eitb.com
April 24 2010
First Turks to commemorate Armenian genocide
Staff – 04/24/2010 | Istanbul |
Human rights activists, Turkish writers and artists have publicly
remembered the Armenian genocide for the first time. This is a
breakthrough in the eternal conflict between the two countries.
Zoom inThe Department of the Istanbul Human Rights Association (IHD)
has organized a memorial for the raid on 220 members of the Armenian
intellectual elite on April 24th, 1915, the beginning of the massacres
that lasted more than two years.
They gathered at the Haydarpasa station in Istanbul, the place where
the first deportations took place. Accompanied by police and media the
protesters showed photographs of prisoners under the slogan "Never
Again".
At 18:00 ‘o clock a second demonstration is planned in the heart of
the European part of Istanbul.
Also in the Armenian capital Yerevan, thousands of people came on the
streets to remember the massacre. According to Armenia more than 1.5
million people died during the genocide, Turkey states half a million.
Officially Ankara still denies there was a genocide. They say the last
years of the Ottoman Empire caused a lot of chaos in the
Caucasus-region, and that they’re not the only ones to blame.
st-turks-commemorate-armenian-genocide/