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Yerevan Urges Bush To Mention Genocide
YEREVAN (RFE/RL)--The Armenian government on Thursday commended George W.
Bush for paying his respects to 1.5 million Armenians massacred and starved to
death in the Ottoman Empire but expressed hope that the US president will
eventually refer to the mass killings as "genocide."
"We appreciate the fact that President Bush continued the tradition by
issuing a statement on the day of the remembrance of the Armenian Genocide,"
Armenian foreign ministry spokeswoman Dziunik Aghajanian told RFE/RL. "We also
appreciate his belief that the best way to remember the victims is to build
a prosperous and secure Armenia. However, we hope that for the sake of
historic justice and the prevention of such crimes in the future, President Bush will
give the events of 1915, poignantly described in his [April 24] message, a
proper definition in his future statements: the genocide."
While acknowledging the "forced exile and annihilation of approximately 1.5
million Armenians in the closing years of the Ottoman Empire," Bush's
message to the Americans of Armenian origin stopped short of describing the 1915
tragedy as "genocide." This led Armenian-American groups to accuse the
president of reneging on his campaign pledge to recognize the Genocide.
The careful wording of the statement reflected Washington's reluctance to
infuriate NATO ally Turkey, which vehemently denies the Genocide. "The
Turkish Daily News," an English-language newspaper close to official Ankara, on
Thursday welcomed Bush's decision to avoid calling the massacres a genocide
despite strong pressure from the Armenian lobby and over one hundred
members of the US Congress.
Armenian, Assyrian and Hellenic Genocide News Archives