Los Angeles Daily News
June 8 2005

House panel will debate genocide

By Lisa Friedman
Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON – Rep. Adam Schiff, D- Pasadena, announced late Wednesday
that the House International Relations Committee has agreed to take
up the contentious debate over whether Congress should officially
call the massacre of Armenians during World War I a “genocide.”
Schiff, who has written a resolution supporting recognition of the
genocide, said he secured an agreement from committee Chairman Henry
Hyde to hear the matter. Hyde promised that the committee would
debate and vote on his resolution “in a timely fashion,” Schiff said.

In exchange, Schiff said he agreed to withdraw two amendments to a
foreign policy bill under debate. One of them would have asked for an
accounting of U.S. responses to Armenian, Cambodian and Rwandan
genocides as well as the Holocaust; the other would have condemned
Turkey’s blockade of Armenia.

The deal came as Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan met in
Washington with President George W. Bush, where both declared a
strong alliance.

Schiff said he believed he was able to strike the deal because House
Republican leaders who have opposed the genocide resolution fearing
it could endanger U.S./Turkish relations, “weren’t sure that they
could defeat my amendments and they were also concerned about the
timing of the amendments during the prime minister’s visit.”

Attempts to reach both Armenian and Turkish officials for comment
late Wednesday were unsuccessful.

Armenian-Americans say 1.5 million Armenians were killed in a
genocide perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1923.
Turkish officials say far fewer people died amid a multiparty
conflict.

The last time the International Relations Committee held a hearing on
the issue was in 2000 as a political favor to then-Rep. James Rogan,
who was facing a tough re-election battle against Schiff.

Officials estimate there are more than 300,000 Armenian-Americans in
Southern California, about a third of them in the Glendale area.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress