The Socialist Party (PS) group of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives Wednesday filed a motion for a resolution to recognize the Armenian Genocide, Belgian La Libre reports.
With this resolution the “Socialist Party and all its MPs give a clear signal of their position on the Armenian Genocide,” while advocating rapprochement between the Turkish and Armenian peoples.
In this proposal, the Parliament “considers that the tragic events between 1915 and 1917, for which the government of the Ottoman Empire is responsible, should be classified as genocide.”
The recognition by the Parliament does not, however, entail legal consequences, notes the PS group.
The Chamber is not intended to replace court to rule on the legal characterization of those events. “It poses a solemn political act of recognizing that due to their nature and their specificity, the massacres of which the Armenians were victims fit the definition of genocide contained as defined in the 1948 Convention,” the resolution reads. It also encourages national and international courts to rule on the subject.
The authors of the resolution file their initiative in “a spirit of support and friendship for Turks and Armenians.”
They also highlight the efforts made within Turkish civil society on this issue.
The resolution has been signed by signed by MP of Turkish descent Özlem Özen, as well as Stéphane Crusnière, Philippe Blanchart and Gwen Grovonius.