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ANCA & Africa Action Hold White House Vigil on Darfur Genocide

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  • ANCA & Africa Action Hold White House Vigil on Darfur Genocide

    Armenian National Committee of America
    888 17th St., NW, Suite 904
    Washington, DC 20006
    Tel: (202) 775-1918
    Fax: (202) 775-5648
    E-mail: [email protected]
    Internet: www.anca.org

    PRESS RELEASE
    May 27, 2005
    Contact: Elizabeth S. Chouldjian
    Tel: (202) 775-1918

    ANCA & AFRICA ACTION CALL ON BUSH ADMINISTRATION TO TAKE DECISIVE
    ACTION ON DARFUR GENOCIDE AT WHITE HOUSE VIGIL

    -- Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) Draws Parallels between Darfur and Armenian
    Genocides

    WASHINGTON, DC -- Armenian Americans from the Greater Washington DC
    area joined with local student leaders and community activists this
    week to protest the ongoing Genocide in Darfur, Sudan.
    Congressional Armenian Caucus Co-Chair Frank Pallone (D-NJ) was
    among speakers at the May 25th White House vigil, organized by the
    Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA).

    Rep. Pallone thanked attendees for calling attention to the
    situation in Darfur, Sudan, and went on to draw parallels between
    Armenian and Darfur genocides. "It's very reminiscent of what
    happened in the case of the Armenian Genocide," stated Rep.
    Pallone. "There were people that were speaking out that were not
    listened to. In the case of the Turks, they were out there in the
    fields, constantly killing people and moving people into the
    desert. While there were those who were speaking out [about the
    Armenian Genocide], the Western powers really weren't doing
    anything about it. We don't want to be in that situation again here
    in the United States."

    Rep. Pallone went on to praise the leadership of fellow New Jersey
    Senator Jon Corzine (D-NJ) and Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ) in
    spearheading the Darfur Accountability Act (S.495/H.R. 1424) in the
    Senate and House. The ANCA has joined with Africa Action and other
    groups in nationwide ANCA WebFax campaigns calling for the passage
    of the legislation. ANCA Government Affairs Director Kate
    Nahapetian updated attendees about the status of each bill and
    called on activists to urge House International Relations Committee
    Chairman Henry Hyde (R-IL) to work for final adoption of the
    measure.

    During the vigil, representatives of the ANCA, Africa Action, the
    Armenian Youth Federation, Genocide Education Project, Armenian
    American activists and supporters gave impassioned remarks about
    the importance of continued activism to press for decisive action
    by the Bush Administration to end the violence in Darfur. Among the
    speakers joining Rep. Pallone and Nahapetian were ANCA Executive
    Director Aram Hamparian; Communications Director Elizabeth
    Chouldjian; Africa Action Executive Director Salih Booker, Director
    for Public Education and Mobilization Marie Clarke Brill, and
    Program Associate Akenji Ndumu; Genocide Education Project
    Education Director Sara Cohan; Armenian American activist Sylvia
    Parsons; and AYF member Megan Young.

    Hamparian expressed concern about the U.S. Government's inaction
    following a September, 2004, statement properly characterizing the
    killings and rapes in Darfur as "genocide". "By using the term
    genocide - and not acting on our legal and moral obligations, our
    invocation of the term genocide is hollowed of meaning. Our
    commitment to the Genocide Convention is undermined. Those whose
    lives it was within our power to save are abandoned," explained
    Hamparian.

    Booker concurred and noted that "President Bush's senior advisors
    have been asked, "Is the President still engaged on the issue of
    genocide in Darfur?" And the Presidential aides, the White House
    aides have said: yes, the President remains engaged on the subject
    of genocide, but there are other more important matters requiring
    his attention. We are here on the lawn of the White House to ask:
    What is more important than stopping genocide?"

    Booker went on to thank the ANCA for providing the leadership for
    the vigil, and for providing leadership "not just today, not
    just over the weeks, not just being an ally, but providing
    leadership in this country to get people to understand what the
    crime of genocide is and why it's unacceptable anywhere that it
    occurs on this earth." The complete texts of Hamparian's and
    Booker's statements are provided below.

    The ANCA has participated in previous Darfur vigils, protested
    outside the Sudanese Embassy, spoken at genocide prevention
    conferences, and generated support - both at the grassroots level
    and in Washington, DC - for Congressional legislation aimed at
    ending the slaughter in the Darfur region.

    Up to 400,000 people have already died and more than 2,000,000
    dislocated in Darfur over the past two years. Recent reports
    confirm that the situation on the ground is deteriorating, and the
    humanitarian crisis is reaching desperate proportions.

    For more information about Darfur:
    http://www.africaaction.org

    To send a free ANCA WebFax protesting the Darfur Genocide:
    http://www.anca.org

    #####

    ================================================== =============Remarks by Aram Hamparian, Executive Director of the Armenian
    National Committee of America (ANCA), at the May 25th Armenian
    American White House Vigil to call for decisive U.S. action to help
    end the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan.
    ================================================== =============
    Dear Friends,

    It has been more than eight months since the President and
    Secretary of State, in September of last year, concluded that
    genocide is taking place in Darfur.

    Since that time one hundred and ten U.S. Representatives and
    Thirty-seven Senators have supported legislation calling for U.S.
    action. Editorial boards across the nation have called for U.S.
    leadership. A broad-based coalition of civil society groups has
    demanded action. Among them: the National Council of Churches,
    Physicians for Human Rights, American Jewish Committee, NAACP, and
    the United Methodist Church.

    We have as a nation, a government and a people clearly defined the
    situation in Darfur as genocide.

    In this sense, we have made a measure of progress from the days of
    Rwanda, when the Clinton Administration refused to call the
    systematic destruction of hundreds of thousands by their proper
    name - "Genocide."

    But in another sense - a profoundly important sense - we have
    retreated even further from our nation's commitment to the
    universal ideals of the Genocide Convention. By using the term
    genocide - and not acting on our legal and moral obligations:

    Our invocation of the term genocide - hollowed of meaning.

    Our commitment to the Genocide Convention - undermined.

    Those whose lives it was within our power to save - abandoned.

    Consider, for a moment, the implications of this failure to act.

    The President and the bipartisan majority of Congress; the
    Secretary of State; a broad cross-section of the media and civil
    society. They have all raised the alarm of Genocide. Yet nothing
    meaningful has resulted. Tens and hundreds of thousands have died -
    and continue to die. Yet it is business as usual at the White
    House.

    Consider, my friends, the implications of this failure to act. Not
    only for Darfur, but also for America.

    We work today to save lives in Darfur - to urge our government to
    action to end the brutality and suffering.

    But we are also working to bring about change here at home. To
    answer the question: "Who speaks for America?"

    Are we satisfied to be represented by those who offer hollow
    rhetoric in the face of overwhelming evidence of genocide?

    Are we satisfied to be represented by those who make excuses for
    inaction, despite death tolls of staggering dimension?

    Are we satisfied to be represented by those who accept genocide
    denial and the denial of justice for the worst of all crimes?

    Or will we do what is needed so that we can live in a nation that -
    in word and deed - lives up to our commitments to the Genocide
    Convention?

    Will we do what is needed so that our government prioritizes the
    crystal clear moral imperative of genocide prevention over
    political considerations?

    Will we do what is needed to see that the great power of our nation
    and the moral standing of our democratic tradition are used to end
    forever the plague of genocide?

    We can, we should, and we must do all that is within our power to
    demand a government that lives up our ideals, values and interests
    as Americans - and we can hold no higher ideal, more enduring
    value, or profound interest than in preventing genocide.

    Thank you.

    ================================================== =============Remarks by Africa Action Executive Director Salih Booker at the May
    25th White House Vigil Calling for Decisive U.S. Action to End the
    Genocide of Darfur, Sudan.
    ================================================== =============
    Dear Friends,

    I really want to thank so much the Armenian National Committee of
    America for providing the leadership for today's vigil. But also
    for providing leadership not just today, not just over the weeks,
    not just being an ally, but providing leadership in this country to
    get people to understand what the crime of genocide is and why it's
    unacceptable anywhere that it occurs on this earth.

    As of course you all know, we're speaking to the White House as
    well and they might need some reminding, this year marks the 90th
    year that we commemorate the Armenian genocide, the 60th year that
    we commemorate the Holocaust, the 11th since the genocide in
    Rwanda.

    Genocide is a unique crime against humanity. It is an attempt to
    destroy in whole or in part a community of people on the basis of
    their race, their religion, their ethnicity, or their nationality.
    It is not just a crime against the targeted group, but a crime
    against all of humanity. And therefore it is also the
    responsibility of all of humanity to stop that crime. War crimes,
    crimes against humanity, genocide, perhaps the ultimate crime
    against humanity, continue to occur in our world in part because
    those who commit such crimes have rarely been punished. Their
    culpability for these crimes is often covered up, or denied, or
    erased from the historical record in order clean up the records not
    only of those who perpetrated the crime of genocide, but all those
    states and governments that refused to act to stop genocide.

    And so along comes the next criminal regime with genocidal intent
    occupancied by genocidal actions and it believes that it will
    easily get away with these crimes. Why? Because as in 1939, Adolf
    Hitler went to the front to visit his commanders on the night
    before they launched their assault on Poland. There were over 60
    general officers in the meeting, and Hitler told them that he knew
    that some had qualms about attacking a peaceful neighboring
    country, some had qualms about his plans to exterminate a people,
    and some worried about how the world will react. And then Hitler
    paused and he said, "Who, today, remembers the Armenians?" Adolf
    Hitler was confident that the world would remain indifferent to the
    plight of the people that he was planning to exterminate because
    the Turks had gotten away with the very same. Who remembers the
    Armenians? We remember the Armenians. We do. And we remember the
    Jews and the Gypsies and others targeted for slaughter by Hitler.
    And we remember the Cambodians, and the Bosnians, and the Rwandans.

    And we ask ourselves, how do we honor the dead? We honor them by
    remembering them. And we ask ourselves, how do we honor the dead?
    And we answer by protecting the living. By protecting those who are
    struggling right now at this moment to survive a genocide and to
    stop a genocide.

    We are here because this genocide in Darfur is continuing. The
    Government of Sudan's genocidal intent and its actions are well
    documented, as are the consequences, which have been laid out
    before you already. President Bush's senior advisors have been
    asked, "Is the President still engaged on the issue of genocide in
    Darfur?" And the Presidential aides, the White House aides have
    said, "Yes, the President remains engaged on the subject of
    genocide, but there are other more important matters requiring his
    attention." We are here on the lawn of the White House to ask: What
    is more important than stopping genocide?

    And so we are here to emphasize that what we are asking is very
    simple. The first priority has to be to protect the people. To
    protect the people who are still living, but who are vulnerable to
    the continuing violence. The US must provide the leadership to give
    a mandate of protection to an international force that can provide
    that protection. And such a force can stop the killing, the raping,
    the destruction of homes. Such a force can provide the security so
    that millions of people who need humanitarian relief can receive
    food, water, and shelter that they need for their survival. A
    protection force can enforce a cease-fire and create a climate
    where political negotiations can take place. And finally, a
    protection force can facilitate the return of people to their land
    to allow them to rebuild their lives and rebuild their homes that
    have been destroy because otherwise this genocide continues, unless
    there are those kinds of reparations and rehabilitation.

    So I want to thank you for coming out today because we all say now
    when someone asks, "Who remembers the Armenians?" We all do, and we
    all remember the people in Darfur, who need us to stand with them
    now and I am so proud that the Armenian-American community is
    standing so strongly with the people of Darfur, Sudan.

    Thank you very much.
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