EP’s Armenian genocide resolution a message to Turkey to come to terms with its past - Nalbandyan
16.04.2015,
10:43
The resolution of the European Parliament contains a message to Turkey to come to terms with its past, to recognize the genocide and thus pave the way for real reconciliation between the Turkish and the Armenian peoples, says the statement by Armenia’s foreign minister Edward Nalbandyan.
YEREVAN, April 16. /ARKA/. The resolution of the European Parliament contains a message to Turkey to come to terms with its past, to recognize the genocide and thus pave the way for real reconciliation between the Turkish and the Armenian peoples, says the statement by Armenia’s foreign minister Edward Nalbandyan.
On Wednesday, the European Parliament passed unanimously a resolution declaring April 24 as the Day of Remembrance of the Armenian Genocide across the European Union.
The resolution calls on all member states of the European Union to adopt documents recognizing and condemning the Armenian genocide. Actually all speakers defended the adoption of the resolution noting its importance ahead of the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.
Armenia welcomes the adoption of the resolution, the minister said.
“The European Parliament underlines that yet in its resolution of 1987 it recognized that what took place against the Armenians in 1915-1917 in the Ottoman Empire represents a genocide as defined by the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, and strongly deplores any attempts of its denial,”, the foreign minister said, as cited by the press office.
Nalbandyan stressed that by the adoption of this resolution the European Parliament once again reaffirmed its dedication to the protection of human rights and universal values.
The European Parliament officially recognized the Armenian Genocide in Ottoman Turkey back in 1987. By another resolution of March 13, 2015, the EP members called on the EU member states to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide.
The Armenian genocide was the first genocide committed in XX century. Turkey rejects the accusation of massacres and the killing of one and a half million Armenians during World War I. The fact of the Armenian genocide is recognized by many countries, particularly by Uruguay, Russia, France, Lithuania, most of the U.S. states, as well as by the parliaments of Greece, Cyprus, Argentina, Belgium, Wales, National Council of Switzerland, Common House of Canada, the Seym of Poland and lower house of Italian parliament. –0--
