The New Anatolian, Turkey
June 30 2006
Incoming US ambassador to Yerevan doesn’t use word ‘genocide’
TNA with AP / Washington
U.S. senators failed to persuade the nominee for U.S. ambassador to
Yerevan to use word ‘genocide’ while describing events of 1915 at his
confirmation hearings Wednesday in the Senate.
"I have not received any kind of written instruction about this,"
Ambassador-designate Richard E. Hoagland said. "I simply have studied
the president’s policy. I’ve studied the background papers on the
policy. And my responsibility is to support the president."
While declining to say the word "genocide," Hoagland, who is
currently the ambassador to Tajikistan, said, "I fully agree that the
events that occurred in 1915 and following were of historic
proportions, as I said, well-documented, horrific, horrifying."
He quoted Maryland democrat Senator Paul Sarbanes, who read a
statement about the situation, that "hundreds of valleys (were)
devastated, no family untouched. It was historic. It was a tragedy
and everyone fully agrees with that, sir."
U.S. President George W. Bush, in a presidential message on the 91st
anniversary of April 24, called the events "a terrible chapter of
history" that "remains a source of pain for people in Armenia and for
all those who believe in freedom, tolerance and the dignity and value
of every human life."
Bush is ordering home their current ambassador in Yerevan, John
Evans, two years into the normally three-year diplomatic term. In
announcing his recall last month, the White House gave no reason and
praised Evans for his service. Last Sunday was his second anniversary
in the Armenian capital. In February 2005 Evans told
Armenian-Americans, "The Armenian genocide was the first genocide of
the 20th century."
Sixty members of the House of Representatives sent a letter to
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice protesting that Evans was being
punished for his reference to "genocide." In a separate letter,
Democratic Senators Edward Kennedy and John Kerry of Massachusetts
demanded an explanation from Rice for Evans’ recall.
The events occurred during the expulsion of ethnic Armenians from
eastern Turkey into Syria in 1915 and 1916. Turkish officials have
traditionally maintained that 300,000 people died. Armenian
terrorists, mainly members of the Armenian Secret Army for the
Liberation of Armenia (ASALA), roamed through Europe and the U.S. in
the 1970s and 1980s and claimed more than 60 attacks against Turkish
targets. The army claimed the campaign killed 30 Turkish diplomats
and dependents.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress