[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 6]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 7568]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




      COMMEMORATING THE 90TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

                                 ______
                                 

                             HON. JIM COSTA

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, April 21, 2005

  Mr. COSTA. Mr. Speaker, Irise today to commemorate the 90th 
anniversary of one of history's most terrible tragedies, the Armenian 
Genocide.
  On April 24, 1915, 300 Armenian leaders, intellectuals and 
professionals were rounded up in Constantinople, deported and killed, 
under orders from the Young Turk government. This was the beginning of 
a campaign of terror resulting in the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians 
and the deportation of more than 500,000.
  The government of the Ottoman Empire justified this policy by 
claiming it was necessary to suppress revolts being launched by 
Armenians as a consequence of the ongoing military operations of World 
War I. This assertion was patently denied by survivors and witnesses. 
United States Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire Henry Morganthau 
reported at that time, ``Deportation of and excesses against peaceful 
Armenians is increasing and from harrowing reports of eyewitnesses it 
appears that a campaign of race extermination is in progress under a 
pretext of reprisal against rebellion.''
  Not content with perpetrating this atrocity, the Young Turks denied 
the genocide had taken place. Generations have since been raised 
denying this tragedy. Such denials are refuted by the archival 
documents and first-hand accounts found in such recent scholarly works 
as Peter Balakian's The Burning Tigris and Samantha Power's A Problem 
From Hell. Director Atom Egoyan presented the horror of the siege of 
Van in his film Ararat, which was based, in part, on the memoirs of 
Clarence Ussher, an American physician and missionary working in Turkey 
at the time. To those who suggest that this ruthless genocide of a 
people and culture did not happen, I ask, what further testimony could 
the world possibly want?
  Mr. Speaker, for myself and my constituents, I rise today to urge 
those who deny this genocide to accept it as fact. Only then can we 
move forward and stop these atrocities from repeating themselves over 
and over again.

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