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Arutz Sheva, Israel
April 12 2015
Turkish Anger at Pope for Calling Armenian Massacres 'Genocide'
Ankara summons Vatican ambassador after Pope Francis compares massacre
of Armenians by Ottoman Turkey to Holocaust, Stalinism.
By Ari Soffer
Turkey has reacted angrily to a declaration by Pope Francis in which
he labeled the mass-murder of more than one million Armenians by
Ottoman Turkey a "genocide".
The Turkish foreign ministry summoned the Vatican's ambassador to
Ankara to express its "disappointment" Sunday, saying the Pope's
speech had caused "a problem of trust" between the two states,
according to the BBC.
Turkey's embassy to the Vatican had already canceled a press
conference scheduled for today in response to the comments.
In his comments, the Pope had named the Armenian genocide, the
Holocaust and Stalinism as the three greatest human tragedies to occur
during the last century.
"In the past century, our human family has lived through three massive
and unprecedented tragedies," Francis stated, at the beginning of a
Mass in the Armenian Catholic rite held at the Vatican.
"The first, which is widely considered 'the first genocide of the 20th
century', struck your own Armenian people," he said, in comments he
would have been aware would not go down well in Turkey, where
authorities deny the scale of the massacre which took place between
1915-1917.
But the Pope called categorically for an end to such denial.
"Concealing or denying evil is like allowing a wound to keep bleeding
without bandaging it," he said.
Only 22 countries recognize the systemic murder of Armenians as
"genocide" (Israel and the US are not among them), but Armenia marks
the genocide every year on April 24.
Between 1-1.5 million Armenians were killed by Turkish forces in a
series of massacres, ultimately leading to the genocide of over
one-third of the Armenian population.
The carnage began after Turkish authorities ordered the executions of
much of the Armenian elite in Istanbul on April 24, 1915.
Men, women, and children were later murdered by various means,
including through forced marches, starvation, and poison.
The Ottoman government set up some 25 concentration camps as well
throughout the period, and mass graves of up to 60,000 people were
found in some locations.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/193934#.VSrLrZscSP8
April 12 2015
Turkish Anger at Pope for Calling Armenian Massacres 'Genocide'
Ankara summons Vatican ambassador after Pope Francis compares massacre
of Armenians by Ottoman Turkey to Holocaust, Stalinism.
By Ari Soffer
Turkey has reacted angrily to a declaration by Pope Francis in which
he labeled the mass-murder of more than one million Armenians by
Ottoman Turkey a "genocide".
The Turkish foreign ministry summoned the Vatican's ambassador to
Ankara to express its "disappointment" Sunday, saying the Pope's
speech had caused "a problem of trust" between the two states,
according to the BBC.
Turkey's embassy to the Vatican had already canceled a press
conference scheduled for today in response to the comments.
In his comments, the Pope had named the Armenian genocide, the
Holocaust and Stalinism as the three greatest human tragedies to occur
during the last century.
"In the past century, our human family has lived through three massive
and unprecedented tragedies," Francis stated, at the beginning of a
Mass in the Armenian Catholic rite held at the Vatican.
"The first, which is widely considered 'the first genocide of the 20th
century', struck your own Armenian people," he said, in comments he
would have been aware would not go down well in Turkey, where
authorities deny the scale of the massacre which took place between
1915-1917.
But the Pope called categorically for an end to such denial.
"Concealing or denying evil is like allowing a wound to keep bleeding
without bandaging it," he said.
Only 22 countries recognize the systemic murder of Armenians as
"genocide" (Israel and the US are not among them), but Armenia marks
the genocide every year on April 24.
Between 1-1.5 million Armenians were killed by Turkish forces in a
series of massacres, ultimately leading to the genocide of over
one-third of the Armenian population.
The carnage began after Turkish authorities ordered the executions of
much of the Armenian elite in Istanbul on April 24, 1915.
Men, women, and children were later murdered by various means,
including through forced marches, starvation, and poison.
The Ottoman government set up some 25 concentration camps as well
throughout the period, and mass graves of up to 60,000 people were
found in some locations.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/193934#.VSrLrZscSP8