Canadian lawmakers remember 'Armenian genocide'

April 24, 2007
Agence France Presse

OTTAWA, April 24 2007

Canadian parliamentarians stood in silence for one minute Tuesday to recognize the "Armenian genocide" during World War I, a sensitive issue that hurt Canadian relations with Turkey last year.

A spokeswoman for Speaker of the House Peter Milliken told AFP the Conservative government's House leader and his counterparts from all three opposition parties agreed to the official commemoration.

Turkey said in April 2006 it was "appalled" by Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's reference to the bloodbath as the first genocide of the 20th century, and temporarily recalled its ambassador to Ottawa in protest.

Ankara said then Harper's comments gave support to Armenia's "unfounded allegations of genocide" and that his position on the issue would "negatively affect ties between Turkey and Canada."

Armenians say up to 1.5 million of their kinsmen were slaughtered in an orchestrated genocide in the final years of the Ottoman Empire.

Turkey categorically rejects claims of genocide, arguing that 300,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks died in civil strife when Armenians began fighting for independence in eastern Anatolia and sided with Russian troops invading the crumbling Ottoman Empire.