[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 44 (Wednesday, March 14, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3143-S3145]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SENATE RESOLUTION 106--CALLING ON THE PRESIDENT TO ENSURE THAT THE
FOREIGN POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES REFLECTS APPROPRIATE UNDERSTANDING
AND SENSITIVITY CONCERNING ISSUES RELATED TO HUMAN RIGHTS, ETHNIC
CLEANSING, AND GENOCIDE DOCUMENTED IN THE UNITED STATES RECORD RELATING
TO THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
Mr. DURBIN (for himself, Mr. Ensign, Mr. Schumer, Ms. Snowe, Ms.
Stabenow, Mr. Coleman, Mrs. Boxer, Mr. Sununu, Mr. Feingold, Mr. Dodd,
Mr. Kerry, Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Lieberman, Mrs. Feinstein, Ms. Mikulski,
Mr. Reed, Mr. Allard, Mrs. Dole, Mr. Lautenberg, Mr. Brown, Ms.
Klobuchar, Mr. Whitehouse, and Mr. Menendez) submitted the following
resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations:
S. Res. 106
Whereas the Armenian Genocide was conceived and carried out
by the Ottoman Empire from 1915 to 1923, resulting in the
deportation of nearly 2,000,000 Armenians, of whom 1,500,000
men, women, and children were killed, 500,000 survivors were
expelled from their homes, and which succeeded in the
elimination of more than 2,500-year presence of Armenians in
their historic homeland;
Whereas, on May 24, 1915, the Allied Powers issued the
joint statement of England, France, and Russia that
explicitly charged, for the first time ever, another
government of committing ``a crime against humanity'';
Whereas that joint statement stated ``the Allied
Governments announce publicly to the Sublime Porte that they
will hold personally responsible for these crimes all members
of the Ottoman Government, as well as those of their agents
who are implicated in such massacres'';
Whereas the post-World War I Turkish Government indicted
the top leaders involved in the ``organization and
execution'' of the Armenian Genocide and in the ``massacre
and destruction of the Armenians'';
Whereas in a series of courts-martial, officials of the
Young Turk Regime were tried and convicted on charges of
organizing and executing massacres against the Armenian
people;
Whereas the officials who were the chief organizers of the
Armenian Genocide, Minister of War Enver, Minister of the
Interior Talaat, and Minister of the Navy Jemal, were tried
by military tribunals, found guilty, and condemned to death
for their crimes, but the punishments imposed by the
tribunals were not enforced;
Whereas the Armenian Genocide and the failure to carry out
the death sentence against Enver, Talaat, and Jemal are
documented with overwhelming evidence in the national
archives of Austria, France, Germany, Russia, the United
Kingdom, the United States, the Vatican, and many other
countries, and this vast body of evidence attests to the same
facts, the same events, and the same consequences;
Whereas the National Archives and Records Administration of
the United States holds extensive and thorough documentation
on the Armenian Genocide, especially in its holdings for the
Department of State under Record Group 59, files 867.00 and
867.40, which are open and widely available to the public and
interested institutions;
Whereas the Honorable Henry Morgenthau, United States
Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1913 to 1916, organized
and led protests by officials of many countries, among them
the allies of the Ottoman Empire, against the Armenian
Genocide;
Whereas Ambassador Morgenthau explicitly described to the
Department of State the policy of the Government of the
Ottoman Empire as ``a campaign of race extermination'', and
was instructed on July 16, 1915, by Secretary of State Robert
Lansing that the ``Department approves your procedure . . .
to stop Armenian persecution'';
Whereas Senate Concurrent Resolution 12, 64th Congress,
agreed to July 18, 1916, resolved that ``the President of the
United States be respectfully asked to designate a day on
which the citizens of this country may give expression to
their sympathy by contributing funds now being raised for the
relief of the Armenians,'' who, at that time, were enduring
``starvation, disease, and untold suffering'';
Whereas President Woodrow Wilson agreed with such
Concurrent Resolution and encouraged the formation of the
organization
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known as Near East Relief, which was incorporated by the Act
of August 6, 1919, 66th Congress (41 Stat. 273, chapter 32);
Whereas, from 1915 through 1930, Near East Relief
contributed approximately $116,000,000 to aid survivors of
the Armenian Genocide, including aid to approximately 132,000
Armenian orphans;
Whereas Senate Resolution 359, 66th Congress, agreed to May
11, 1920, stated in part that ``the testimony adduced at the
hearings conducted by the subcommittee of the Senate
Committee on Foreign Relations have clearly established the
truth of the reported massacres and other atrocities from
which the Armenian people have suffered'';
Whereas such Senate Resolution followed the report to the
Senate of the American Military Mission to Armenia, which was
led by General James Harbord, dated April 13, 1920, that
stated ``[m]utilation, violation, torture, and death have
left their haunting memories in a hundred beautiful Armenian
valleys, and the traveler in that region is seldom free from
the evidence of this most colossal crime of all the ages'';
Whereas, as displayed in the United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum, Adolf Hitler, on ordering his military
commanders to attack Poland without provocation in 1939,
dismissed objections by saying ``[w]ho, after all, speaks
today of the annihilation of the Armenians?'' and thus set
the stage for the Holocaust;
Whereas Raphael Lemkin, who coined the term ``genocide'' in
1944, and who was the earliest proponent of the Convention on
the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide, invoked the
Armenian case as a definitive example of genocide in the 20th
century;
Whereas the first resolution on genocide adopted by the
United Nations, United Nations General Assembly Resolution
96(1), dated December 11, 1946, (which was adopted at the
urging of Raphael Lemkin), and the Convention on the
Prevention and Punishment of Genocide, done at Paris December
9, 1948, recognized the Armenian Genocide as the type of
crime the United Nations intended to prevent and punish by
codifying existing standards;
Whereas, in 1948, the United Nations War Crimes Commission
invoked the Armenian Genocide as ``precisely . . . one of the
types of acts which the modern term `crimes against humanity'
is intended to cover'' and as a precedent for the Nuremberg
tribunals;
Whereas the Commission stated that ``[t]he provisions of
Article 230 of the Peace Treaty of Sevres were obviously
intended to cover, in conformity with the Allied note of 1915
. . . offenses which had been committed on Turkish territory
against persons of Turkish citizenship, though of Armenian or
Greek race. This article constitutes therefore a precedent
for Article 6c and 5c of the Nuremberg and Tokyo Charters,
and offers an example of one of the categories of `crimes
against humanity' as understood by these enactments'';
Whereas House Joint Resolution 148, 94th Congress, adopted
by the House of Representatives on April 8, 1975, resolved
that ``April 24, 1975, is hereby designated as `National Day
of Remembrance of Man's Inhumanity to Man', and the President
of the United States is authorized and requested to issue a
proclamation calling upon the people of the United States to
observe such day as a day of remembrance for all the victims
of genocide, especially those of Armenian ancestry'';
Whereas Proclamation 4838 of April 22, 1981 (95 Stat. 1813)
issued by President Ronald Reagan, stated, in part, that
``[l]ike the genocide of the Armenians before it, and the
genocide of the Cambodians which followed it--and like too
many other persecutions of too many other people--the lessons
of the Holocaust must never be forgotten'';
Whereas House Joint Resolution 247, 98th Congress, adopted
by the House of Representatives on September 10, 1984,
resolved that ``April 24, 1985, is hereby designated as
`National Day of Remembrance of Man's Inhumanity to Man', and
the President of the United States is authorized and
requested to issue a proclamation calling upon the people of
the United States to observe such day as a day of remembrance
for all the victims of genocide, especially the one and one-
half million people of Armenian ancestry'';
Whereas, in August 1985, after extensive study and
deliberation, the United Nations Sub-Commission on Prevention
of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities voted 14 to 1
to accept a report entitled ``Study of the Question of the
Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide'', which
stated ``[t]he Nazi aberration has unfortunately not been the
only case of genocide in the 20th century. Among other
examples which can be cited as qualifying are . . . the
Ottoman massacre of Armenians in 1915-1916'';
Whereas such report also explained that ``[a]t least
1,000,000, and possibly well over half of the Armenian
population, are reliably estimated to have been killed or
death marched by independent authorities and eye-witnesses
and this is corroborated by reports in United States, German,
and British archives and of contemporary diplomats in the
Ottoman Empire, including those of its ally Germany'';
Whereas the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, an
independent Federal agency that serves as the board of
trustees of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
pursuant to section 2302 of title 36, United States Code,
unanimously resolved on April 30, 1981, that the Museum would
exhibit information regarding the Armenian Genocide and the
Museum has since done so;
Whereas, reviewing an aberrant 1982 expression by the
Department of State (which was later retracted) that asserted
that the facts of the Armenian Genocide may be ambiguous, the
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia
in 1993, after a review of documents pertaining to the policy
record of the United States, noted that the assertion on
ambiguity in the United States record about the Armenian
Genocide ``contradicted longstanding United States policy and
was eventually retracted'';
Whereas, on June 5, 1996, the House of Representatives
adopted an amendment to H.R. 3540, 104th Congress (the
Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs
Appropriations Act, 1997), to reduce aid to Turkey by
$3,000,000 (an estimate of its payment of lobbying fees in
the United States) until the Government of Turkey
acknowledged the Armenian Genocide and took steps to honor
the memory of its victims;
Whereas President William Jefferson Clinton, on April 24,
1998, stated, ``This year, as in the past, we join with
Armenian-Americans throughout the nation in commemorating one
of the saddest chapters in the history of this century, the
deportations and massacres of a million and a half Armenians
in the Ottoman Empire in the years 1915-1923'';
Whereas President George W. Bush, on April 24, 2004,
stated, ``On this day, we pause in remembrance of one of the
most horrible tragedies of the 20th century, the annihilation
of as many as 1,500,000 Armenians through forced exile and
murder at the end of the Ottoman Empire''; and
Whereas, despite the international recognition and
affirmation of the Armenian Genocide, the failure of the
domestic and international authorities to punish those
responsible for the Armenian Genocide is a reason why similar
genocides have recurred and may recur in the future, and that
a just resolution will help prevent future genocides: Now,
therefore, be it
Resolved, That the Senate--
(1) calls on the President to ensure that the foreign
policy of the United States reflects appropriate
understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to
human rights, ethnic cleansing, and genocide documented in
the United States record relating to the Armenian Genocide
and the consequences of the failure to realize a just
resolution; and
(2) calls on the President, in the President's annual
message commemorating the Armenian Genocide issued on or
about April 24 to accurately characterize the systematic and
deliberate annihilation of 1,500,000 Armenians as genocide
and to recall the proud history of United States intervention
in opposition to the Armenian Genocide.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I rise today to submit a resolution
calling on the President to ensure that the foreign policy of the
United States reflects an appropriate understanding of the Armenian
Genocide and sensitivity concerning issues related to human rights,
ethnic cleansing, and other mass atrocities that made up the Armenian
Genocide.
The President usually issues an annual message commemorating the
Armenian Genocide issued on or about April 24. This resolution calls on
the President to accurately characterize what happened to the Armenian
people as genocide and to recall the proud history of United States
intervention in opposition to it.
The definition of ``genocide'' is ``the deliberate and systematic
extermination of a national, racial, political, or cultural group.''
Scholars agree that what the Armenian people suffered in 1915 to 1917
fits the definition of genocide.
The sheer scale of the death toll is evidence of a systematic,
organized plan to eliminate the Armenians. One and a half million
people were systematically and deliberately annihilated, many simply
left to die of starvation and exposure.
To date, 19 countries and the European Parliament have officially
recognized this violence as genocide. Countries officially recognizing
the Armenian Genocide include: Argentina, Armenia, Belgium, Canada,
Cyprus, France, Greece, Italy, Lebanon, Lithuania, The Netherlands,
Poland, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland, Uruguay, Vatican City
and Venezuela.
Thirty-seven States of the United States recognize the Armenian
Genocide. They are: Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado,
Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas,
Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota,
Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New
Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode
Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington
and Wisconsin.
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Genocide is wrong. It is evil.
It is evil whether its victims are Armenians, Sudanese, Rwandan
Tutsis, Cambodians or European Jews.
Not to acknowledge genocide for what it is denigrates the memory of
its victims.
Recognition of genocide is part of the healing process.
Reminding the world that genocide has occurred far too often serves
to help prevent it from happening again.
Recognizing the Armenian Genocide takes on added importance in the
face of the genocide occurring right now in the Darfur region of Sudan.
As we recognize the role Americans played in exposing the Armenian
Genocide and trying to relieve the suffering of the Armenian people, we
remind ourselves that it is our tradition to speak out and do
something.
During the Armenia Genocide, American consuls and missionaries, in
what was then the Ottoman Empire, reported the atrocities which were
taking place far from the capital in Istanbul. Our ambassador, Henry
Morganthau Sr., confronted the Ottoman government with the accusations.
Ambassador Morganthau wrote in his memoirs:
Whatever crimes the most perverted instincts of the human
mind can devise, and whatever refinements of persecution and
injustice the most debased imagination can conceive, became
the daily misfortunes of this devoted people. I am confident
that the whole history of the human race contains no such
horrible episode as this. The great massacres and
persecutions of the past seem almost insignificant when
compared with the sufferings of the Armenian race in 1915.
The American Near East Relief Committee, a relief organization for
refugees in the Middle East, raised over $102 million for Armenians
both during and after the genocide.
As I have said in this Chamber before, the response to the atrocities
was the birth of the American international human rights movement.
Official recognition of the role Americans played in confronting the
Armenian Genocide over 90 years ago will reaffirm our tradition of
protecting the vulnerable and inspire us to not stand by and watch as
genocide occurs in our time.
Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about an issue of
great importance to the Armenian community. In order to move forward,
we must not repeat the mistakes of the past. It is for this reason that
I have long sought to bring proper recognition to the crimes
perpetuated against the Armenian people.
April of this year will mark the 92nd anniversary of the attempted
annihilation that occurred in the Ottoman Empire from 1915-1923.
Millions of Armenians of all ages were subjected to deportation,
expropriation, abduction, torture, massacre, and starvation.
The great bulk of the Armenian population was forcibly removed from
Armenia and Anatolia to Syria, where the vast majority was sent into
the desert to die of thirst and hunger. Large numbers of Armenians were
methodically massacred throughout the Ottoman Empire. Women and
children were abducted and horribly abused.
There is one word that describes the horrific attempt to annihilate
the Armenian people, and it is genocide. Ironically, while the United
States has failed to make that recognition, Adolf Hitler, in defending
his own plans to rid the world of Polish people, among others, asked,
``Who, after all, speaks to-day of the annihilation of the Armenians?''
The resolution I introduce today, with my distinguished colleague
Senator Durbin, calls on President Bush to ensure that the foreign
policy of the United States demonstrates significant understanding of
the issues surrounding the Armenian Genocide. The resolution encourages
the President to commemorate the Armenian Genocide by recognizing the
persecution and extermination of over 1,500,000 Armenian citizens as
genocide.
The resolution calls on the President to state that the slaughter of
Armenians by the Ottoman Empire was genocide and to recall the proud
history of United States intervention in opposition to the Armenian
genocide. It is important that the United States once and for all
reaffirms the incontestable facts of history and allows our
representatives to speak out about the crimes perpetuated against the
Armenian people from 1915-1923.
It is my hope that through recognition of these crimes our Nation and
the entire world community will be able to prevent further instances of
genocide, ameliorate relations between Turkey and Armenia, and increase
awareness of issues such as ethnic cleansing and human rights around
the globe.
As we fight to ensure freedom around the globe, we must ensure that
our future reflects the lessons of the past. In this case the facts are
incontestable. Yes, the Armenian people were victims of genocide.
Genocide at any time, at any place, is wrong and needs to be confronted
and remembered. Let us come together to remember that by recognizing
that what happened to the Armenian people from 1915-1923 was genocide.
We owe it to the victims and to the future of freedom.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, as we approach the 92nd anniversary of
the Armenian Genocide, I rise today in support of a resolution
introduced by Senator Richard Durbin, calling on the President to
recognize the Armenian Genocide.
Specifically, this resolution would: encourage the President to
incorporate the memory and lessons of the Armenian Genocide into the
foreign policies of the United States, and; urge the President to
accurately portray this terrible episode as ``genocide'' in his annual
statement.
Between 1915 and 1923, as many as 1.5 million Armenians perished and
500,000 were exiled by the Ottoman government in a systematic campaign
of murder, deportation, and forced starvation.
Ninety-two years later, nearly all of the survivors are no longer
with us. Yet their solemn voices still echo, urging us to remember them
and work to ensure that their suffering was not in vain.
In my 15 years in the U.S. Senate, I have received thousands of
letters from members of the Armenian-American community in my home
State of California, encouraging our government to recognize the
Armenian Genocide. Many of them are descendants of the genocide's
survivors, who immigrated to the United States and, over the course of
a few decades, built a strong and vibrant community in California and
elsewhere.
For the genocide's victims, there can be no justice. But by
preserving and cherishing their memory, we can begin healing the wounds
that still linger.
The recent murder of Hrant Dink, a Turkish-Armenian journalist who
championed human rights and advocated Turkish recognition of the
Armenian Genocide, serves as a chilling reminder of the dangers that
loom in our silence. An open, informed, and tolerant discussion of the
genocide is necessary for true and lasting reconciliation between
present-day Turkey and the Armenian people.
Equally important, recalling the Armenian Genocide is essential to
the prevention of ongoing and future atrocities, including the genocide
in Darfur. By taking an unequivocal stance against genocide--regardless
of where or when it occurs--we and other members of the international
community will send a strong message that such atrocities will not be
tolerated. Let us remember Adolf Hitler's ominous words on the eve of
the 1939 Nazi invasion of Poland: ``Who, after all, speaks today of the
annihilation of the Armenians?''
So today, let us speak loudly. Let us join the hundreds of thousands
of Armenian Americans in my home State of California and across the
United States, as well as millions of people around the world, in
acknowledging and commemorating the Armenian Genocide. Let us ensure
that the legacy of these atrocities is one of reconciliation and hope.
And let us fulfill the promises our parents made us, and we made to our
children: never again.
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