Remembering the Armenian Genocide: statement by Jack Layton

Tue 24 Apr 2007
National Democratic Party of Canada

As we commemorate the Armenian Genocide, it is time to pay tribute to the long overdue recognition of this tragic episode not only in Armenian, but indeed human history.

Over 1.5 million Armenians were murdered in the Armenian Genocide of 1915-1923. Barbaric acts took place during this period. Murders and arrests took place in Constantinople, there were massive deportations of the civilian population, rapes, abductions, and forced religious conversions.

This tragic human episode is too frequently eclipsed by the First World War in Western Europe, but it needs its proper place in the memory of human experience. Perhaps had we taken note at the time of the suffering occurring in Armenia; perhaps if we’d had access at the time to a label powerful enough to command the moral distress of the international community, we would have done more to develop the emerging architecture of the international community to prevent such horrors in the future. But in the wake of the Great War, the suffering of Armenians was lost, and their experience wasn’t given a name.

Today, we are well aware of the consequences: Armenia was not the last genocide of the 20th Century, but the first.

We must always remember the Armenian people. We must acknowledge this genocide; and we must never forget it.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.