[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

[[Page S3144]]

     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.

[[Page S3145]]

  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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