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THOUSANDS MARK GENOCIDE ANNIVERSARY IN ARMENIA
Agence France Presse
April 24, 2013 Wednesday 10:08 AM GMT
Thousands flocked on Wednesday to a hilltop memorial above Yerevan to
mark the 98th anniversary of the mass killings of Armenians in the
Ottoman Empire during World War I which Armenia wants recognised
internationally as a genocide.
In the annual ceremony broadcast by all national television channels,
huge crowds headed to the memorial that commemorates the massacres
to lay flowers at the eternal flame.
"Today we bow to the memory of innocent victims," President Serzh
Sarkisian said in a statement.
He attacked modern-day Turkey for refusing to accept that the killings
were genocide -- a term strongly rejected by Ankara.
"It is our duty to realise and to bring the attention of the
international community to the fact that denial of the genocide
constitutes direct continuation of that very crime," said Sarkisian.
On Tuesday night, activists of the nationalist Dashnaktsutyun party's
youth wing burned Turkish flags and led a 10,000-strong torch-lit
procession in Yerevan.
"Each torch symbolises our eternal fight. The blood of innocent
victims will never be forgotten," one of the march participants,
23-year-old Ashot Kazarian, told AFP.
Using both diplomatic levers and its influential diaspora abroad,
Armenia has long sought to win the massacre's international recognition
as genocide.
Last year, a diplomatic row erupted between Ankara and Paris when
France's then-president Nicolas Sarkozy initiated a law criminalising
denial of the mass killings as genocide.
France's top court later struck down the law 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 sided with invading Russian troops.
Over 20 countries have so far recognised the massacres as genocide.
mkh-im/sjw
Agence France Presse
April 24, 2013 Wednesday 10:08 AM GMT
Thousands flocked on Wednesday to a hilltop memorial above Yerevan to
mark the 98th anniversary of the mass killings of Armenians in the
Ottoman Empire during World War I which Armenia wants recognised
internationally as a genocide.
In the annual ceremony broadcast by all national television channels,
huge crowds headed to the memorial that commemorates the massacres
to lay flowers at the eternal flame.
"Today we bow to the memory of innocent victims," President Serzh
Sarkisian said in a statement.
He attacked modern-day Turkey for refusing to accept that the killings
were genocide -- a term strongly rejected by Ankara.
"It is our duty to realise and to bring the attention of the
international community to the fact that denial of the genocide
constitutes direct continuation of that very crime," said Sarkisian.
On Tuesday night, activists of the nationalist Dashnaktsutyun party's
youth wing burned Turkish flags and led a 10,000-strong torch-lit
procession in Yerevan.
"Each torch symbolises our eternal fight. The blood of innocent
victims will never be forgotten," one of the march participants,
23-year-old Ashot Kazarian, told AFP.
Using both diplomatic levers and its influential diaspora abroad,
Armenia has long sought to win the massacre's international recognition
as genocide.
Last year, a diplomatic row erupted between Ankara and Paris when
France's then-president Nicolas Sarkozy initiated a law criminalising
denial of the mass killings as genocide.
France's top court later struck down the law 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 sided with invading Russian troops.
Over 20 countries have so far recognised the massacres as genocide.
mkh-im/sjw