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"INARTFUL DANCE" OF STATE DEPARTMENT: US AMBASSADOR TO ARMENIA NOMINEE REFUSES TO REFERENCE AS GENOCIDE MASSACRE OF ARMENIANS IN OTTOMAN TURKEY
news.am
July 14 2011
Armenia
WASHINGTON. - US Ambassador to Armenia nominee John Heffern in his
testimony during the hearings in U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign
Relations refused to reference as genocide the massacre of 1.5 million
Armenians in Ottoman Turkey.
In response to the New Jersey Senator Robert Menendez question:
"Do you agree that there were mass killings, ethnic cleansing and
forced deportation of over one and a half million Armenians during the
period that the Ottoman Empire existed?" Heffern replied positively.
"The massacres and the forced deportations leading to the deaths of 1.5
million Armenians is acknowledged and recognized by President Obama,
and, yes, I believe it as well," said John Heffern.
Menendez also noted that Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention
and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide that the U.S. has both signed
and ratified states that genocide means any of the following acts
committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group, as such, (a) Killing members of
the group, (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of
the group, (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life
calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.
"Those are [Articles of] a Convention for which we, the United States,
has signed. Would not the facts that you acknowledged in your opening
statement during period of 1915 to 1923 meet the definition of Article
2?" asked Senator Robert Menendez.
"You have accurately described Article two, the definition of genocide
in the Convention, so, yes to that part of the question and yes to
the facts that were in my statement and that you have repeated, but
the characterization of those events is a policy decision that is made
by the President of the United States and that policy is annunciated
in his April 24 Remembrance Day statement," replied the nominee of
the President Obama to the U.S. Ambassador to Armenia.
Heffern noted that the U.S. President Obama has recognized and
deplored the "horrific events that took place in the waning days
of the Ottoman Empire." He reminded that Obama has publicly called
"the massacre of 1.5 million Armenians at this time one of the worst
atrocities of the 20th century" and urged Turkey and Armenia to
"work through their painful history to achieve a full, frank, and
just acknowledgement of the facts."
"If confirmed, I will do my best to fulfill the president's vision,"
he added.
Senator Robert Menendez stressed that he finds it "very difficult
to be sending diplomats of the United States to a country in which
they will go to a genocide commemoration, and yet never be able to
use the word genocide."
"This is a difficult, an inartful dance that we do. We have a State
Department whose history full of dispatches cites the atrocities
committed during this period of time, we have a Convention, which we
signed onto as a signatory that clearly defines these acts as genocide,
we have a historical knowledge of the facts, which we accept that
would amount to genocide, but we are unwilling to reference it as
genocide. If we cannot accept the past, we cannot move forward,"
said Menendez. "It is much more than a question of a word, it is
everything that signifies our commitment to saying never again. And
yet we cannot even acknowledge this fact, and we put diplomats in a
position that is totally untanable."
From: Baghdasarian
news.am
July 14 2011
Armenia
WASHINGTON. - US Ambassador to Armenia nominee John Heffern in his
testimony during the hearings in U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign
Relations refused to reference as genocide the massacre of 1.5 million
Armenians in Ottoman Turkey.
In response to the New Jersey Senator Robert Menendez question:
"Do you agree that there were mass killings, ethnic cleansing and
forced deportation of over one and a half million Armenians during the
period that the Ottoman Empire existed?" Heffern replied positively.
"The massacres and the forced deportations leading to the deaths of 1.5
million Armenians is acknowledged and recognized by President Obama,
and, yes, I believe it as well," said John Heffern.
Menendez also noted that Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention
and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide that the U.S. has both signed
and ratified states that genocide means any of the following acts
committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group, as such, (a) Killing members of
the group, (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of
the group, (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life
calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.
"Those are [Articles of] a Convention for which we, the United States,
has signed. Would not the facts that you acknowledged in your opening
statement during period of 1915 to 1923 meet the definition of Article
2?" asked Senator Robert Menendez.
"You have accurately described Article two, the definition of genocide
in the Convention, so, yes to that part of the question and yes to
the facts that were in my statement and that you have repeated, but
the characterization of those events is a policy decision that is made
by the President of the United States and that policy is annunciated
in his April 24 Remembrance Day statement," replied the nominee of
the President Obama to the U.S. Ambassador to Armenia.
Heffern noted that the U.S. President Obama has recognized and
deplored the "horrific events that took place in the waning days
of the Ottoman Empire." He reminded that Obama has publicly called
"the massacre of 1.5 million Armenians at this time one of the worst
atrocities of the 20th century" and urged Turkey and Armenia to
"work through their painful history to achieve a full, frank, and
just acknowledgement of the facts."
"If confirmed, I will do my best to fulfill the president's vision,"
he added.
Senator Robert Menendez stressed that he finds it "very difficult
to be sending diplomats of the United States to a country in which
they will go to a genocide commemoration, and yet never be able to
use the word genocide."
"This is a difficult, an inartful dance that we do. We have a State
Department whose history full of dispatches cites the atrocities
committed during this period of time, we have a Convention, which we
signed onto as a signatory that clearly defines these acts as genocide,
we have a historical knowledge of the facts, which we accept that
would amount to genocide, but we are unwilling to reference it as
genocide. If we cannot accept the past, we cannot move forward,"
said Menendez. "It is much more than a question of a word, it is
everything that signifies our commitment to saying never again. And
yet we cannot even acknowledge this fact, and we put diplomats in a
position that is totally untanable."
From: Baghdasarian