Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, has joined thousands of Armenians to rally outside the Turkish Consulate in Los Angeles to mark the 102nd anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.
“One hundred and two years ago, the Ottoman Empire began a gruesome campaign against the Armenians, murdering 1.5 million men, women and children. The very first genocide of the 21st Century, the Armenian Genocide, is a wound which will never truly heal,” Rep. Schiff said in a Facebookpost.
“Today, we march today to commemorate, to remember, and to demand justice,” he added.
Schiff blasted Republican President Donald Trump for failing to recognize the events as a “genocide.”
“Today, we received a disappointing statement from yet another president, refusing to acknowledge the murder of 1.5 million Armenians from 1915-1923 for what it was – a genocide,” FOX 11 quotes Schiff as saying.
“President Trump now joins a long line of both Republican and Democratic presidents unwilling to confront Turkey, and by refusing to do so, he has made the United States once again a party to its campaign of denial,” he added.
“Today, we remember and honor the memory of those who suffered during the Meds Yeghern, one of the worst mass atrocities of the 20th Century,” Trump said.
“Beginning in 1915, one and a half million Armenians were deported, massacred or marched to their deaths in the final years of the Ottoman Empire. I join the Armenian community in America and around the world in mourning the loss of innocent lives and the suffering endured by so many,” he stated.
