Pope Francis says he decided to use the word āgenocideā in his speech at the Armenian presidential Palace, because āit would have sounded strange not to say at least the same thing I said last year.ā
Asked Sunday en route home from Armenia why he decided to add āgenocideā into his prepared remarks, Francis said it was simply the term that he had always used in Argentina, where he was close to the Armenian community.
āIn Argentina, when you spoke of the Armenian extermination, they always used the word āgenocide.ā I didnāt know another. At the cathedral in Buenos Aires, we put a stone cross in the third altar on the left, remembering the Armenian genocide. The archbishop came, two Armenian archbishops, the Catholic and the Apostolic, they inaugurated itā¦ also the Apostolic Archbishop in the Catholic Church of St. Bartholomew made an altar in memory of St. Bartholomewā¦ but alwaysā¦ I didnāt know. I another word come from this word. When I arrived in Rome, I heard another word: āThe Great Evilā or the āterrible tragedy,ā but in Armenian, I donāt know how to say itā¦ and they tell me that no, that that is offensive, that of āgenocide,ā and that you must say this. Iāve always spoke of three genocides in the last centuryā¦ always three! The first was the Armenian, then that of Hitler, and the last is that of Stalinā¦ there are small ones, there is another in Africa, but as in the orbit of the two great wars there are these threeā¦ Iāve asked whyā¦ ābut some feel like itās not true, that there wasnāt a genocideā… another said to meā¦ a lawyer told me this that really interested me: the word āgenocideā is a technical word, itās a word that is not a synonym of āextermination.ā You can say extermination, but declaring a āgenocideā brings with it actions of reparationā¦ this is what the lawyer said to me,ā PopeĀ told reporters.
āLast year, when I was preparing the speech, I saw that St John Paul II had used the word, that he used both: Great Evil and genocide. And I cited that one in quotation marksā¦ and it wasnāt received well. A statement was made by the Turkish government. Turkey, in a few days called its ambassador to Ankara, who is a great man, Turkey sent us a top ambassador, who returned three months ago… But, Turkey has the right… The right to protest, we all have it,ā the Pope said.
Speaking of his use of the word āgenocide on the first day of his visit to Armenia, the Pope said: āIn this speech at the start there wasnāt a word, that is true. I respond because I added it. But after having heard the tone of the speech of the president and also with my past with this word, and having said this word last year in St. Peterās publicly, it would have sounded strange not to say at least the same thing. But there, I wanted to underscore something else, and I donāt think I err that I also said: in this genocide, as in the other two, the great international powers looked in the other direction. And this was the thing. In the Second World War some powers, which had photographed the train lines that led to Auschwitz had the possibility to bomb and didnāt do it. An example. In the context of the First War, where was the problem of the Armenians? And in the context of the Second War where was the problem of Hitler and Stalin and after Yalta of the areaā¦ and all that no one speaks about. One has to underscore this. And make the historical question: why didnāt you do this, you powers?ā
āI donāt accuse, I ask a question. Itās curious. They looked at the war, at so many thingsā¦ but not the peopleā¦ and I donāt know if itās true, but I would like to know if itās true that when Hitler persecuted the Jews, one of the words, of the thing that he may have said was āWell, who remembers today the Armenians, letās do the same with the Jews.ā I donāt know if itās true, maybe itās hearsay, but Iāve heard this said. Historians, search and see if itās true. I think I answered. But I never said this word with an offensive intention, if not objectively,ā the Pope said.