A la memoire des 1 500 000 victimes armeniennes

RUBRIQUE EN ANGLAIS

Appeal: The "Process" should bury the Negationism before the 100th anniversary of the Genocide

Turkey observes for months a "process" of which the title, goals, perspectives and application ways frequently undergo modifications.

An immediate end to the suffering for fallen youths, a rapid democratization of the country and recognition of freedom and equality of rights for Turkey's all peoples are the common demand of the country's all democratic forces.

However, if this peace and democratization move is conducted under the banner of "Islamic brotherhood", it will never bring nothing other than exclusion and humiliation of our peoples belonging to other origins and beliefs who had established many civilizations before the Turkish-Islamic conquest of these lands and subjected for centuries to pressures and discriminations under Ottoman and Republican rules.

This why, the principal actors of the "process" should declare that they recognize the 1915 Genocide of Armenians and Assyrians of which the 98th anniversary to be observed to-morrow. Also they should officially promise to render the usurped rights of 1.5 billion victims of the genocide and the deportation.

This is a duty to humanity.

Furthermore, the principal actors of this "process" should guarantee that they will, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Genocide in 2015, constructively participate in the campaigns, not only in Turkey but in all world, especially in the countries where Turkish migrants and Armenian, Assyrian, Kurdish, Yezidi and Greek diasporas live side by side.

On the occasion of the 98th anniversary of the 1915, we share by heart the pain of our peoples, victims of genocide and deportations, and call on all democratic forces of our country to adopt a resolved stand for the 100th anniversary.

Brussels, April 23, 2013

INFO-TURK FOUNDATION

http://www.info-turk.be/416.htm#enterrer

Are We Ready?
Armenian Genocide, Editorial | April 19, 2013 1:05 pm
By Edmond Y. Azadian

The centennial of the Armenian Genocide is around the corner. Only two years are left to prepare a commemoration commensurate with the magnitude of that colossal tragedy, which not only cost 1.5 million lives, but also a 3000-year-old homeland. Assimilated generations of Armenians, or masses alienated from their roots must be added in the loss ledge of the martyrs.

Once in a while we come across some Armenian media statements to the effect of a tsunami in 2015, which will scare the Turks and turn a new page in our struggle to promote the recognition of the Armenian Genocide. Yes, indeed, there are some preparations in Armenia and we learn about the centennial commemoration committees being formed in many communities throughout the Diaspora. However, no major earth-shaking event seems to be in the offing. It would be a shame if the centennial commemoration also turns out to be a run-of-the-mill program, akin to those which we organize every year in Armenia and in active Armenian communities around the globe. Any impressive commemorative event will take more than two years to organize.

There seem to be no major undertakings to celebrate the survival of the Armenian people by gathering world-class artists and celebrities of Armenian extraction in an impressive venue in New York, Paris, Moscow or Yerevan. That certainly would entail tremendous resources, which no benefactor, foundation or organization seems ready to undertake, let alone initiate.

Monuments have been erected in many capitals of the world, sometimes compromising the location, depending on the clout of the respective Armenian community.

The most impressive and eloquent monument would have been the Genocide Museum at the heart of our nation’s capital. In addition to its symbolism, the museum by itself could make a political statement. It is almost tragic that two years shy of the centennial, the museum is still a hostage to the dispute of opposing parties. One is certainly justified to begin to believe that the project is already a victim of a political conspiracy. The government of Turkey would have given an arm and a leg to have the museum disappear from that conspicuous location in Washington, DC. But that wish thus far is being offered for free by internecine warfare.

One area where we have recorded strides is the academic sphere and that is where the battle is shaping up between victims of the Genocide and the descendants of the perpetrators. One hundred and twenty world-renowned genocide scholars have signed a powerful statement in the New York Times, leaving no room for any rebuttal. However, the Turkish government is buying corrupt scholars to promote their line of denial.

In the production of academic volumes, the Armenian case has enjoyed the support of world-class non-Armenian scholars otherwise the dispute would have been reduced to the level of he said-she said, which still remains the goal of Turkish authorities.

Yet one phenomenal development is that respected Turkish scholars have also joined the fray.

From time to time, Turkish leaders float trial balloons to dupe the international media. They propose to form a joint committee of scholars to “research both sides of the argument,” while there is no other side in this case. It is unthinkable in any other context. For example, no one has proposed to form scholarly committees to study “conflicting” views on the Jewish Holocaust.

While Turkish authorities propose the formation of joint committees, they already know the conclusion; indeed, Prime Minister Erdogan, on the one hand proposes the idea of the joint committee, yet in the same breath, he emphatically declares that there has never been a genocide in Turkish or Ottoman history.

Fortunately thus far, there have been no takers of that offer from the Armenian side — neither the Armenian government nor any party in the Diaspora.

But the growing clout of Turkey on the international political scene has been influencing government positions in countries where Armenian lobbying groups have been active. President Obama has retreated on his pledge to recognize the Armenian Genocide; his annual April 24 statements are testimony to that cowardice.

Many Armenians who believed in President Obama’s moral fabric, have come to the realization that like his advisor, Samantha Power, and other statesmen, he is caught in the gears of political power to forgo morality. No Armenian still entertains any hope that he will come up with a statement using the word genocide this year, next year or in 2015.

The dramatic 40-percent drop in US aid to a starving Armenia is an indirect contribution to the Turkish-Azeri efforts to squeeze Armenia out of existence.

Adding insult to injury, the president has kept parity in military aid to Armenia and Azerbaijan, bypassing again Article 9 of the Freedom Support Act, to deny Azerbaijan any military assistance in view of the Baku government’s belligerence.

Unfortunately, we have also retreated in France despite the valiant campaign of the French-Armenian community. President Francois Hollande had promised to pass the resolution in the French Parliament crafting iron-tight legal language to withstand the Supreme Court arguments. After some reassurances, his foreign minister has quietly dropped the case, arguing that the Supreme Court had already issued its verdict.

Our strategic ally, Russia, is in no better position. Its bilateral trade with Turkey is approaching an annual figure of $100 billion, which no side is willing to compromise, despite the fact that political divisions keep them apart. For example, Russia is arming the Assad regime in Syria while Turkey is arming mercenaries on the border to overthrow the Syrian government. Recent political contacts between Ankara and Moscow indicate nothing but rapprochement between the two parties. Although Russia has recognized the Armenian Genocide, Mr. Putin does not seem to have the appetite to help Genocide recognition worldwide.

Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has targeted the diasporan Armenians. He has reiterated recently his statement that Baku’s number one enemy is the Armenian Diaspora. When we see the enemies intention to turn diasporan Armenians against the homeland, it behooves us to close ranks facing that enemy. But what are we doing instead? Confined to our narrow corners and unable to read the tides of world powers, we are jeopardizing Armenia’s existence and future, under the pretense of supporting democracy there. If Armenia’s existence is compromised, democracy can only be an exercise in futility.

The Genocide centennial is around the corner yet the prospects of a powerful show of force seem to be remote. Turkey has been using all its political and financial resources to prevent any waves on the international scene. No matter how much we may court optimism, the facts of life still remain against us.

In this kind of atmosphere, no tsunami appears on the horizon; perhaps just a breeze to soothe our burning hearts.

http://www.mirrorspectator.com/2013/04/19/are-we-ready/

Armenian Genocide Memorial erected in Hungary

20:47, 22 April, 2013

YEREVAN, APRIL 22, ARMENPRESS: A memorial dedicated to the victims of the Armenian Genocide was inaugurated in Szeged, Hungary, on Saturday.

As reports Armenpress, referring to Politics Hungarian daily, the cross stone was erected in the Park of Christian Solidarity near Szeged cathedral.

Addressing the ceremony, goodwill Ambassador Levon Sargsyan, President Serzh Sargsian’s brother, welcomed that a memorial of this kind was unveiled in Hungary.

“Although the recent period has witnessed some difficult moments, they have been swept away like ash in the wind,” he said.

Although diplomatic relations between Armenia and Hungary were broken, ties between the two nations date back to centuries, Levon Sargsyan said.

The ambassador stressed the need to pay tribute to the 1.5 million victims and fight to prevent similar atrocities anywhere in the world.

Addressing a letter to the participants, Hungarian Foreign Minister Janos Martonyi said that the two nations had been bound by centuries-long friendship, arising from a common Christian faith, common fate and the remarkable achievements of Armenians who had settled in Hungary.

Martonyi said that Hungarian-Armenian friendship should be further deepened and cooperation extended in all fields of life, including diplomatic relations.

Despite the regrettable cessation of political contacts, Hungary supports Armenia’s endeavor for integration into Europe and would welcome if talks on the association and free trade agreements were concluded at the Vilnius summit of the Eastern Partnership and the European Union, Martonyi.

Armenia unilaterally suspended diplomatic relations with Hungary last August after an Azeri officer, serving a life sentence for murdering an Armenian officer in Budapest, had been repatriated to his homeland where he had been released.

http://armenpress.am/eng/news/716204/armenian-genocide-memorial-erected-in-hungary.html

Israel: The Politics Behind The Armenian Genocide
By: Akiva Eldar for Al-Monitor Israel Pulse Posted on April 22.

On Wednesday [April 24] the world will mark the 98th anniversary of the genocide carried out against the Armenians by the Ottoman Empire. As it does every year, this year, too, Israel will be silent. The Jewish state, which just two weeks ago [April 8] honored the 6 million Jews who perished in the Holocaust, will abstain from marking the genocide in which 1 million to 1.5 million Armenians perished. President Shimon Peres, who spoke at the central memorial ceremony at Yad Vashem and pointed a finger at “those who forget and deny the Holocaust,” will continue, as he does every year, to ignore the cruel genocide carried out a quarter of a century before World War II.

When Adolf Hitler was asked how the world would respond to his "Final Solution" plan — the extermination of the Jewish people in Europe — he replied, without compunction: “Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?”

Germany speaks today of the annihilation of the Jews, assumes responsibility for the Holocaust, memorializes the victims and compensates the survivors. Turkey not only refuses to recognize the Armenian genocide — its government conducts all-out wars against states that mention the event and punishes governments that grant it official recognition. Only a year and a half ago, Turkey recalled its ambassador from Paris to protest the French parliament’s approval of legislation that criminalizes the denial of the Armenian genocide (several weeks later, the law was repealed).

The 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such.”

The man who coined the term genocide and fought for adoption of the treaty was the Jewish-Polish jurist Raphael Lemkin, whose entire family was annihilated in the Holocaust. He himself managed to flee to the United States. Lemkin referred specifically to the Armenian annihilation as an act of genocide. This position was never adopted by Israeli governments. The official Israeli position was summed up in 2001 in an interview by then-Foreign Minister Shimon Peres with the Turkish Daily News: “The Armenians suffered a tragedy,” he said, “but not genocide.”

In advance of the Armenian memorial day someone should point out to the president a compilation of testimony provided by members of Nili (a Jewish spy ring that operated in Palestine during World War I in an effort to help the British army wrest it from the Turks) about what befell the Armenians. He might just change his mind.

This is the testimony of Eitan Belkind, a Nili man who infiltrated the Turkish military: 

“I was amazed to see the river colored red with the blood and bodies of decapitated children floating on the water. The sight was horrendous — and we are powerless to help.” Belkind later described how Circassian soldiers ordered the Armenians to gather thorns and thistles and form them into a large pyramid, tied some 5,000 people to each other hand to hand in a ring around the thorn pile and set it on fire. “The fire rose to the sky along with the screams of the wretched people charred to death in the bonfire,” he wrote. “I fled from the place because I could not watch that horrible scene. I urged my horse to gallop with all his might and after a wild two-hour ride I could still hear their miserable cries until their voices died out. Two days later I went back to the place and saw the charred bodies of thousands of human beings.” 

In a memorandum submitted to the British Ministry of Defense in 1916, Nili leader Aaron Aaronsohn wrote: “The massacre of the Armenians is a well-planned Turkish action and the Germans were partners in this shameful act.”

These harsh words were echoed at a seminar held on April 11 of this year on the subject of “The Nakba in Israel’s National Memory” (by The Walter Lebach Institute for Jewish-Arab Coexistence through Education and the Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research at Tel Aviv University). During the discussion, Professor Yair Auron of the Open University, who for years has been leading a determined struggle for recognition of the Armenian genocide, was sharply critical of the indifference of Israel’s political and academic elite to the tragedies of other nations. Later, in an interview with Al-Monitor, Auron contended that through their indifference, “they are defiling the memory of the Holocaust.”

And, in fact, other than a handful of right- and left-wing politicians, none of the leaders of mainstream Israeli politics showed up. For them, any attempt to hint that other peoples were also persecuted and massacred for racist reasons is considered “disrespect for the Holocaust” (they themselves, on the other hand, often use the term “Holocaust,” especially to scare the Israeli public with the Iranian threat). They do not define the Armenian genocide as a human-Jewish-ethical issue. Israeli universities make do with teaching the Jewish Holocaust and evince no interest in the disasters of other peoples. Nonetheless, at Auron’s instigation, the Open University has for several years been teaching a course on the Armenian genocide, which is much in demand by students.

The recognition of the Armenian genocide by Israeli decision-makers is a question of politics, of the relationship between Israel, Turkey and the United States. Who cares about relations with little Armenia (3 million citizens)? In fact, Israel even earned several million dollars recently, benefiting from the Turkish government’s decision to cancel a weapons deal with France in retaliation for the above-mentioned legislation against denial of the Armenian genocide. 

In 2007, the Knesset decided to remove from its daily agenda a proposal by Knesset Member Haim Oron of the Meretz Party to debate the Armenian genocide in the Education and Culture Committee. The decision resulted from orders by then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who feared that further discussion of the issue would lead to a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey.

In a debate that took place in the Knesset five years later (June 12, 2012), over the objections of the diplomatic echelon, the government’s representative, then Minister of Environmental Protection Gilad Erdan, confessed that “this whole debate is taking place against the backdrop of relations between Israel and Turkey.” Nothing has changed.

At the low point of relations with Turkey, following the failed May 2010 Israeli takeover of the flotilla to Gaza which gave birth to the “Marmara Crisis,” some right-wing politicians suggested “punishing” the Turks by recognizing the Armenian genocide. And what would we have done now? Would Prime Minister Netanyahu have repealed the recognition of the Armenian genocide to complement his apology to Turkey over the Marmara? Hearing of that idea, Auron reacts with anger: “As a human being and as a Jew, I am deeply ashamed that an issue of such basic principle and ethics has been turned into a pawn.”

The office of President Peres did not respond to a query by Al-Monitor, asking whether he had changed his mind regarding the genocide of the Armenian people.

Akiva Eldar is a contributing writer for Al-Monitor’s Israel Pulse. He was formerly a senior columnist and editorial writer for Haaretz and also served as the Hebrew daily’s US bureau chief and diplomatic correspondent. His most recent book (with Idith Zertal), Lords of the Land, on the Jewish settlements, was on the best-seller list in Israel and has been translated into English, German and Arabic.


http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/04/the-politics-behind-the-armenian-genocide.html#ixzz2REbTT4vN

Is Turkey Overcoming The Armenian Taboo?
By: Orhan Kemal Cengiz for Al-Monitor Turkey Pulse Posted on April 22.

Until recently, the Armenian question was a dreadful taboo that couldn’t be spoken about in Turkey. If you talked about it, you could be prosecuted, receive endless threats and even be physically assaulted.

It was impossible to carry out a reasonable debate that went beyond the official state narrative — that the Armenians were deported in 1915 because of the circumstances of World War I.

In 2005, when Bogazici University attempted to organize a Conference on Armenians to debate the official narrative, the country shook. For days, Turkish nationalists organized angry protests in front of the university. The minister of justice of the time, Cemil Cicek, referred to organizers of the conference when he said, “They are stabbing us in the back.” When a group protesting the conference took the matter to the court, the conference was banned. The organizers were forced to hold the conference in a tense atmosphere at Bilgi University, a private institution, instead of at a state university as originally planned.

Also that year, Orhan Pamuk, Turkey’s only Nobel Prize-winning novelist, told the Swiss periodical Das Magazin: “On this soil, 30,000 Kurds and one million Armenians were killed.” He was threatened with charges based on article 301 of the Penal Code, which bans denigrating Turkism. A short time later, largely because of the court case and threats he received, Pamuk left the country.

Another world-famous Turkish novelist, Elif Safak, was also prosecuted under article 301 following a dialogue on the Armenian question in her novel Baba ve Pic [“Father and Bastard”]. In 2006 and 2007, many intellectuals were investigated for their views on the Armenian question, all under the notorious penal code article. One of those trials ended with a tragedy. Hrant Dink, the editor-in-chief of the Armenian-Turkish weekly Agos was tried under article 301 because of his articles on the Armenian question. That trial made him a target of Turkish nationalists, and on Jan. 19, 2007, he was shot and killed in front of the Agos offices in Istanbul.

Those who filed complaints against intellectuals were the same people who congregated in front of the courts to insult the defendants when the cases were brought to trial. Many of these people were eventually detained and imprisoned, starting in 2008 with the Ergenekon case that tried those accused of planning coups against the government. Prosecutors charge that these people collaborated with military personnel planning coups. Although the Ergenekon trials are heavily criticized, it is generally agreed that threats and assaults have declined against religious minorities and intellectuals who express views challenging official narratives.

Three factors have contributed to ending the Armenian taboo and ushering Turkey into its current environment of free debate. The first was the serious blow inflicted on “deep state” structures with military personnel at their cores. The second was the emotional rupture caused by Dink's murder. Protests with hundreds of thousands of marchers carrying placards reading “We are all Armenians” illustrated that a sizable segment of the population didn't subscribe to official state narratives. The third important factor was the government decision in 2008 to amend the infamous article 301 of the Penal Code, to require permission from the Ministry of Justice for court cases under this article. This “filter” has made it difficult to try people under that article.

Because of these changes, the serious taboo on the Armenian issue no longer exists, and changes that were impossible to dream of a decade ago have become a reality. Since 2010, on each April 24, those who lost their lives in Turkey in 1915 are remembered in public meetings held in the streets and halls.

The change of language of the announcement used by the Dur De [“Say Stop to Racism and Nationalism”] initiative, which organizes these meetings, helps demonstrate the gradual erasing of the Armenian taboo in Turkey. In 2010, the announcement of the commemorative events began with the words, “This pain is our pain.” In the text, the events of 1915 were described as "the great disaster," the Turkish equivalent of the phrase "Meds Yegem" used by Armenians. Cengiz Algan, spokesman for Dur De, says they received many threatening messages despite that "soft terminology." The language became "clearer" over the years, and the number of threats declined. On the 2011 announcement, the title said only "April 24, 1915." The text read, "This is the date when the extermination of the Armenians began." The title of last year's announcement read, "This is a pain of all of us," while the text spoke of the tragedy of the Armenian people at length. The text of this year’s announcement is even more daring. It begins, “We are remembering the victims of genocide,” and it continues, “With the campaign of extermination that began on April 24, 1915, the Armenian people were eradicated en masse.”

Algan provides interesting statistics about these commemorative meetings. In 2010, the only meeting was in Istanbul, and between 700 and 800 people participated. In 2011, meetings were also organized in Ankara and Izmir, and roughly 2000 people participated in the Istanbul meeting. Last year, Bodrum and Diyarbakir were added as locations, and the number of participants in Istanbul rose to 3000. Algan notes that initially Armenians living in Istanbul were reluctant to participate, but they are increasingly coming. Every year, these meetings are protested by right-wing and left-wing nationalists. Algan says this year they expect an even larger attendance at the meeting, including participation of Armenians from abroad, and they expect the usual protests. The police will provide a human buffer between the protestors and participants in the meeting. Algan says each year his organization gets in touch with state officials during their planning process, and every year they get a better reception.

Turkey is changing from a country where the very term "the Armenian question" couldn’t be uttered, to a country where groups are marching in the streets referring to the "Armenian genocide." We'll have to wait to see whether these changes will radically alter the state's official policies — for example, resulting in an apology and compensation to the Armenians for 1915. But until then, it will be interesting to observe the commemorative meeting on April 24 in Istanbul. 

Orhan Kemal Cengiz is a human-rights lawyer, columnist and former president of the Human Rights Agenda Association, a Turkish NGO that works on human-rights issues ranging from the prevention of torture to the rights of the mentally disabled.
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/04/armenian-genocide-taboo-turkey-anniversary.html#ixzz2RDyAzBf8


The Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute Published the Monograph “Recognition and Condemnation: Young Turks Trials (1919-1921 and 1926) by Meline Anumyan
16.04.2013
The Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute published Meline Anumyan’s (PHD) monograph “Recognition and Condemnation: Young Turks Trials (1919-1921 and 1926). The work is dedicated to the study of the lawsuits issued over the massacres and deportations of the Armenians in Military Tribunals of the Ottoman Empire during 1919-1921 and the trials of the Young Turks held in the Independent courts of the Turkish Republic in 1926.

The political atmosphere in Turkey after the establishment of Mudros armistice, as well as the discussions on Armenian deportations and massacres that emerged in Ottoman press and in two-chamber parliament at the end of 1918 are presented in the first chapter of current monograph . The author also refers to the investigations launched during this period in Turkey against those, responsible for the Armenian genocide.

The cases on Armenians deportations and massacres of 1919-1921 filed in the Military Tribunals of Istanbul and trials of the Young Turks during 1919-1920 are studied in the second chapter. The political developments in Turkey during 1923-1926 are discussed in the third chapter. The author presents Young Turks’ reasons for appearing in the frontlines of opposition after the proclamation of the Turkish Republic, as well as the planned assassination attempt in Izmir against Mustafa Kemal, President of the Turkish Republic. Young Turks had a significant role in the nationalistic struggle. The third chapter is also dedicated to the study of the case filed over the assassination attempt in Izmir and the one known as Ankara or “Black Band” case. Both cases were heard in Independent courts of the Turkish Republic. At the end of the chapter author makes comparison between Young Turks trials of 1919-1921 and 1926, and emphasizes the fact of preserving Ittihad tradition within the ideology and state governance in the political life of the Turkish Republic.
http://www.genocide-museum.am/eng/index.php

Armenian Genocide Exhibit Will be Included in Canadian Museum for Human Rights

WINNIPEG — Calling the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks a genocide may hurt lucrative trade between Canada and Turkey but the Canadian Museum for Human Rights is not about to call the slaughter of an estimated 1.5 million people anything other than genocide, the Winnipeg Free Press writes.

When the museum opens in Winnipeg next year, information about the Armenian genocide will be included in its galleries, and it will be called “genocide,” the museum’s head of stakeholder relations said Sunday.

Clint Curle was responding to reports that Turkish Ambassador Tuncay Babali said the Harper government’s decision to brand the First World War-era killing of Armenians as genocide may be hindering a potentially lucrative trading relationship with Turkey.

“I’m a true believer in the potential of our two nations,” Babali told The Canadian Press. “Canada has a lot to offer Turkey and Turkey in return has a lot to offer Canada,” said Babali in the interview, noting Canada’s internal Foreign Policy Plan has identified Turkey as a key country of focus.

“It cannot be business as usual while accusing a nation of genocide. It’s a serious allegation. It needs to be substantiated legally, historically.”

Babali said he suspects Canada is not engaging as quickly as Turkey would like because the genocide issue is still hanging over relations. The $2.5 billion in two-way trade between the countries “is far from the potential” of what Turkey predicts would result from deeper economic ties: $10 billion to $15 billion within five years, he said.

On the genocide question, Babali said Turkey would like to see a gesture from Canada that the government is “trying to leave this behind us.”

The Armenian genocide will not be left behind when the Canadian Museum for Human Rights opens, Curle said.

“Human rights lessons from the Armenian genocide will be explored in a number of ways in the CMHR, including in an exhibit exploring Raphael Lemkim’s work (he coined the term genocide), an exhibit examining the 1948 Genocide Convention, and in a gallery that will explore a cross-section of global mass atrocities, including the five atrocities that the Canadian Parliament has recognized as genocides,” said Curle.

“This gallery will include survivor testimony, primary-source evidence and an exhibit that explores the diaspora community struggles that led to the Parliamentary recognition of the Armenian genocide.”

In April 2004, Parliament passed a resolution acknowledging the Armenian genocide of 1915 and condemning it as a crime against humanity.

In a museum blog posted last week, Curle said it’s a timely human rights issue.

“Ongoing denial of this historic atrocity, waged in the name of ethnic homogeneity, makes it a contemporary human rights concern.” He recently visited Yerevan in Armenia to see the genocide museum there and will be working to develop links between it and the human rights museum in Winnipeg.

On Sunday, he said the museum doesn’t take a position on issues surrounding trade and diplomacy.

“Our role is to promote and advance education about the importance of human rights, and to encourage and facilitate dialogue and reflection about human rights.”

http://www.genocide-museum.am/eng/14.04.2013.php

An Exhibition Dedicated to the 80th Anniversary of Franz Werfel’s “The 40 Days of Musa Dagh” opened at the National Library

An exhibition dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the first publication of the famous novel “The 40 Days of Musa Dagh” by Franz Werfel opened today in cooperation with the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute and RA National Library.

Hayk Demoyan, the director of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute and Tigran Zargaryan, the director of RA National Library had opening speeches. Hayk Demoyan handed a golden medal issued under the “Gratitude” nomination to the National Library.

The historical novel “The 40 Days of Musa Dagh” describes one of the heroic episodes of the Cilician Armenians’ struggle during the Armenian Genocide. Thanks to this struggle and French warships, more than four thousand people were miraculously saved from the impending extermination. This novel is justly considered a monumental work the contents of which fully represent the Armenians’ struggle for self-preservation and the horrors of the Armenian Genocide in the frame of fiction.

The exhibition which was presented in the National Library includes more than fifty publications of the novel which were published in different years and in different languages and are part of the collections of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute and National Library.

The exhibition will be open until April 25.

http://www.genocide-museum.am/eng/17.04.2013.php


Armenian Genocide victims commemorated during Argentinean Football Championship
10:19, 23 April, 2013
YEREVAN, APRIL 23, ARMENPRESS: Before the match of the Argentinean Football Club Boca Juniors, the representatives of the Club raised a poster devoted to the memory of the victims of the Armenian Genocide. According to Armenpress, before the game of the Argentinean Boca Juniors – Belgrano de Córdoba, the young players raised a poster saying “Let us commemorate the Armenian Genocide”.

The action was held by the community of the Argentinean Armenians on the occasion of the 98th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.

http://armenpress.am/eng/news/716230/armenian-genocide-victims-commemorated-during-argentinean-football-championship.html


U.S. Representatives support aid for Armenia, Artsakh, Javakhk and at-risk Middle East Armenians
12:25 23.04.2013
Congressional Armenian Caucus Co-Chairmen Frank Pallone (D-NJ) and Michael Grimm (R-NY) were joined by over twenty of their colleagues in calling on leading House foreign aid appropriators to increase aid to Armenia, expand assistance for Nagorno Karabakh, target allocations for Javakhk, and support refugee resettlement funding for displaced Christian Armenian populations in the Middle East, as they advance the Fiscal Year 2014 foreign aid bill, reported the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA).

“All friends of Armenia join in expressing our appreciation to each and every legislator supporting this initiative to advance our interests and values in a vitally important region of the world,” said Aram Hamparian, Executive Director of the ANCA. “We look forward to working in partnership with these friends, and others, as we continue to support Armenia’s growth, Artsakh’s security, Javakhk’s development, and the welfare of at-risk Armenians and other Christians in the Middle East.”

In a letter sent today to the leadership of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on State-Foreign Operations, Chairwoman Kay Granger (R-TX) and Ranking Democrat Nita Lowey (D-NY), a bipartisan group of legislators made the case for supporting the U.S.-Armenia strategic relationship through economic development and security assistance. Their key requests were as follows:

- At least $5 million in U.S. humanitarian and developmental aid to Nagorno Karabakh.

- At least 10% of U.S. assistance to Georgia to be earmarked for job creation programs in the Samtskhe-Javakheti region of that country.

- At least $50 million in U.S. economic aid to Armenia.

- Funds for humanitarian and resettlement assistance specifically targeted to Armenian and other Christian populations as well as other minority communities affected by the recent unrest in the Middle East.

- Language strengthening Section 907 restrictions on U.S. aid to Azerbaijan.

- Removal of barriers to contact and communication with representatives of the NagornoKarabakhRepublic.

- Language calling for the participation of Nagorno Karabakh leaders in the OSCE Minsk Group negotiations

Joining Congressmen Pallone and Grimm as signatories were Representatives: Bruce Braley (D-IA), Judy Chu (D-CA), David Cicilline (D-RI), Jim Costa (D-CA), Joe Crowley (D-NY), Anna Eshoo (D-CA), Chaka Fattah (D-PA), Rush Holt (D-NJ), Jim Langevin (D-RI), Barbara Lee (D-CA), Daniel Lipinski (D-IL), Stephen Lynch (D-MA), Ed Markey (D-MA), Jim McGovern (D-MA), Grace Napolitano (D-CA), Gary Peters (D-MI), Linda Sanchez (D-CA), Loretta Sanchez (D-CA), Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Brad Sherman (D-CA), Jackie Speier (D-CA), John Tierney (D-MA) and Henry Waxman (D-CA).

The letter comes just weeks after President Obama released his FY 2014 budget which included a 38% cut in Fiscal Year 2014 (FY14) economic aid to Armenia, a proposal that, if approved by Congress, would reduce U.S. assistance to Armenia to its lowest level since the 1988 earthquake.

The President’s proposal of $24,719,000 in Economic Support Funds for Armenia was dramatically less than last year’s actual economic aid allocation of $40 million, and less than half the $50 million in FY14 aid requested earlier this year in an Armenian Caucus letter and ANCA Congressional testimony.  The White House’s proposal did, however, maintain parity in terms of appropriated military aid to Armenia and Azerbaijan, with International Military Education and Training (IMET) assistance set at $600,000 and Foreign Military Financing (FMF) set at $2,700,000.

http://www.armradio.am/en/2013/04/23/u-s-representatives-support-aid-for-armenia-artsakh-javakhk-and-at-risk-middle-east-armenians/

Candlelight vigil in memory of the victims of the Armenian Genocide
12:33 23.04.2013

In honor of the 1.5 million victims of the Armenian Genocide, Unified Young Armenians (UYA) has organized a candlelight vigil.  The Armenian-American community will rally to honor the memory of their massacred ancestors.

It will take place on April 23, 2013 at 7:00 P.M. in the City of Glendale, CA at the Glendale Civic Auditorium’s parking.   Many guest speakers have confirmed, including key political figures currently serving the City of Glendale and Los Angeles.  The organized rally will also include traditional musical performances by popular artists within the Armenian-American community.

This year marks the 98^th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. On April 24, 1915, 1.5 million Armenian men, women, and children living in the Ottoman Empire were mercilessly annihilated, murdered, and raped.  Most of the survivors were left orphaned and rebuild their lives away from the homeland, in many countries around the world, including the United States of America. With UYA’s leadership, the Armenian-American community congregates on the eve of the Armenian Genocide to honor the memory of their ancestors with a candlelight vigil.

The President of Unified Young Armenians, Aroutin Hartounian, states: “The memory of the victims of the Armenian Genocide will live in our hearts, in our minds, and most importantly, will be reflected in our actions. Our fight will go on.”  UYA demands for the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by both the Unites States of America and the Republic of Turkey. It seeks justice for the sake of all genocides in the past and present.

http://www.armradio.am/en/2013/04/23/candlelight-vigil-in-memory-of-the-victims-of-the-armenian-genocide/

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