[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 46 (Thursday, April 23, 1998)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E668]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                TRIBUTE TO VICTIMS OF ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. STEVE R. ROTHMAN

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, April 23, 1998

  Mr. ROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, it is an honor to join my colleagues in 
commemorating the Armenian Genocide and the solemn memory of the 1.5 
million Armenians who lost their lives earlier this century. This is an 
important day to reflect on the lessons of history and work to avoid 
the horrors faced by the Armenian people in 1915.
  For the Congressional Record, I would very much like to submit a 
letter concerning the Armenian Genocide that I sent to President Bill 
Clinton. It is my earnest hope that the United States Congress, with 
President Clinton's determining leadership, will swiftly move to adopt 
a resolution acknowledging the Armenian Genocide.

                                         House of Representatives,
                                   Washington, DC, April 21, 1998.
     Hon. William J. Clinton,
     President of the United States.
       Dear Mr. President: I am writing to you, as a proponent of 
     peace and stability in the Caucasus, to urge your 
     Administration to play an active role in ending Turkey's 
     denial of the Armenian Genocide.
       In addition to the clear moral imperative to appropriately 
     recognize and commemorate all instances of Genocide, such a 
     move would serve our own national interests by ensuring that 
     the United States is viewed as an impartial and honest broker 
     in the ongoing Nagorno-Karabagh peace process.
       During your 1992 Presidential campaign, you acknowledged 
     the ``Genocide of 1915.'' Your words were welcomed by 
     Armenians and all people of good conscience as a principled 
     stand by a leader committed to resisting the Turkish 
     government's shameful campaign to deny the Armenian Genocide. 
     It is unfortunate that members of your Administration have 
     failed to live up to your own words, issuing ambiguous 
     statements about the ``Armenian massacres.'' I strongly 
     encourage the Administration to use the correct term, 
     genocide, to describe the systematic and deliberate 
     extermination of the Armenian people--a crime against 
     humanity thoroughly documented in our own national archives.
       As a nation, we pay a great price for our government's 
     participation in the Turkish government's denial of the 
     Armenian Genocide. As you would surely agree, complicity in 
     the denial of genocide--for any reason, at any time--is 
     simply unacceptable conduct for the world's leading defender 
     of human rights.
       The United States' long-standing acquiescence of Turkey's 
     denial was accurately characterized in 1995 by Stanley Cohen, 
     a professor of criminology at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, 
     writing in ``Law and Social Inquiry,'' published by the 
     American Bar Foundation: ``The nearest successful example [of 
     collective denial] in the modern era is the 80 years of 
     official denial by successive Turkish governments of the 
     1915-17 genocide against the Armenians in which some 1.5 
     million people lost their lives. This denial has been 
     sustained by deliberate propaganda, lying and cover-ups, 
     forging documents, suppression of archives, and bribing 
     scholars. The West, especially the United States, has 
     colluded by not referring to the massacres in the United 
     Nations, ignoring memorial ceremonies, and surrending to 
     Turkish pressures in NATO and other strategic arenas of 
     cooperation.''
       As I noted, withholding the proper recognition of the 
     Armenian Genocide also significant hinders our nation's 
     ability to help resolve the ongoing conflict over Nagorno-
     Karabagh. The Administration's assurance of security 
     guarantees for the people of Nagorno-Karabagh are greatly 
     weakened by our government's unwillingess, after 83 years, to 
     acknowledge that a crime of genocide was committed against 
     the Armenian nation. This unwillingness seriously undermines 
     the faith that the people of Karabagh have that the United 
     States will stand up for their rights in the event of renewed 
     Azerbaijani aggression.
       Mr. President, very appropriately, you have always stressed 
     that the United States must lead on the question of 
     fundamental freedoms around the world. Your statement on 
     March 25th of this year in the Rwandan capital was in the 
     proudest tradition of our nation's commitment to human 
     rights. At the Kigali airport, you stated that, ``Genocide 
     can occur anywhere. It is not an African phenomenon. We must 
     have global vigilance. And never again must we be shy in the 
     face of evidence.''
       Mr. President, the evidence of the Armenian Genocide is 
     clear. Now is the time to stand up for justice and help bring 
     an end to Turkey's denial of the Armenian Genocide.
           Sincerely,

                                            Steven R. Rothman,

                                               Member of Congress.

     

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