Opinion: Today is Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day – By Holly Richardson (Deseret News) / April 24, 2023
This year is only the 3rd time that the United States has recognized the Armenian genocide, when 1.5 million Armenians were killed
“Turkey is taking advantage of the war in order to thoroughly liquidate its internal foes, i.e., the indigenous Christians, without being thereby disturbed by foreign intervention. What on earth do you want? The question is settled. There are no more Armenians.” — Talat Pasha, in a conversation with Dr. Mordtmann of the German Embassy in June 1915.
On April 24, 1915, the authorities of the Ottoman Empire (modern-day Turkey), began rounding up and killing Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople. From there, the systematic attempt at eradicating all ethnic Armenians spread across the country and included mass executions and forced starvation of 1.5 million Armenians, out of 1.8 million who were living in the area at the time. The remaining 300,000 or so fled or were deported, resulting in one of the “greatest diasporas in the 20th century,” as penned by the University of Minnesota College of Liberal Arts.
Some 80 years later, one of the great-great-grandchildren of the diaspora joined our family via Russian adoption. Our daughter’s DNA profile shows her to be nearly 50% Armenian and Turkish.
As with all genocides, the victims were dehumanized and stripped of basic human rights before the killings began. Laws were passed allowing the new Turkish government to deport anyone they “sensed” was a security threat. Another one allowed the confiscation of “abandoned” Armenian property and another required Armenians to turn in their weapons, including former members of the military who were then worked to death in labor camps.
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