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THOUSANDS OF ARMENIANS MARK GENOCIDE ANNIVERSARY
Agence France Presse
April 24, 2012 Tuesday 9:41 AM GMT
Thousands of Armenians staged a procession to a hilltop memorial above
the capital on Tuesday to mark the 97th anniversary of the genocide
of their kin by Ottoman Turks during World War I.
>From early morning, crowds of people joined the annual procession,
carrying candles and flowers to lay at the eternal flame at the centre
of the monument commemorating the mass killings.
"Today we, just as many, many others all over the world, bow to the
memory of the innocent victims of the Armenian genocide," President
Serzh Sarkisian, who led top officials laying wreaths at the monument,
said in a statement.
"This day is one of those moments when the entire nation rallies
around the unification of our homeland," he said.
Among the mourners was 75-year-old Tsovinar Tumasian, who said that
her father had fought to save women and children from Turkish attacks.
She urged other countries to pressure Turkey to accept that the
killings were genocide.
"If they are not forced to do so, they will not recognise the genocide
as fact. They think that with time, everyone will forget about it,"
Tumasian told AFP as her relatives helped her make her way up the
hill towards the monument.
The procession was broadcast throughout the day on all Armenia's
national television channels, accompanied by sombre music, documentary
footage about the massacres and eyewitness accounts from survivors.
The night before the commemoration, more than 8,000 people led by the
youth wing of the nationalist Dashnaktsutyun party held a torch-lit
march through central Yerevan, where a group of activists staged
their now-traditional burning of a Turkish flag.
"Our action is a protest, a cry of indignation," one of the marchers,
student Hamayak Serobian, told AFP, demanding that Turks accept
"the brutality of their ancestors".
Turkey strongly denies the genocide allegations and the annual
commemoration comes after the dispute between the neighbours was
reignited by an attempt by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to bring
in a law criminalising denial of the mass killings as genocide.
After a diplomatic row with Turkey erupted, France's top court struck
down the law in February on the grounds that it infringed freedom
of expression.
Armenians say up to 1.5 million people were killed during World War I
as the Ottoman Empire was falling apart, a claim supported by several
other countries.
Turkey argues 300,000 to 500,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks
died in civil strife when Armenians rose up against their Ottoman
rulers and sided with invading Russian troops.
Agence France Presse
April 24, 2012 Tuesday 9:41 AM GMT
Thousands of Armenians staged a procession to a hilltop memorial above
the capital on Tuesday to mark the 97th anniversary of the genocide
of their kin by Ottoman Turks during World War I.
>From early morning, crowds of people joined the annual procession,
carrying candles and flowers to lay at the eternal flame at the centre
of the monument commemorating the mass killings.
"Today we, just as many, many others all over the world, bow to the
memory of the innocent victims of the Armenian genocide," President
Serzh Sarkisian, who led top officials laying wreaths at the monument,
said in a statement.
"This day is one of those moments when the entire nation rallies
around the unification of our homeland," he said.
Among the mourners was 75-year-old Tsovinar Tumasian, who said that
her father had fought to save women and children from Turkish attacks.
She urged other countries to pressure Turkey to accept that the
killings were genocide.
"If they are not forced to do so, they will not recognise the genocide
as fact. They think that with time, everyone will forget about it,"
Tumasian told AFP as her relatives helped her make her way up the
hill towards the monument.
The procession was broadcast throughout the day on all Armenia's
national television channels, accompanied by sombre music, documentary
footage about the massacres and eyewitness accounts from survivors.
The night before the commemoration, more than 8,000 people led by the
youth wing of the nationalist Dashnaktsutyun party held a torch-lit
march through central Yerevan, where a group of activists staged
their now-traditional burning of a Turkish flag.
"Our action is a protest, a cry of indignation," one of the marchers,
student Hamayak Serobian, told AFP, demanding that Turks accept
"the brutality of their ancestors".
Turkey strongly denies the genocide allegations and the annual
commemoration comes after the dispute between the neighbours was
reignited by an attempt by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to bring
in a law criminalising denial of the mass killings as genocide.
After a diplomatic row with Turkey erupted, France's top court struck
down the law in February on the grounds that it infringed freedom
of expression.
Armenians say up to 1.5 million people were killed during World War I
as the Ottoman Empire was falling apart, a claim supported by several
other countries.
Turkey argues 300,000 to 500,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks
died in civil strife when Armenians rose up against their Ottoman
rulers and sided with invading Russian troops.