[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 19 (Friday, February 18, 2005)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E278-E279]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   PRAISING FOREIGN MINISTER OF ARMENIA, VARTAN OSKANIAN'S STATEMENT 
   COMMEMORATING THE 60TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE LIBERATION OF AUSCHWITZ

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. FRANK PALLONE, JR.

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                      Thursday, February 17, 2005

  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I was proud to join my colleagues last 
month in commemorating the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the 
Auschwitz. On that solemn occasion, Congress remembered the heroic 
forces that helped bring an end to this crime against humanity, and we 
reminded ourselves and others to never forget the lessons of the past.
  At the request of the United States, Canada, the European Union, 
Australia, New Zealand, and Russia, the United Nations, for the first 
time, also observed the liberation of Auschwitz. Armenia's Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, Vartan Oskanian, was among a select group of foreign 
ministers who addressed the United Nations 28th Special Session in New 
York.
  As a people victimized by genocide under the cover of WWII, all 
Armenians have a special empathy for the victims, survivors and 
descendants of the Holocaust. As Minister Oskanian said at the UN 
General Assembly:
  ``After Auschwitz, we are all Jews, we are all Gypsies, we are all 
unfit, deviant and undesirable, for someone, somewhere.''
  As the Co-Chair of the Congressional Caucus on Armenian Issues, I am 
pleased to submit the Minister's full remarks as delivered to the 
Congressional Record. By remembering all instances of man's inhumanity 
to man, we renew our commitment always to prevent this crime's 
recurrence, and therefore negate the dictum that history is condemned 
to repeat itself.

Statement of H. E. Vartan Oskanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Republic 
 of Armenia at the 28th Special Session on the 60th Anniversary of the 
 Liberation of the Nazi Concentration Camps--New York, January 24, 2005

       Mr. President, Your Excellencies, Dear Friends: On behalf 
     of the people and government of Armenia, and as a descendant 
     of genocide survivors, I feel compelled to be here today, to 
     join other survivors and descendants, of both victims and 
     perpetrators, to take part in this commemoration. I am also 
     duty-bound to urge us all to confront more effectively the 
     threat of genocide anywhere, at any time, regardless of 
     cost and political discomfort.
       The liberation of Auschwitz is, indeed, cause for 
     commemorative celebration. However, in this commemoration, 
     with each uttering of the name Auschwitz, we are forced to 
     reflect: to look back, look around, look deep, look at the 
     other, but also look inward, at ourselves.
       After 9/11 and reacting to the unusually high number of 
     victims of a singular event, an editorialist proclaimed ``We 
     are all Americans''. Sympathy, solidarity, anxiety, and 
     indignation bound us together. How much more intense our 
     feelings about Auschwitz and the singularity of its horror, 
     its synonymity with the technology of death-making, its 
     eerily ordinary commitment to efficiency, to pragmatic, 
     effective, result-oriented administration.
       After Auschwitz, we are all Jews, we are all Gypsies, we 
     are all unfit, deviant and undesirable, for someone, 
     somewhere. After Auschwitz, the conscience of man cannot 
     remain the same. Man's inhumanity to men, to women, to 
     children, and to the elderly, is no longer a concept in 
     search of a name, an image, a description. Auschwitz lends 
     its malefic aura to all the Auschwitzes of history, our 
     collective history, both before and after.
       In the 20th century alone, with its 15 genocides, the 
     victims have their own names for places of infamy. What the 
     French call `les lieux infames de memoire' are everywhere. 
     Places of horror, slaughter, of massacre, of the 
     indiscriminate killing of all those who have belonged to a 
     segment, a category, an ethnic group, a race or a religion. 
     For Armenians, it is the desert of Deir-EI-Zor, for 
     Cambodians they are the killing fields, for the children of 
     the 21st century, it is Darfur. For the Jews and Poles and 
     for a whole generation of us growing up after The War, it is 
     Auschwitz.
       Mr. President: Just as we all were, or are, or might be 
     victims, we all were or are or might also be guilty. It is 
     only through the engagement of those who have seen and done 
     the unimaginable, and who have had the dignity, the grace, 
     the sensitivity, the decency and courage to acknowledge 
     wrongdoing, that we may achieve the requisite collective 
     political will and its expression.
       This is not as naive, unrealistic, idealistic as some might 
     wish to label it, perhaps in order to dismiss it. Genocide is 
     not about individuals who act insanely, do evil, commit 
     crimes, perpetrate irrevocable wrongs. Genocide is the 
     undertaking of a state apparatus, which must, by definition, 
     act coherently, pragmatically, with structure and 
     organization.
       Thus, this is not a plea to reform human beings, but an 
     appeal to take conscious account of the role our national 
     institutions and international institutions must play to 
     ensure that no one can expect to enjoy impunity.
       After Auschwitz one would expect that no one any longer has 
     a right to turn a blind eye or a deaf ear. As an Armenian, I 
     know that a blind eye, a deaf ear and a muted tongue 
     perpetuate the wounds. It is a memory of suffering unrelieved 
     by strong condemnation and unequivocal recognition. The 
     catharsis that the victims deserve, which societies require 
     in order to heal and move forward together, obligates us here 
     at the UN, and in the international community, to be 
     witness, to call things by their name, to remove the veil 
     of obfuscation, of double standards, of political 
     expediency.
       Mr. Chairman: Following the Tsunami-provoked disaster, we 
     have become painfully aware of a paradox. On the one hand, 
     multilateral assistance efforts were massive, swift, generous 
     and without discrimination. But, when compared and contrasted 
     with today's other major tragedy, in Africa, it is plain that 
     for Darfur, formal and ritual condemnation has not been 
     followed by any dissuasive action against the perpetrators.
       The difference with the Tsunami, of course, was that there 
     were no perpetrators. No one wielded the sword, pulled the 
     trigger or pushed the button that released the gas.
       Recognizing the victims and acknowledging them is also to 
     recognize that there are perpetrators. But this is absolutely 
     not the same as actually naming them, shaming them, 
     dissuading or warning them, isolating or punishing them.
       If these observations signal a certain naivete that 
     overlooks the enduring structures of our political and 
     security interests, then, on this occasion, when we have 
     gathered to commemorate this horrible event, then allow me 
     this one question: if not here and now, then where and when?
       Mr. Chairman: The Spanish-American philosopher George 
     Santayana, who has been

[[Page E279]]

     quoted here, admonished us to remember the past, or be 
     condemned to repeat it. This admonition has significance for 
     me personally, because the destruction of my people, whose 
     fate in some way impinged upon the fate of the Jews of 
     Europe, should have been viewed more widely as a warning of 
     things to come.
       Jews and Armenians are linked forever by Hitler. Who, after 
     all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians? said 
     Adolf Hitler, days before he entered Poland.
       Hitler's cynical remembrance of Armenians is prominently 
     displayed in the Holocaust Memorial in Washington because it 
     is profound commentary about the crucial role of third 
     parties in genocide prevention and remembrance. Genocide is 
     the manifestation of the break in the covenant that 
     governments have with their peoples. Therefore, it is third 
     parties who become crucial actors in genocide prevention, 
     humanitarian assistance and genocide remembrance.
       We are commemorating today, because the Soviet troops 
     marched into Auschwitz 60 years ago. I am here today because 
     the Arabs provided sanctuary to Armenian deportees 90 years 
     ago.
       Third parties, indeed, can make the difference between life 
     and death. Their rejection of the behaviors and policies 
     which are neither in anyone's national interest nor in 
     humanity's international interest, is of immense moral and 
     political value.
       What neighbors, well-wishers, the international community 
     can't accomplish, is the transcending and reconciling which 
     the parties must do for themselves. The victims, first, must 
     exhibit the dignity, capacity and willingness to move on, and 
     the perpetrators, first and last, must summon the deep force 
     of humanity and goodness and must overcome the memory of the 
     inner evil which had already prevailed, and must renounce the 
     deed, its intent, its consequences, its architects and 
     executors.
       Auschwitz signifies the worst of hate, of indifference, of 
     dehumanization. Remembrance of Auschwitz and its purpose, 
     however abhorrent, is a vital step to making real the phrase 
     ``Never Again.''

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