Gianni Valente - Rome
Global and regional upheavals and re-alignments mirror the
massacre carried out against the Armenians a century ago. Important figures are
expected to attend the mass for faithful of the Armenian Church which Pope
Francis will celebrate in St. Peter’s on 12 April. “Czar” Putin has confirmed
he will be present: on 24 April he will fly to Erevan to attend the official
ceremonies for the centenary of the Armenian genocide. On that day, Iranian
members of parliament, who are also members of the Iran-Armenia friendship
group, will also be present in the Armenian capital. They will fly from Tehran
especially and will also pay an official visit to Tsitsernakaberd, Armenia’s official Genocide memorial. Meanwhile,
the President of Israel, Reuven Rivlin, will attend a commemorative liturgy at
Jerusalem’s Holy Sepulchre for the centenary of what the Armenian’s refer to as
the Metz Yeghérn (The Great Evil).
***
“Czar” Putin has confirmed he will be present: on 24 April
he will fly to Erevan to attend the official ceremonies for the centenary of
the Armenian genocide. On that day, Iranian members of parliament, who are also
members of the Iran-Armenia friendship group, will also be present in the
Armenian capital. They will fly from Tehran especially and will also pay an
official visit to Tsitsernakaberd,
Armenia’s official Genocide memorial. Meanwhile, the President of
Israel, Reuven Rivlin, will attend a commemorative liturgy at Jerusalem’s Holy
Sepulchre for the centenary of what the Armenian’s refer to as the Metz Yeghérn
(The Great Evil).
In the current landscape marked by the many humanitarian
tragedies of a “piecemeal Third World War” (Pope Francis), the centenary of the
Armenian genocide - planned a hundred years ago by the Young Turks – also
becomes a test for the regional and global re-alignments that are underway.
With revealing outcomes.
Armenians have always held that the Ottomans embarked on a
systematic decimation of the Armenian people, exterminating one and a half
million people. Turkey contests the term “Genocide”, claiming that “less” than
500 thousand people – not just Armenians – died at war or of hunger. Last year,
for the first time, in an attempt to win goodwill from the Armenian community,
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, extending Turkey’s condolences to descendants
of Armenians who lost their lives “in the context of the 20th century,” But as
the official commemoration of the centenary of the genocide drew near, fair
play evaporated. Last week Erdogan accused Armenia and the Armenian diaspora of
putting pressure on States and international bodies to recognise the Armenian
Genocide, with the aim of discrediting Turkey. “Like in every era in the
history,” the Turkish leader said at pains and tragedies were experienced
during the years of the Great War. Armenians were not the only people affected
by them,” Turkey’s president said at an exhibition on World War I in the
Ottoman Archive Facility, in Istanbul. Erdogan even dared Armenians to pull out
any documents they had that could prove the Genocide. Before this, in an act
Armenians saw as provocative, the Turkish president invited 100 world leaders –
including Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian – to Ankara to attend the 24 April
celebrations for the commemoration of the so-called battle of Gallipoli. The
battle resulted in the resounding defeat of the allied forces at the hands of
the Ottoman Empire in 1915.
We shall have to wait and see which world political leaders
will accept Erdogan’s invitation. However, some important voices – and silences
– already feature in the list of recently pronounced messages on the centenary
of the Armenian Genocide.
The Armenian Genocide has been officially recognised more or
less explicitly by the parliamentary assemblies of 22 nations, including
Russia, France, Italy, Germany, Canada and Argentina. Elsewhere, it has only
received recognition from local administrations or regional legislative
assemblies. Many other countries such as the US and Israel still refrain from
using the term Genocide.
Barack Obama, who was in favour of recognising the Genocide
before he was elected President of the US, has avoided using the term since he came
to power. Democratic and Republican lawmakers
in the House of Representatives presented a resolution for the
recognition of the Genocide to Congress in recent weeks. Similarly, in its
annual human rights report approved on 12 March, the European Parliament called
on EU member states to recognise the Armenian Genocide. The Turkish government
immediately criticised this move as “problematic” and harmful to Turkey’s
relations with Armenia and the European Union.
The most striking developments surrounding the
political-diplomatic dispute over the Armenian Genocide, were seen above all in
the Middle Eastern context, in a region devastated by armed conflict and
sectarian violence. Here, the planned massacres carried out one hundred years
ago mirror the bitter suffering of millions of people today. In the Islamic
Repubòic of Iran, the centenary of the Armenian Genocide will be at the centre
of a series of commemorative events that will involve the Islamic Consultive
Assembly (Italian parliament).
In April, the two Armenian members of Parliament will
present a motion before the entire Assembly, condemning the Armenian Genocide.
This is after 100 letters were sent out to their colleagues, to raise awareness
about the subject and encourage them to publicly issue a shared condemnation of
the systematic massacres carried out by the Young Turks in Anatolia a century
ago. Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, in public statements issued last 21 January, the
Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal invoked Turkey “which considers the Armenian
genocide as purely a figment of the imagination,” adding that “this huge denial
has gone on too long”. Meanwhile, in his official addresses (including the one
at the UN conference on 29 January) the President of Israel Reuven Rivlin – who
announced he would be attending the commemorative liturgy scheduled for 24 May
in the Holy Sepulchre – has referred to the Armenian Genocide on a number of
occasions. The Genocide is not officially recognised by Israel yet.
Last May, the Israeli Parliament discussed the issue during
a plenary session, at the instigation of left-wing party Meretz. On 4 March, in
Damascus, the Syrian People’s Assembly dedicated a session to the commemoration
of the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. The initiative, which was
promoted first and foremost by Cristiana Maria Saadeh, a Syrian member of
parliament, involved members of the parliamentary committees on foreign
affairs. On that occasion no accusations were made against Erdogan’s Turkey,
which media and government bodies presented as a preparation area for the
military operations carried out in the country by jihadist militia of the
Al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State. Meanwhile, the Armenian ambassador to
Syria, Arshak Poladyan, recalled that a hundred years ago Armenians who fled
the planned massacres in Anatolia, found refuge in Aleppo and other Syrian
cities. In light also of the jihadist violence against Christians in Syria and
Iraq, on 24 March the Armenian parliament voted unanimously in favour of a
resolution that condemned the massacre of Assyrians and Greeks in the Ottoman
Empire between 1915 and 1923. Less than two years ago a request for a similar
resolution was rejected by members of parliament from Yerevan.
In the context of the church, the commemoration of the 100th
anniversary of the “Great Evil” will culminate in the liturgy for the
canonization of victims of the Armenian Genocide scheduled for 23 April in
Yerevan at the Patriarchal see of the Catholicosate of Etchmiadzin headed by
Patriarch Karekin II. 38 Churches, ecclesial communities and ecumenical bodies
have confirmed that a delegation will be present at the canonization rite. That
same day, at 19:15 – which is symbolic of the year 1915 – all Armenian churches
around the world – except those on Turkish territory – will ring their bells
100 times to commemorate the centenary of the Genocide.
On 12 April, all
Armenian communities will ideally be present in St. Peter’s Basilica, in Rome,
where Pope Francis will celebrate a mass for faithful of the Armenian rite to
commemorate the Genocide. The liturgy will be presided over by Pope Francis on
Divine Mercy Sunday, with the participation of Armenian Catholic patriarch
Nerses Bedros XIX along with Armenian Catholic bishops. Armenian sources told
Vatican Insider that unless there are any last minute changes, the two highest
representatives of the Armenian Apostolic Church will also be present:
Patriarch Karekin II and Catholicos Aram I who heads the Catholicosate of the
Great House of Cilicia based in Antelias, Lebanon.
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