Category: 2019

168: “Man is capable of worst when he forgets what ties him with neighbors” – Emmanuel Macron’s Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day statement (photos)

Emma Nadirian
| 10:28 | April 25 2019
Category
Society

President of France Emmanuel Macron has honored the memory of the Armenian Genocide victims on April 24 with the following statement:

“On April 24, we officially commemorate the memory of the Armenian Genocide victims, in order to remember that man is capable of doing the worst when he forgets what ties him with his neighbor, and in order to be coherent that history does not repeat its mistakes,” Macron tweeted.

Emmanuel Macron

@EmmanuelMacron

Aujourd’hui, 24 avril, nous commémorons officiellement le génocide arménien, pour nous souvenir que l’Homme est capable du pire lorsqu’il oublie ce qui le lie à son prochain, et pour faire en sorte que l’Histoire ne répète pas ses erreurs.

Emmanuel Macron

@EmmanuelMacron

La France regarde l’Histoire en face.
Comme je m’y suis engagé, dans les prochaines semaines, la France fera du 24 avril une journée de commémoration du génocide arménien.https://twitter.com/emmanuelmacron/status/958496146359508993 …

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On the 104th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide was commemorated at the Paris City Hall in participation of Mayor Anne Hidalgo. This year’s event was the first National Commemoration Day of the Armenian Genocide, an annual event that will take place after Macron’s decree on adding the remembrance day in the French national calendar.

168: “We made a promise we would never forget the Armenian Genocide” – Kim Kardashian (photos)

Khondkarian Raffi
| 10:39 | April 25 2019
Category
Society

Armenian-American reality TV star Kim Kardashian has commemorated the Armenian Genocide on April 24th by tweeting : “We made a promise we would never forget the Armenian genocide”, with the photo of a myosotis flower, the official symbol of the Armenian Genocide centennial commemoration events.

She also re-tweeted The Promise producer Eric Esrailian’s photo from a visit to the Tsitsernakaberd Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan in 2018.

Kim Kardashian and her sisters personally visited the memorial during a trip to Armenia in 2015.

The reality TV star also shared photos from her husband Kanye West’s Yerevan concert of the same year.

RFE/RL Armenian Report – 04/24/2019

Chmshkian Vicken 
                                        Wednesday, 
Armenia Marks Genocide Anniversary
Armenia -- People walk to the Tsitsernakabert memorial in Yerevan during an 
annual commemoration of the 1915 Armenian genocide in Ottoman Turkey, April 24, 
2019.
Tens of thousands of people marched to the Tsitsernakabert memorial in Yerevan 
and laid flowers there on Wednesday as Armenia marked the 104th anniversary of 
the 1915 genocide of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey.
As always, the annual procession began with a prayer service held by Catholicos 
Garegin II, the supreme head of the Armenian Apostolic Church, by the eternal 
fire of the hilltop memorial overlooking the city center. The ceremony was 
attended by President Armen Sarkissian, Prime Minister Prime Minister Nikol and 
other senior state officials.
“It is the day to recall once again the tragedy of our compatriots who had 
suffered ferocities and had been expelled from the land of their ancestors … to 
tell the world once again about the Genocide -- the most hideous crime against 
humanity -- and to call for soberness and a fight against denial,” Sarkissian 
said in a written statement issued on the occasion.
“Impunity that followed the Armenian Genocide had opened the doors for other 
grave crimes against humanity and genocides: remember the Holocaust, the 
tragedies in Cambodia and Rwanda,” he said.
Armenia -- Catholicos Garegin II holds a prayer service at the Tsitsernakabert 
memorial in Yerevan during an annual commemoration of the 1915 Armenian 
genocide in Ottoman Turkey, .
A separate statement released by Pashinian noted not only the slaughter of some 
1.5 million Armenians but also the destruction of Armenian cultural heritage in 
the Ottoman Empire.
“We were consistently deprived of the land on which Armenian culture and 
Armenian identity were formed and developed over thousands of years,” read the 
statement. “The cultural heritage that constitutes the Armenian identity -- 
thousands of schools, churches and monasteries -- was erased from the face of 
the earth.”
Pashinian also recalled the World War One-era massacres of hundreds of 
thousands of Greeks and Assyrians perpetrated by the Ottoman Turks. Armenia 
officially recognized them as genocide in 2015.
Both the president and the prime minister made clear that Yerevan will continue 
to seek greater international recognition of the Armenian genocide.
Turkey continues to deny a premeditated government effort to exterminate the 
Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire. Its vehement denials are dismissed 
by most scholars outside Turkey.
“The historical record on the Armenian Genocide is unambiguous and documented 
by overwhelming evidence,” the International Association of Genocide Scholars 
said in 2007.
Pope Francis and his predecessor John Paull II prayed at Tsitsernakabert when 
they visited Armenia in 2016 and 2001 respectively. They both officially 
recognized the genocide, as did more than two dozen nations, including France, 
Germany and Russia.
Corruption Charges Against Senior Official ‘Not Fabricated’
        • Gayane Saribekian
Armenia - Prosecutor-General Artur Davtian (R) addresses protesters outisde his 
office in Yerevan, December 24, 2018.
Law-enforcement authorities had sufficient grounds to bring corruption charges 
against the head of an Armenian anti-graft agency, Prosecutor-General Artur 
Davtian insisted on Wednesday.
Davtian dismissed claims by Davit Sanasarian, the suspended head of the State 
Oversight Service (SOS), that the charges were “fabricated” by the National 
Security Service (NSS).
“There is no way a criminal case can be fabricated against anyone,” he told 
reporters. “Forget about that word. There is no such thing.”
Davtian said the ongoing criminal investigation into alleged corrupt practices 
within the SOS, a government body tasked with combatting financial 
irregularities in the public sector, will be “absolutely objective and 
comprehensive.”
The NSS indicted Sanasarian last week as part of that probe. It arrested two 
other senior SOS officials in late February, saying that they attempted to cash 
in on government-funded supplies of medical equipment to three hospitals. 
Sanasarian is accused of helping them enrich themselves and a private company 
linked to them.
Sanasarian, who actively participated in last year’s “velvet revolution” and 
has been a political ally of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian until now, strongly 
denies the accusations. The former civic activist’s lawyer, Inessa Petrosian, 
has claimed that the high-profile case is based on “false testimony” given by 
SOS officials against her client.
Earlier this week, Petrosian asked the Office of the Prosecutor-General to 
order another law-enforcement body, the Special Investigative Service (SIS), to 
take over the probe. Davtian said there are “no grounds yet” to grant the 
request.
Sanasarian’s supporters, among them leaders of some Western-funded 
non-governmental organizations, have defended him on social media, denouncing 
the NSS and its influential director, Artur Vanetsian, in particular.
Pashinian hit back at the critics on Saturday, saying that they place their 
personal relationships with Sanasarian above the rule of law. “Davit is also my 
friend, but be aware that there are no untouchable persons in Armenia,” he said.
Tsarukian Denies Mixing Politics With Business
        • Gayane Saribekian
Armenia - Gagik Tsarukian and other deputies of his Prosperous Armenia Party 
arrive for a parliament session in Yerevan, April 8, 2019.
Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) leader Gagik Tsarukian denied on Wednesday any 
connection between his political activities and business interests, comparing 
himself to U.S. President Donald Trump and Italy’s former Prime Minister Silvio 
Berlusconi.
Tsarukian was accused by pro-government lawmakers of mixing politics and 
business during last week’s heated debates in the Armenian parliament on a 
government proposal to impose tariffs on cement imported to the country. The 
tycoon and his allies said the proposed measure is not far-reaching enough to 
protect domestic cement manufacturers.
The largest of them, the Ararat Tsement plant, is owned by Tsarukian. The 
latter has warned that he could lay off most of its 1,100 workers unless the 
tariffs also apply to Iranian clinker, a material developed before the final 
stage of cement production.
Deputies from the ruling My Step bloc said Tsarukian’s position on the issue is 
motivated by his personal business interests. One of them, former journalist 
Hayk Gevorgian, told the tycoon to make a choice between business and politics.
“He is too little a person [to make such statements,] let him go back to 
journalism,” Tsarukian said of Gevorgian. “All over the world successful 
politicians are business owners,” he added, pointing to Trump and Berlusconi.
Tsarukian insisted that he is concerned about the fate of Ararat Tsement 
workers, rather than his profits.
The Armenian constitution bars members of the National Assembly from engaging 
in entrepreneurial activity. The BHK leader claims that he meets this 
requirement because he only owns dozens of businesses and does not manage them.
The cement tax controversy came amid mounting tensions between Prime Minister 
Nikol Pashinian’s My Step and the opposition BHK which has the second largest 
group in the parliament. Some Tsarukian-owned businesses were raided by tax 
officials shortly after the BHK leader criticized the government’s economic 
policies early this month. The State Revenue Committee denied that the tax 
audits are politically motivated.
Senior representatives of the two political forces traded fresh accusations on 
the parliament floor on April 18. Pashinian and Tsarukian met to discuss the 
cement dispute and other contentious issues later that day.
“The [economic] issues that we discussed found solutions,” Tsarukian told 
reporters on Wednesday. He did not elaborate.
Tsarukian also stood by his criticism of the current government’s track record, 
saying that the economic situation in Armenia has not improved since Pashinian 
came to power almost a year ago. “I’m not saying there have been no changes,” 
he said. “But there has been no socioeconomic change and that’s the main 
problem.”
Yerevan Reports More Agreements With Russian Arms Exporter
RUSSIA -- Vehicles are parked near the office building of Rosoboronexport 
company in Moscow, March 1, 2016
Armenia will continue to acquire Russian weapons “very vigorously,” Defense 
Minister Davit Tonoyan said on Wednesday after holding fresh talks with the 
head of Russia’s state-owned arms exporter, Rosoboronexport.
Tonoyan and Rosoboronexport’s Alexander Mikheyev met on Tuesday on the 
sidelines of an international security conference held in Moscow.
“The parties reached a number of new agreements on expanding the scope of 
cooperation and ensuring its continuity,” the Armenian Defense Ministry said in 
a short statement on the meeting. It did not elaborate.
Tonoyan, who was appointed as defense minister in May 2018, and Mikheyev met on 
at least two occasions last year. Their latest talks came two months after 
Russian and Armenian officials signed fresh defense contracts in Moscow. Their 
details have still not been made public.
Earlier in February, Yerevan confirmed the signing of a Russian-Armenian 
contract for the purchase of four Sukhoi Su-30SM fighter jets to the Armenian 
Air Force. The total cost of the deal remains unknown.
Speaking to Russian journalists on Wednesday, Tonoyan reiterated that the 
multirole jets will be delivered to Armenia by the beginning of 2020. The 
Armenian side has already made first payments for them, he said, according to 
the TASS news agency.
The minister also reaffirmed Yerevan’s plans to buy more such Russian 
warplanes. “We will be arming and rearming ourselves very vigorously,” he 
added. “The purchases of Russian weaponry will continue.”
Press Review
“It’s now wrong to speak about the Armenian genocide the way Soviet Armenian 
intellectuals did in the 1960s and 1970s,” writes “Aravot.” “They were 
talented, patriotic people. Their task was to pass on to the next generations 
the pain endured by our nation and to keep the memory of that suffering live. 
We don’t have to keep that memory live as our grandchildren will know very well 
what happened in the early 20th century. Our task is much more pragmatic now.” 
The Armenians, the paper says, must now remember that their ancestors were not 
only massacred by the Ottoman Turks but also deprived of their land and 
properties. It says they must also strengthen their independent state and 
instill a notion about its “eternity” in younger generations.
Lragir.am quotes President Armen Sarkissian as revealing that in April 2018 he 
received dozens of phone calls from people urging him not to meet Nikol 
Pashinian in Yerevan’s Republic Square. The online publication praises 
Sarkissian for ignoring those appeals, saying that his open-air meeting with 
Pashinian impressed many Armenians and made them feel more confident about the 
future of their country. “Who made those phone calls to President Sarkissian?” 
it asks. “Will he name names soon or choose to publicize that at a more 
opportune moment when the new Armenia feels the need to have those names 
disclosed?”
“Zhamanak” reports that a deputy chairman of the former ruling Republican Party 
(HHK), Armen Ashotian, said on Tuesday that Serzh Sarkisian decided to resign 
before his deputy prime minister, Karen Karapetian, met with Pashinian at a 
detention center in Yerevan on April 23, 2019. Ashotian thus denied a statement 
to the contrary made by parliament speaker Ararat Mirzoyan. The paper wonders 
if Karapetian knew about Sarkisian’s resignation when he discussed it with 
Pashinian. It speculates that Karapetian was acting on a foreign power’s orders.
(Lilit Harutiunian)
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2019 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.
www.rferl.org

White House, once again, calls 1915 events by Armenian name "Meds Yeghern"

Ani Tigranian
AHVAL
APril 24 2019
 
 
White House, once again, calls 1915 events by Armenian name “Meds Yeghern”
 
Ilhan Tanir
Apr 24 2019
This story has been updated by Armenian Assembly of America Executive Director Bryan Ardouny’s and Turkish MFA’s statements.
 
The White House has released a statement on April 24, Armenian Remembrance Day, to “commemorate the Meds Yeghern and honor the memory of those who suffered in one of the worst mass atrocities of the 20th century.”
 
Meds Yeghern, meaning “the great crime,” is the term used by Armenians to refer to the 1915 mass displacement and killing of Ottoman Armenians, who were considered a threat by the leadership of the crumbling empire. The term was used for first time by previous U.S. President, Barack Obama.
 
These events have been widely accepted by scholars, and acknowledged by dozens of other countries, as a genocide – a claim strongly disputed by Turkey, which accepts that the killings took place but denies that their circumstances constituted genocide.
 
This year’s statement released by the White House is very similar to what was released last year and a year earlier, after Trump came to office.
 
Every year the topic of genocide is being debated with the Armenian diaspora asking the White House to call the events genocide, rather than Meds Yeghern or other terms.
 
American presidents have for years issued statements on the April 24th to commemorate the day.
 
Eliot Engel, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, is expected to introduce a bill on the genocide to the Committee, following its current recess, according to Ahval’s sources at U.S. Congress.
 
Earlier this month, bipartisan Armenian Genocide resolutions  were introduced in both the Senate spearheaded by Sens. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) & Ted Cruz (R-TX) and in the House of Representatives spearheaded by Reps. Adam Schiff (D-CA) & Gus Bilirakis (R-FL), the AAA website reported .
 
So far, only President Ronald Reagan in 1981 has used the term genocide during a public even, the opening of the Holocaust museum in Washington, DC.  “Like the genocide of the Armenians before it, and the genocide of the Cambodians which followed it – and like too many other such persecutions of too many other peoples – the lessons of the Holocaust must never be forgotten.” Reagan stated.
 
The White House Statement continued:
 
Beginning in 1915, one and a half million Armenians were deported, massacred, or marched to their deaths in the final years of the Ottoman Empire.  On this day of remembrance, we again join the Armenian community in America and around the world in mourning the many lives lost.
 
The president also remembered Raphael Lemkin, human rights activist and lawyer who first coined the term “genocide” in 1940s and defined the Armenian massacres as such.
 
“The failure to squarely acknowledge the Armenian Genocide reflects a pattern not only in this year’s presidential statement, but past administrations as well that fosters an atmosphere for denial and empowers authoritarian regimes to persecute Christians and other minorities,” stated Armenian Assembly of America Executive Director Bryan Ardouny. “A genocide denied is an injustice to all who are being persecuted,” he added in an email to reporters displaying his organisation’s displeasure over the statement.
 
Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement shortly after White House’s Remembrance Day statement and said, Turkey rejects it.
 
Turkish MFA statement continued to say that “we invite President Trump to be fair while reminding that there were more than 500 thousand Muslims’ pains who were massacred by Armenian rebels.”
 
 
 
 

Statement by the President on Armenian Remembrance Day 2019 | The White House

Chalian Meline
The White House, USA
 
 
Statement by the President on Armenian Remembrance Day 2019
 
 LAW & JUSTICE
 
  Issued on:
 
Today, we commemorate the Meds Yeghern and honor the memory of those who suffered in one of the worst mass atrocities of the 20th century.  Beginning in 1915, one and a half million Armenians were deported, massacred, or marched to their deaths in the final years of the Ottoman Empire.  On this day of remembrance, we again join the Armenian community in America and around the world in mourning the many lives lost.
 
On this day, we also honor and recognize the work of those who tried to end the violence, as well as those who sought to ensure atrocities like this would not be repeated, like human rights activist and lawyer Raphael Lemkin.  We recall the contributions of generous Americans who helped save lives and rebuild Armenian communities.  As we honor the memory of those who suffered, we also draw inspiration from the courage and resiliency of the Armenian people who, in the face of tremendous adversity, built vibrant communities around the world, including in the United States.
 
We pledge to learn from past tragedies so as to not to repeat them.  We welcome the efforts of Armenians and Turks to acknowledge and reckon with their painful history.  And we stand with the Armenian people in recalling the lives lost during the Meds Yeghern and reaffirm our commitment to a more peaceful world.
 
 
 

Statement by the Canadian Prime Minister in observation of Armenian Genocide Memorial Day

Vanyan Gary
The Office of the Prime Minister of Canada
 
 
 
Statement by the Prime Minister in observation of Armenian Genocide Memorial Day
 
Ottawa, Ontario –
 
The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today issued the following statement:
 
“Today, we join Armenian communities in Canada and around the world to honour the memory of the victims of the Armenian genocide, a dark chapter in human history which must never be forgotten.
 
“Although more than a century has since passed, the memory of those who unjustly lost their lives and suffered reminds us that we must never respond to hatred or violence with indifference.
 
“As we observe this solemn day and pay tribute to the strength and spirit of the Armenian people, we also look forward to a future built on peace and mutual respect.
 
“The Government of Canada pays tribute to the victims of this tragedy and reaffirms its commitment to strive for a world in which nobody – regardless of faith or ethnic background – fears discrimination or persecution because of who they are.”
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

April 24, a day Commemorating Armenian Genocide

Hunanian Jack
Greek City Times
 
 
April 24, a day Commemorating Armenian Genocide
 
April 24th is the day the world commemorates the Armenian Genocide committed by Turks in 1915. That day, 250 Armenian intellectuals and community leaders were arrested in Constantinople and sent to Chankri and Ayash, where they were later slain.
 
On this day, the Armenian genocide began.
 
The cleansing continued during and after World War I, resulting in the massacre of millions of Armenians, Greeks and Assyrians of Anatolia.
  
Ordinary Armenians were turned out of their homes and sent on death marches through the Mesopotamian desert without food or water. Frequently, the marchers were stripped naked and forced to walk under the scorching sun until they dropped dead.
 
At the same time, it is said that the Young Turks created a “Special Organisation,” which in turn organised “killing squads” or “butcher battalions” to carry out, as one officer put it, “the liquidation of the Christian elements.” These killing squads were often made up of murderers and other ex-convicts. They drowned people in rivers, threw them off cliffs, crucified them and burned them alive.
 
It is estimated about 1.5 million Armenians, 900,000 Greeks, and up to 400,000 Christian Assyrians, were killed due to the genocide.
 
Records show that during this “Turkification” campaign government squads also kidnapped children, converted them to Islam and gave them to Turkish families. In some places, they raped women and forced them to join Turkish “harems” or serve as slaves. Muslim families moved into the homes of deported Armenians and seized their property.
 
On August 30, 1922, Armenians who were living in Smyrna were victims of more Turkish atrocities. The “Smyrna Disaster” of 1922 also killed Greeks who were living in the seaside city and involved thousands of Armenians. Turkish soldiers and civilians set all Greek and Armenian neighbourhoods on fire, forcing the fleeing of Greeks and Armenians to the harbor, where thousands were killed.
 
On April 24, 1919, the Armenian community that had survived held a commemoration ceremony at the St. Trinity Armenian church in Constantinople. Following its initial commemoration in 1919, this date became the annual day of remembrance for the Armenian Genocide.
 
Today, most historians call this event a genocide–a premeditated and systematic campaign to exterminate an entire people.
 
However, the Turkish government does not acknowledge the enormity or scope of these events. Despite pressure from Armenians and social justice advocates throughout the world, it is still illegal in Turkey to talk about what happened to Armenians during this era.
 
After the Ottomans surrendered in 1918, the leaders of the Young Turks fled to Germany, which promised not to prosecute them for the genocide. Ever since then, the Turkish government has denied that a genocide took place.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

2020 candidates line up behind Armenian genocide bill as US-Turkey relations plummet

Toneyan Mark
Al-Monitor
 
 
2020 candidates line up behind Armenian genocide bill as US-Turkey relations plummet
 
Bryant Harris
 
 
As Turkey continues to lose clout in Washington amid strained bilateral ties, Armenian-American advocacy groups are hopeful this will be the year the United States finally recognizes the World War I era massacre of more than 1 million mostly Christian Armenians as a genocide.
 
More than 100 lawmakers in the House and Senate have signed on to legislation recognizing the genocide since its introduction earlier this month, in line with past efforts. And President Donald Trump, whose evangelical base supports the move, is expected to issue a statement marking the anniversary of the massacre on April 24.
 
“If either [the House or the Senate] measures were to come before their respective committees or the floor, it’s hard to see how in this environment anyone’s going to step forward to defend Ankara’s denial of the Armenian genocide,” said Aram Hamparian, the executive director of the Armenian National Committee of America.
 
At least two other advocacy groups — the Armenian Assembly of America and In Defense of Christians — have also lobbied Congress to pass the resolution in the past. Lobbyists for Turkey and pro-Turkey groups in Washington have long advocated against such a move, warning that it would poison bilateral relations.
 
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“The Armenian Diaspora claim of genocide is a one-sided assessment of the inter-communal war between Ottoman Armenians and Ottoman Muslims in 1915, and it prejudices Turkish and Armenian rapprochement,” the Turkish Coalition of America states on its website.
 
Turkey denies the wartime deaths amount to a genocide and has made clear that US-Turkey relations would further deteriorate if the United States went ahead with a genocide statement. After President Emmanuel Macron of France declared April 24 to be a national day of commemoration of the Armenian genocide in February, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan lashed outand said France should instead own up to its colonial-era atrocities.
 
Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., the top Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, introduced the nonbinding resolution in the upper chamber earlier this month, just before lawmakers left town for the April recess. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., introduced similar legislation in the lower chamber around the same time.
 
The Senate bill boasts 15 bipartisan cosponsors, while another 89 lawmakers have signed on to the House resolution. Several 2020 presidential candidates have signed on to the bills, as they have in previous years.
 
Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Kamala Harris, D-Calif., are both cosponsoring the Menendez resolution. Reps. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, and Seth Moulton, D-Mass., who announced his presidential campaign this week, signed on to the House resolution. Another candidate, Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., signed on to the House resolution in 2017 but has yet to do so this year.
 
President Barack Obama promised to recognize the Armenian genocide as a senator on the campaign trail, but never fulfilled that pledge while in office. And while 100 lawmakers signed a letter asking Trump to recognize the genocide in 2018, Trump instead opted to continue condemning it as “one of the worst mass atrocities in the 20th history” in an April 24 statement last year, stopping short of calling it a genocide.
 
Hamparian expects several more lawmakers to sign on when Congress returns from its recess next week.
 
One of them is high-profile freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., her spokesman told Al-Monitor today. Her defeated primary opponent, former House Democratic caucus chairman Joe Crowley, was a longtime proponent of recognizing the Armenian genocide.
 
The bill faces tall odds. The last time Congress advanced similar legislation was in 2014, when it cleared the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — only to stall on the floor. The House Foreign Affairs Committee for its part advanced a resolution in 2010 that also failed to get a floor vote.
 
Hamparian attributes the lack of progress in recent years to Turkish lobbying efforts.
 
“If you were to subtract the Turkish threat of retribution, this would pass overwhelmingly in the House and the Senate,” Hamparian told Al-Monitor. “The president himself would recognize the Armenian genocide.”
 
The Trump administration has recently sought to salvage the US-Turkish relationship by including the Turks in a proposed safe zone for northeastern Syria, despite strong objections from America’s Syrian Kurdish allies. But several other irritants in the relationship remain, most notably Ankara’s pending purchase of a Russian missile defense system that could trigger US sanctions.
 
“Turkey is in the process of purchasing S-400 missiles from Russia, which has recognized the Armenian genocide,” said Hamparian. “It’s clear that it’s just a matter of Turkey making these terrible threats, not delivering on them, and US policymakers, out of cowardice, just failing to stand up.”
 
 
 

What led to the genocide of Armenians by the Ottomans

Maral Chavushian
Arab News, Saudi Arabia
 
 
What led to the genocide of Armenians by the Ottomans
 
People take part in a torchlight procession as they mark the anniversary of the killing of 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman forces, Yerevan, . (AFP)
 
Regional affairs expert explains the reasons behind the carnage
The Ottoman Empire was known during the 19th and early 20th centuries as the sick man of Europe
 
RIYADH: Eyad Abu Shakra, a Middle East specialist, said there were three things that needed to be considered when researching how the Ottoman Empire handled Armenia during the First World War. Approaching the subject in this way made it possible to understand the violent repression of non-Muslim minorities in the Ottoman Empire, especially the Armenians.
 
Speaking to Arab News on Tuesday, Abu Shakra said the first point was related to Armenian history and heritage. They were among the first people to convert to Christianity, which was the dominant religion in Anatolia prior to Islam. The majority of Armenians belong to the Armenian Orthodox Church, which is one of the oldest churches in the world. It was founded in the first century A.D. by St. Thaddeus and St. Bartholomew, two of Jesus Christ’s disciples.
 
Abu Shakra said the second point was related to the “Eastern question,” a reference to the final decades of the Ottoman Empire and the mounting pressure it faced from European powers that were competing to carve out their own territories.
 
He said the historical roots of the Eastern question dated back to the 16th century, when Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and Emperor Francis I reached an understanding by which France was granted special status as protector of the non-Muslim minorities in the Ottoman Empire, which was at the time at the height of its power.
 
But what started as a generous grant bestowed by a powerful state in the 16th century, became in the 19th century a tool of European pressure, and impositions from Christian powers on a weakened Ottoman state. This imbalance was reflected in the military losses of the Ottomans at the hands of the Europeans.
 
The Ottoman Empire was known during the 19th and early 20th centuries as the sick man of Europe.
 
The worst setbacks were during the Russo-Ottoman war of 1768-1774, when the Ottoman Empire lost territories in the northern Black Sea region. The Ottoman decline climaxed by the end of the 19th century, when they lost much of the Balkans to separatist Serbs and Bulgarians.
 
“The Eastern question was finally answered after the First World War with the total collapse of the Ottoman Empire, which was forced to sign the Treaty of Sevres and then the Treaty of Lausanne. It gave up its claims to the Balkans and the Middle East. New states came into existence, such as Serbia, Bulgaria, and Turkey which was established in Anatolia, Istanbul and the Straits, while other territories came under direct rule of the allied victors,” said Abu Shakra.
 
The third point, according to Abu Shakra, lay in the Ottoman reforms that started during the reign of Sultan Abdul Majid I and continued until the First World War in 1914. For a long time the Ottoman Empire occupied swathes of territory across the continents of the ancient world. It included diverse populations and religions and this great power had an influential role in world politics. However, from the 18th century onward it became a decaying power.
 
The European powers, on the other hand, were on the rise despite their rivalries. So while the Ottoman state bureaucracy and military deteriorated, its army suffered from defeats in various wars that it fought on various fronts, draining the empire’s resources.
 
These defeats made the Ottoman intelligentsia consider going through reforms to save whatever could be saved and modernize the empire.  This reform movement made important achievements, but it was argued by conservatives that the internal fabric could not withstand the pace of reforms. This tension became a pretext for questioning the validity of the reforms which increased the confidence of non-Muslims (including Armenians), non-Turks (especially Arabs), who started to have a growing sense of identity. This friction was encouraged by the European powers, who had been interfering in the affairs of the Ottoman Empire.
 
As a result, Sultan Abdul Hamid II came to power representing the conservative nationalist line, which was apathetic to the aspirations of non-Turks, especially the European ones. Although Abdul Hamid was removed from power after 30 years, the theater was prepared for the “Armenian Genocide” during the years of the First World War.

DENIAL IS THE LAST ACT OF A GENOCIDE: ARMENIAN GENOCIDE TURNS 104

Toneyan Mark
The Blunt Post
 
 
DENIAL IS THE LAST ACT OF A GENOCIDE: ARMENIAN GENOCIDE TURNS 104
 
 
By Vic Gerami
 
 
 
On Armenians worldwide commemorate the 104th anniversary of the Genocide that claimed the lives of 1.5 million people.On this day in 1915 hundreds of Armenian intellectuals were rounded up, arrested and later executed.
 
The massacres were perpetrated in different regions of the Ottoman Empire by the Young Turks Government which was in power at the time.
 
When WWI erupted, the Young Turks government, hoping to save the remains of the weakened Ottoman Empire, adopted a policy of Pan Turkism – the establishment of a mega Turkish empire comprising of all Turkic-speaking peoples of the Caucasus and Central Asia extending to China, intending also to Turkify all ethnic minorities of the empire.
 
 
The Armenian population became the main obstacle to the realization of this policy. Although the decision on the deportation of all Armenians from Western Armenia (Eastern Anatolia) was adopted in late 1911, the Young Turks used WWI as a suitable opportunity for its implementation.
 
The first international reaction to the violence resulted in a joint statement by France, Russia and Great Britain, in May 1915, where the Turkish atrocities directed against the Armenian people was defined as “new crime against humanity and civilization” agreeing that the Turkish government must be punished for committing such crimes.
 
While Turkey still continues to deny the Armenian Genocide, it has been acknowledged by thirty countries, countless international organizations and forty-nine US States. It is illegal to deny the Armenian Genocide in Switzerland and France.
 
 Vic Gerami
 
Vic Gerami is journalist, media contributor and the Editor & Publisher of The Blunt Post. He spent six years at Frontiers Magazine, followed by LA Weekly and Voice Media Group. His syndicated celebrity Q&A column, 10 Questions with Vic, is a LA Press Club’s National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Award finalist. In 2009, he was featured in the Wall Street Journal as a “Leading Gay Activist” for opposing Prop 8 and his marriage equality advocacy. Vic was on the planning committee of the historic Resist March in 2017 and is a founding board member of Equality Armenia. In 2015, he was noted in the landmark Supreme Court lawsuit, Obergefell v. Hodges, in which the Court held in a 5–4 decision that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Vic is a contributor for Montrose Star, DC Life Magazine, Out & About Nashville, Q Virginia, GNI MAG, QNotes, Windy City Times, WeHo Times, GoWeHo, Los Angeles Blade, Asbarez, California Courier, Desert Daily Guide, Armenian Weekly, GED, The Pride LA, IN Magazine and The Advocate Magazine.