The Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, issued a statement on Armenian Genocide Memorial Day, also known as Medz Yeghern. ARMENPRESS reports, citing the official website of the Canadian PM, Trudeau particularly said in his statement,

“Today on Armenian Genocide Memorial Day, we join Armenian communities in Canada and around the world to remember those who lost their lives and who suffered from the senseless acts wrought upon the Armenian people. We also honour their descendants and all those who continue to live with the pain, trauma, and loss from this tragedy.

“The Armenian genocide showed the world the unconscionable cost of division, exclusion, and hatred. Canada vigorously opposes and condemns hate, intolerance, and xenophobia. Today, we reaffirm our commitment to the fundamental rights and dignity of all human beings, and commit to continue working with our partners to make sure atrocities like these never happen again.

“We continue to be inspired by the strength and spirit of the Armenian people in the face of unimaginable hardship, and look forward with hope to a more peaceful, just tomorrow.

“On this sombre anniversary, I invite all Canadians to pause to remember the victims and those who survived the horrors of the Armenian genocide. We will continue to honour them by fighting hate, protecting the most vulnerable, and working to make our world a better one.”

Historic statement will likely exacerbate tensions with Turkey, whose relationship with the U.S. has deteriorated in recent years

WASHINGTON—President Biden formally declared the massacres of Armenians in the early 20th century to be genocide, fulfilling a campaign promise to Armenian-Americans and others who have sought such an official acknowledgment for decades.

Mr. Biden’s declaration Saturday is the first such formal statement by a sitting U.S. president and will likely exacerbate growing tensions with Turkey, which denies that the killings of Armenians between 1915 and 1923, under the Ottoman Empire, constituted genocide.

The declaration came as part of a statement prepared for Saturday’s day of remembrance, an annual commemoration held by Armenians in the U.S. and elsewhere.

“Each year on this day, we remember the lives of all those who died in the Ottoman-era Armenian genocide and recommit ourselves to preventing such an atrocity from ever again occurring,” Mr. Biden said in the statement. “We do this not to cast blame but to ensure that what happened is never repeated.”

Mr. Biden informed Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan about the decision on Friday during the first call between the two leaders since Mr. Biden’s inauguration, a senior administration official said.

The official said Mr. Biden’s decision showed the U.S. focus on international human rights, adding that the statement was intended more for the victims rather than for assigning blame. The official said the two presidents plan to meet in June on the sidelines of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in the U.K. to address a range of differences.

Turkey objects to the use of the term “genocide,” arguing that the Armenians revolted and sided with invading Russian forces, and that both sides suffered casualties.

The Turkish government said Mr. Erdogan discussed “so-called Armenian genocide slander” at a meeting Thursday, and Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told Haberturk television on Tuesday that a declaration by Mr. Biden would only harm ties.

The term has been widely accepted by historians, governments and international organizations in reference to the Ottoman Empire’s treatment of Armenians and members of other ethnic and religious minorities from 1915 to 1923.

In recent years, ties between the U.S. and Turkey, a fellow NATO member, have deteriorated over Ankara’s acquisition of the Russian S-400 air-defense system, as well as human- and civil-rights issues under Mr. Erdogan and Turkey’s role in several regional conflicts.

Under pressure from Congress, the Trump administration imposed sanctions against Turkish government entities over the acquisition of the S-400, which Pentagon officials said could be used to collect intelligence on the F-35 stealth jet fighters that Turkey was due to buy, and removed Ankara from participation in the U.S.-led F-35 stealth jet fighter program.

Congress in 2019 overwhelmingly passed nonbinding resolutions in the House and Senate calling the 1915 actions a genocide.

Analysts said Ankara could respond by calling attention to the treatment of Native Americans by European settlers, mounting a diplomatic protest or erecting informal barriers to U.S. exports. If tensions escalate, Turkey could bar U.S. forces from using the country’s Incirlik air base.

U.S. support for Kurdish militants fighting Islamic State in Syria has also alienated the Turkish government in recent years as the fighters belong to an offshoot of an organization that is labeled a terrorist group by both Washington and Ankara.

On Saturday, the Turkish government said the country’s forces launched a military operation against Kurdish militants in northern Iraq. State broadcaster TRT said the operation, which began Friday night and focused on the Matina region just south of the Turkey-Iraq border, including helicopters and F-16 fighter jets.

Mr. Erdogan, who was in contact with the command center for the operation, said “many terrorists have been neutralized” in the offensive against militant hideouts in the region, according to Turkey’s state news agency Anadolu. Kurdish media also reported Turkish shelling in the area. The claims of casualties could not be immediately verified.

James Jeffrey, a former U.S. ambassador to Turkey and senior official in the Obama and Trump administrations, said the question of genocide recognition has long been the subject of a debate within the U.S. government.

“Those of us who always argued that for geopolitical reasons we shouldn’t do it knew that sooner or later a president would do it,” he said of the decision to recognize the genocide.

As a result of years of tensions, U.S.-Turkey ties might now be damaged beyond repair, some observers of the relationship said.

yprus will continue the efforts for achieving the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by the international community, President Nicos Anastasiades said on Twitter.

“Today is the day of remembrance of the Armenian Genocide victims. We feel pain for their sacrifice. We are firmly attached to our Armenian brothers who live here, in our homeland. We will continue the efforts for the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by the international community”, the Cypriot President said.

Senator Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, released the following statement after reports that the Biden administration will formally recognize the century-old atrocities committed by the Ottoman Empire against Armenians as genocide, marking the 106th anniversary of the atrocities that took the lives of 1.5 million Armenians beginning in 1915.  
 
“It’s long past time that the United States formally recognized the crimes committed against the Armenian people for what they were – genocide,” said Senator Markey. “I applaud the Biden administration for taking this step that many have pledged, but none have fulfilled. As we approach the 106th anniversary of the first genocide of the 20th century, we not only remember the 1.5 million Armenians who lost their lives, but embark on a new era in history in which the United States formally recognizes the atrocities committed against them.

“I and many of my colleagues have been calling for years for the United States to take this step of acknowledgment and place us firmly on the right side of history. The only way to seek to live up to the phrase ‘never again’ is to honestly and openly accept the past. The Biden administration has rightfully placed human rights at the center of U.S. foreign policy and this step will send an important message to those around the world who think they can commit abuses without consequence. I thank the Armenian-American community for their decades of passionate advocacy in their fight for recognition, and I will continue to stand with them as we strive to heal the wounds of the past. Together we can build something positive, something hopeful, something good for the future – an Armenia that is respected and honored by its allies and neighbors.”

On March 19, 2021, Senator Markey joined Senator Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and 35 colleagues in a letter calling on President Biden to become the first U.S. President to officially recognize the Armenian Genocide.

The National Assembly of Quebec on Thursday unanimously adopted a resolution on the 106th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, the Armenian Embassy to Canada reported.

The resolution marks the 106th anniversary of the atrocities that took the lives of 1.5 million Armenian men, women and children.

It regrets that the political recognition of the Genocide throughout the world is still a subject of debates because of its denial by Turkey.

The National Assembly recalls that the Armenian people once again became victims of the bloody events and abuses in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) over the past year and unequivocally supports the decision of the Canadian government to suspend arms exports to Turkey.

The legislature body expresses its solidarity with the Armenian people and recognizes their right to live in peace and security while preserving their language, culture and faith.

Manouk Akopyan,

My grandmother Annik Khorsikyan lost her battle to COVID-19 on January 18. She was 87.

Nene, as her six grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren called her, was the backbone of the entire family.

The pandemic robbed her loved ones from visiting her during the holidays, or giving her a proper goodbye during her final days. As has tragically become the case for many around the world, she died alone in an overcrowded hospital, hers being the Hollywood Presbyterian hospital in Los Angeles—the location of my birth 35 years ago.

It’s still hard to process or heal from nene’s death because I couldn’t properly mourn the loss of our matriarch.

I heal and find solace knowing that her existence, and the life she persevered through as a widowed mother of three by the age 20, is a miracle itself.

Annik was the daughter of Hovanes Dakesian, an Armenian genocide survivor who escaped slaying at the hands of the Ottoman Empire when they persecuted and massacred over 1.5 million Armenians during World War I.

Ottomans ransacked Armenian-occupied land, forced them out of their homes, led them to death marches, all while murdering men, raping women and leaving children orphaned along the way. The 2016 film “The Promise” starring Christian Bale and Oscar Isaac documents some of the harrowing details.

Hovanes’ brother Gevork, who was 8-years-old at the time, wasn’t so fortunate to survive, as he was kidnapped and never found again.

The attempted ethnic cleansing of Armenians, the world’s first Christian nation, is one of the darkest chapters in history. Assyrians and Greeks were grouped in the mass killings as well. Turkey till this day vehemently denies a genocide ever took place in order to avoid paying reparations for its human rights violations.

That hasn’t stopped an overwhelming number or countries, politicians, public figures and historians alike to call the killings what they are—a genocide.

If my great-grandfather had not escaped his death sentence, there never would have been a nene to commemorate, or a grandson to commemorate her.

My family and I would never exist, and an entire clan would be reduced to a red stroke of the paintbrush, as depicted in the “Our Wounds Are Still Open” mural on Hollywood Boulevard near Alexandria Avenue, the cross-streets where nene lived in Los Angeles’ Little Armenia.

My parents emigrated to the U.S. four decades ago from Yerevan, Armenia and coincidentally first settled right near this mural, too. I was conceived nearby on Lexington Avenue. Every time I visited nene’s house, I quickly entered a hazy time machine piecing a puzzle around my identity.

Many Armenians left the land they knew to pursue greener paths around the world because they were bereft of their history, belongings, land and identity.

Both the image and message in Tinseltown’s mural serve as a stark reminder of the strength and resilience of the Armenian people. It also proves the wound is still blistering and far from being able to heal.

Backed by Turkey and Syrian jihadists, Azerbaijan waged a 44-day war against Armenians and seized historical land in the Republic of Artsakh last November.

Several thousand young Armenians soldiers lost their lives, and several thousand more citizens were displaced once a ceasefire agreement was arranged by Russia.

Artsakh was populated and controlled by ethnic Armenians for centuries, and a heavier war between Armenians and Azerbaijanis took place in 1994. The internationally known region as Nagorno-Karabakh sits inside Azerbaijan’s borders after the territory was annexed by Joseph Stalin soon after Armenians died or dispersed in 1918.

My cousins, friends and former co-workers were all forced to leave their families and careers behind in the recent battle to fight in a hopeless war ignited by the opposition. Over 100,000 Armenians—myself included—marched the streets of Hollywood during the pandemic, desperately trying to bring attention to a second attempt of genocide. Armenians around the world held similar demonstrations.

Azerbaijan meanwhile has since used the seizure of sacred land to glorify its racism, highlighted by a war “park” it recently created in Baku to boast about their victory by depicting Armenians in a humiliating light. One such putrid part of the park presents the helmets from fallen soldiers. Other areas show dead mannequins. The degrading display invites children to attend, further teaching the systematic hatred and harboring of hard feelings and brainwashing of an innocent generation.

Nene was born in Sofia, Bulgaria in 1933 because her father was forced to flee from his original home in Tekirdağ, Turkey to Burgas, Bulgaria. They did not live in Armenia until her family was awarded a relocation program from Armenian officials in 1946.

Shortly before her death, nene relived the trauma of her past because the atrocious wrongs of the last century were never righted. The stained hands of the perpetrators were never cleansed. The war in Artsakh was one of the last emotional pains she experienced before COVID-19 took over her fragile body.

Nene’s stories can never be heard again, but they’ll be carried in our identities, much like millions of others who share a similar past.

The seeds from strong genocide survivors from over a century ago still remain, sprinkled in concentrated areas from Los Angeles, New York and Boston to Beirut, Iran, Russia, London, Amsterdam, Argentina, Uruguay, Australia and all around the world, presently reaching nearly 11 million.

They exist to preserve their identities and fight against the violation of human rights for people of all backgrounds and beliefs.

To help prevent history from repeating for its people, and other groups.

To raise awareness and educate in order to revitalize a country for a prosperous and promising future ahead.

To protect political interests, the United States has forever pandered to Turkey’s problematic stance even when the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) member has always had crises in the west.

Like several presidents before him, President Joe Biden promised to recognize the Armenian genocide.

“The Armenian Genocide is not an allegation, a personal opinion, or a point of view, but rather a widely documented fact supported by an overwhelming body of historical evidence,” former President Barack Obama once said as an Illinois senator running for office. “The facts are undeniable.”

The entire Armenian nation around the world awaits to see how the United States’ pen can once and for all be mightier than Azerbaijan and Turkey’s swords, guns and drone bombings.

My nene, and every Armenian who’s no longer with us, would be able to rest in peace with a resolution and restitution.

Manouk Akopyan is a journalist who’s written for USA Today, Los Angeles Times and The Guardian, among countless other publications.

The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.

The “Day of Remembrance of the Armenian Genocide” is an anniversary always special for the peoples of Greece and Armenia, linked by centuries of ties, and also a friendship that has been forged in difficult conditions, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said in a statement on the 106^th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, the Armenian national Committee of Greece reports.

“One hundred and six years after the crime of 1915, humanity does not forget the ethnic cleansing of a people, a massive and systematic crime, which, in fact, was organized when the eyes of the planet were focused on the muddy trenches of the First World War,” the Prime Minister said.

“Today, therefore, as every April 24th, we honor the memory of the innocent victims, declaring our faith in respect for human life and dignity, because only peaceful coexistence leads peoples forward, turning their diversity into mutual wealth,” he added.

“Over time, Greece and the Caucasus walked together in mythology and history, culture and traditions. That is why our country could only stand by the side of the Armenians in their latest ordeal. It immediately responded to the request for humanitarian aid. And today, it supports the consolidation of security in the region, based on international law, for a solution that respects the rights of the local population, away from a new, unjust bloodshed,” Mr. Mitsotakis said.

“Greece also does not forget that at the beginning of the 20th century Greeks and Armenians lived together moments of martyrdom. That is why, even in difficult conditions itself, our country was one of the first to treat persecuted Armenians and recognize the Genocide of their people,” the Greek PM stated.

He said this historical coexistence over the centuries continues today thanks to the two communities in the two countries, two stable bridges between, which participate fruitfully in the economic and social life of the two states, renewing their long-standing friendship.