VISITING RUSSIAN PATRIARCH PAYS HOMAGE TO VICTIMS OF GENOCIDE

Itar-Tass
March 17 2010
Russia

YEREVAN, March 17 (Itar-Tass) – Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia
Kirill, who is on a visit to Armenia, paid homage to 1.5 million
victims of the 1915 genocide of the Armenian people in the Ottoman
Empire.

The Russian patriarch, accompanied by head of the Armenian Apostle
church Catholicos Garegin II, laid wreaths to a memorial built in 1967
to the victims of mass demolition enforced by the authorities of the
Ottoman empire. Then, Patriarch Kirill and the Armenian catholicos
delivered commemoration services in memory of the genocide victims.

Patriarch Kirill went to a museum created near the memorial in 1985.

On display are historical documents, photographs, works of art,
tabloids with the demographic data showing the number of ethnic
Armenians who lived in the Ottoman empire in different periods and
perished as a result of the genocide. A prominent place in the museum
exposition is occupied by a resolution passed by the Russian State
Duma on April 14, 1985 that denounced the organizers of genocide of
the Armenian people and expressed compassion to the people of Armenia.