A large crowd gathered on Istanbul’s central Istiklal Avenue on April 24 to commemorate the 1915 killings of Armenians, which Turkey refuses to recognize as “genocide,” the Hurriyet Daily News reports.
Nearly 1,000 people, including renowned journalists, writers and activists, lit candles and held pictures of those who lost their lives in an event that was staged for the first time in Istanbul in 2010.
Rakel Dink, the wife of the murdered Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, and the parents of Sevag Şahin Balıkçı, a young Armenian killed while performing his military duty on April 24, 2011, also attended this year’s commemoration.
The names of prominent Armenian public figures and community leaders who perished in 1915 were also read out during the event.
