sudan is
funding the ongoing attacks on the people of Darfur.
In other news concerning the Armenian Genocide, The Stiletto has been
following the controversy over the Anti-Defamation League’s No Place
For Hate program for schoolchildren, because the organization refuses
to recognize the Armenian Genocide. Armenians in MA want schools in
their state to reject the program. On September 8th, at a meeting
of the Belmont Human Rights Commission, Lenna Garibian – a mother
of two daughters, one 7 years-old and the other 5 – gave a speech
(video link) about how Armenian Genocide denial affects the families
of survivors and victims. Here is some of what Garibian had to say:
Over the past few months, as this No Place for Hate issue has gone
on, Armenians have become more and more frustrated and angered by
the insensitivity of the Anti- Defamation League – and also with the
individual towns and politicians that host No Place for Hate programs.
A number of suggestions have been made to Armenians:
~F It has been suggested that Armenians sit down with Turkish
historians to "uncover the truth" about the events of 1915.
~F It has been suggested that Armenians withdraw the Congressional
resolution, already supported by a majority of U.S. Congressmen,
that calls for the U.S. Congress to set aside April 24 as a day to
commemorate the victims of the Armenian genocide.
~F It has also been suggested that Armenians reconcile with Turkey
and put away the bad feelings of almost 100 years ago.
~F And finally, it’s been suggested that Armenians give Mr. Foxman
and the ADL more time, perhaps until November, to decide on what the
ADL’s policy regarding the Armenian Genocide should be.
I am here to tell you that we Armenians are fed up with the callous
and insensitive suggestions that have been proposed to us. We are the
sons and daughters of a generation who were driven from their lands,
raped, tortured and slaughtered in the deserts of Turkey. …
My grandmother was five years old when she was taken from her home
and told to start walking. Her father had been taken by the Turkish
police weeks before.
When the same police returned, they told her family that their village
was no longer safe, and that they would be escorted to safety. She
left with her mother and three year-old brother, Edward.
In time, her mother weakened and died before her eyes.
My grandmother vividly remembered watching her mother’s body buried
in the Syrian Desert. But what she remembered most was being told
by her mother before she died to take care of her three year-old
brother. The two of them continued alone, and she held her brother’s
hand, walking through the desert for weeks, until one day she found
that she had lost him.
Somewhere along the way, she became too weak or too tired or too
delirious to keep hold of a three year-old boy’s hand, and he was
lost forever.
Lost forever, except in my grandmother’s mind. Because for the rest
of her life [she] lived with the guilt of letting her little brother
die alone in the desert.
Until the last weeks of her life – when she was most confused – she was
tearing around the nursing home still trying to find Edward. … She
could never forget the horror of letting him wander alone in the
desert, presumably to die. She never forgave herself for that.
…
When I think of my grandmother’s guilt, and her pain, and I think of
these suggestions that have been made to Armenians, I am outraged. And
when I read of the statements between Mr. Foxman and Turkish officials
– referring to this crisis as an uncomfortable episode that Turks
must endure, I am incensed. Having grown up with countless stories
like the ones you have heard this evening, I have lost the ability
to be patient – with the politicians and people who want me to wait
a bit while they think things over.