JOE BIDEN: GENOCIDE PREVENTION SHOULD BE ‘NATIONAL SECURITY PRIORITY’

PanArmenian News
April 23 2009
Armenia

The United States needs to see genocide prevention "not just as
a moral imperative," but also as a "national security priority,"
said the vice president of U.S. In a speech at the U.S. Holocaust
Memorial Museum’s National Tribute Dinner in Washington, Joe Biden
added that he and President Obama believe that "preventing genocide
is not only a representation of who we are as a people but also a
very high national priority."

Responding to genocide is not required in a moral context, but also
"strategically necessary," he said. "When genocide goes unchecked
America’s credibility and leadership is tarnished."

Biden said that the U.S. has been slow to act in the past against
genocide because the issue has been presented as a choice between
doing nothing and making a major military commitment.

"President Obama and I reject that as a false choice," said the vice
president, adding that "military might is something that is an option
— sometimes the only option" but that there are a "wide range of
effective strategies."

"We have to reclaim the words ‘Never again,’" he said. Too often, he
said, those words have been used as a "true lament" or "expression
of shame over responses that were insufficient." But "never again"
should be "assertive," he said, JTA reports.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress