[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 54 (Wednesday, April 24, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H3788-H3789]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          REMEMBER THE MARTYRS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Torkildsen] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. TORKILDSEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise with my colleagues, the gentleman 
from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone], the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. 
Porter], and many others to remember the Armenian genocide.
  Last week Members of Congress, the Nation and the world observed Yom 
HaShoah to honor and remember the millions of Jews who perished in the 
Holocaust. Sadly, one tragic truth about the Holocaust is that it 
occurred 20 years after the Armenian genocide, which took the lives of 
over 1\1/2\ million Armenians. In fact, it was Hitler who uttered the 
infamous statement, ``Who remembers the Armenians?''
  Today we stand here in this Chamber and in places around our Nation 
to do just that, to remember the Armenians, remember the martyrs, to 
say we will always remember them and we will never let the world forget 
the Armenian genocide that occurred at the hands of the Ottoman Turks.
  It was just over 81 years ago that 1.5 million Armenians were 
systematically murdered and another 500,000 were driven from their 
homeland during the 8-year genocide. Revisionist historians have sadly 
doubted the historical reality of the genocide. The Armenians were not 
killed indiscriminately or at random. The Armenians murdered between 
1915 and 1923 were the victims of a calculated extermination through 
starvation, torture and deportation, a genocide in every cruel meaning 
of the word and nothing less.
  Earlier today back in my district, Mayor Peter Torigian of Peabody, 
MA held a remembrance and flag-raising ceremony that included 8 
survivors of the genocide. These people are living proof that the 
genocide occurred. Their words bear witness to the reality of what 
happened 81 years ago.
  Mayor Torigian often tells a terrifying but very sobering story of 
his mother, who survived the genocide. Any time someone tries to deny 
the historical reality of the genocide, he reminds them that his 
mother, who was quite ill and confined to a nursing home, often repeats 
an Armenian

[[Page H3789]]

phrase which when translated means: ``The soldiers are coming, the 
soldiers are coming.'' These are the words of a then terrified 14-year-
old girl who was able to survive the atrocities inflicted upon her 
people many years ago.
  I join with my colleagues in calling on President Clinton to use the 
word ``genocide'' as the only accurate description of the terror 
inflicted on the Armenian people. For the dead and the living, we must 
bear witness so that this horror will never happen again.

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