DIASPORAN ARMENIAN PRESS AGAIN REFERES TO CONTRIBUTION OF RAPHAEL LEMKIN IN CONDEMNATION OF ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

Noyan Tapan

Ju ne 3, 2008

LOS ANGELES, JUNE 3, ARMENIANS TODAY – NOYAN TAPAN. The Diasporan
Armenian press has often refers to the book of Raphael Lemkin on the
Armenian Genocide, mentioning that the book constitutes an important
contribution for scholars, human rights activists and others seeking to
know what the originator of the term genocide and the "father" of the
Genocide Convention had to say about the Armenian Genocide. Periodicals
remind that Raphael Lemkin was one of the greatest and most influential
lawyers and human rights activists in the last century. Not only did
he coin the word "genocide", but was also the prime mover for the
enactment of the United Nations Convention for the Prevention and
Punishment of Genocide (the "Genocide Convention"), the international
law document that in 1948 made genocide an international "crime
of crimes."

Distressed by the cyclical slaughter of Armenians by Turks, Lemkin
compiled a dossier and searched for legal remedies to punish
perpetrators of mass murder and to deter and prevent future genocides.