RA PRESIDENT: WE BECAME VICTIMS OF FIRST WORLD WAR THOUGH WE WERE NOT
INITIATORS OF THAT WAR

Pan Armenian News
20.04.2005 03:46

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ We pay tribute to the memory of vanished victims as
we commemorate the 90-th anniversary of the tragic events. We do it
with double pain, since we are still bound to continue the struggle
for the international recognition of the committed crime”, Armenian
President Robert Kocharian stated today at the opening ceremony of
the Ultimate Crime, Ultimate Challenge. Human Rights and Genocide
International Conference. The statement of the Armenian leader says,
“The First World War aimed at global re-distribution of the world and
the big ideological controversy of the 20-th century that followed
became the major obstacles to recognition of the legitimate rights
of the Armenian people. We became victims of the First World War even
though we were not the initiators of that war. And our right for the
memory was sacrificed to the Cold War even though we were not its
masterminds. When the planned policy of extermination of the Armenian
nation was executed the term “genocide” did not exist. Now was it
defined. There were no international structures that could serve as a
floor for the discussions to give a united response to that crime of
genocide. Obviously the world is changing. It took time for the world
to treat genocides as crimes against humanity with all the relevant
consequences. It took time to prevent the practice of sacrificing
fundamental humanitarian values to the geopolitical interests of
great powers and to include the moral considerations into foreign
policy making of the civilized world. The avenue of that change was
tragic for many peoples. For the Armenian people the price of that
change equals one and a half million of human lives.”