7. MAGG.2023 : Commemoration of 24 on 108 .anivrrsory

EDITORIAL: Commemorating the Genocide While Another is In Progress
by Editor April 24, 2023

“Stop Genocide” graphic
As we commemorate the 108th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, another genocide of Armenians is in progress as the inhumane and illegal Azerbaijani blockade of Artsakh is in its 134th day.

The threats of more attacks and killings, as well as ultimatums emanating from Baku, especially the Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev, clearly point to a premeditated plan to systematically cleanse all Armenians from Artsakh. This, coupled with Azerbaijan’s breach of Armenia’s sovereign borders in the three provinces of Gegharkunik, Syunik and Aragadzodn, signals that Azerbaijan’s territorial ambitions go beyond the areas in Artsakh it has already occupied since the 2020 war.

The United States and the European Union have taken a keen interest in Armenia and the situation in the region, all advancing an illusive peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan, as well as pushing the normalization of Yerevan’s relations with Ankara, all the while ignoring the brazen violations of the Armenians’ rights by Azerbaijan and encouraged by Turkey.

On the other hand, Russia is advancing its political priorities based on the ultimate goal of conquering Ukraine and fighting the West for regional supremacy.

This disregard for what is happening on the ground to the Armenians is reminiscent of the same ignorance displayed more than a century ago when the leaders of the Young Turk government were planning and executing the Armenian Genocide.

At least back then the international press was intermittently documenting the atrocities of the Ottoman Turks. Today, the same publications, that would ultimately become the chroniclers of the Armenian Genocide, are dispatching reporters to Armenia to cover the influx of Russians to Yerevan after the start of the Ukraine conflict, while completely ignoring the brewing genocide mere miles away, while at the same time highlighting war crimes and human rights violations in Ukraine on a daily basis.

The post-Genocide reality saw Armenians around the world rally for justice and recognition. It took the United States—the self-proclaimed torchbearer for human rights—106 years to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide by using the “g” word, because all the decades before it was not politically expedient to do so for fear of angering Turkey.


Armenians rally in support of the Armenian population of Artsakh, who have been blockaded by Azerbaijan for 132 days
In his statement recognizing the Armenian Genocide in 2021, President Joe Biden said he was recommitting “to preventing such an atrocity from ever again occurring… to ensure that what happened is never repeated.”

Evidently, it only took two short years for the Biden Administration—as well as all other well-meaning nations that recognized the Armenian Genocide in order to prevent the recurrence of such crimes—to abandon its resolve to work toward “a world unstained by the daily evils of bigotry and intolerance, where human rights are respected, and where all people are able to pursue their lives in dignity and security,” as Biden said in 2021.

These same powers who have voiced “concern” over Azerbaijan’s continued aggression against Armenians and have urged Baku to end the blockade—without succinct action—also have forgotten their “shared resolve to prevent future atrocities from occurring anywhere in the world. And let us pursue healing and reconciliation for all the people of the world,” as Biden said in 2021.

These days, other’s human rights seem to be worth more than the rights of the Armenians, whose future and very existence is being threatened. Clearly a case of not taking lessons from history and the blatant forgetting of pledges to usher in a more humane world.

There is no doubt, however, that the resolve that has guided the Armenian people for the past 108 years to fight for justice and its National aspirations will not waver, and we will take the lessons from the past to confront the present-day challenges facing our Nation.

Editor
Editor

Vartanian