ARMENIA MOURNING FOR THE VICTIMS OF 1915 GENOCIDE

Tert.am
24.04.10

April 24 may sound a usual calendar day for any other nation but
not for Armenians. It bears special symbolism – one of irretrievable
losses and unforgettable anguish that still has its living witnesses
to tell their tragic stories in person.

Scores of Armenians – men and women, children and grown-ups,
blue-collared and high-ranking officials – are now heading for
Tsitsernakaberd at this morning hour of the day and despite the
drizzling rain.

Erected on a hilltop in the outskirts of Yerevan, it stands as
a reminder of as many as almost 2 millions of Christian Armenians
massacred and death-marched in the desert of Deir el-Zor in the break
up of the Muslim Ottoman Empire in 1915.

Our correspondent in Tsitsernakaberd says there are already flowers
around the eternally-flamed memorial since early morning: it has become
a tradition for the young wing members of the Armenian Revolutionary
Federation to march with torches to this memorial complex in the
evening of April 23, put flowers there and wait for the dawn.

He also says that the flow of people moving to the memorial is getting
thicker and thicker as more people join in.

Armenians gather in Tsitsernakaberd on this symbolic day of mourning
and sorrow from the capital Yerevan and all the marzes (provinces)
to pay tribute of their fellow Armenians massacred and deported from
their homeland only for being Armenians.

This year the Armenians are commemorating the 95th anniversary of the
Genocide – the greatest man-made atrocity in the early 20th century.

Several governments across the world have so far recognized the
Armenian Genocide while Turkey has avoided doing it. Consecutive
Turkish governments have for decades pursued denialist policies saying
that those massacred were the victims of a wider conflict.

US Congress Committee on Foreign Affairs adopted a resolution
(H.Rep.#252) on March 4 this year that called on President Barack Obama
to call those massacres as genocide. Days later a similar document
was adopted by the Swedish parliament and another one is set to be
brought on parliamentary vote in the Israeli Knesset on April 28.

In an attempt to keep his campaign pledge and at the same time not
to insult Ankara US President Barack Obama used a carefully-chosen
but an improper term – Mets Yeghern (Great Calamity) – in his April 24
commemoration speech last year, in fact breaking his election pledge to
"recognize the Armenian Genocide."

Whether he will do it this time, is anybody’s guess given the recent
developments on Armenia-Turkey normalization process: the ratification
of the Armenia-Turkey Protocols was suspended with an April 22 decision
by Armenia’s President Serzh Sargsyan.

Citing Turkey’s attempts to link the normalization to the progress
in the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement as the main reason for Yerevan’s
decision Sargsyan said in a televised address Armenia did not withdraw
its signature from the Protocols but rather suspended the ratification
and would wait until Turkey ratifies them.

Ankara has already responded to Yerevan’s move with Turkish Foreign
Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan saying
that it is up to Armenia to decide what to do with the ratification
process and that Turkey would ratify the Protocols "unless there are
relevant circumstances" for it.