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Beirut: Armenian-Lebanese Protest Outside Turkish Embassy

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  • Beirut: Armenian-Lebanese Protest Outside Turkish Embassy

    ARMENIAN-LEBANESE PROTEST OUTSIDE TURKISH EMBASSY
    By Van Meguerditchian

    The Daily Star
    http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Local-News/2012/Apr-24/171232-armenian-lebanese-protest-outside-turkish-embassy.ashx#axzz1szMVGWJD
    April 24 2012
    Lebanon

    BEIRUT: Thousands of Armenian-Lebanese gathered outside the Turkish
    Embassy in Rabieh, Metn, burning Turkish flags and calling on Ankara
    to recognize the genocide of 1915-1916.

    Officials at the Interior Ministry estimated that between 20,000
    and 25,000 people took part in the rally, which began following a
    rememberance Mass at the Armenian Orthodox Catholicosate in Antelias,
    Metn, and proceeded to the Turkish Embassy in nearby Rabiyeh to mark
    the 97th anniversary of the genocide.

    The huge protest prompted the Turkish Embassy to request a change of
    security arrangements in the vicinity of the mission.

    Angry crowds were separated from the embassy by two rows of barbed
    wire fences and hundreds of riot police. No incidents occured during
    the two and a half hour rally which ended at 2:30 p.m.

    They chanted anti-Turkish slogans and set at least six Turkish flags
    on fire.

    Organizers managed to keep the situation under control and called
    for restraint.

    Traffic from Antelias to Rabiyeh came to a standstill as a result
    of the protest, which saw the participation of the country's main
    Armenian-Lebanese political parties: the Tashnag, Henchag and Ramgavar.

    Armenians say up to 1.5 million of their forebears were killed by
    the Ottoman Empire during World War I in what amounted to a genocide.

    Turkey disputes the figure, arguing that up to 500,000 Armenians died
    during a war which claimed many victims, and that the Armenians were
    not the victims of genocide.

    Meanwhile, the head of the Central Maronite Council, former Minister
    Wadih Khazen, issued a statement commemorating the Armenian victims
    of the genocide at the hands of the Ottoman Empire, comparing their
    suffering to that which Lebanon has endured in its historical quest
    for freedom.

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