Music by Komitas opened a conference at the UN headquarters in New York. The event initiated by Armenia’s Permanent Mission to UN was dedicated to the prevention and raising awareness of genocide, the Voice of America reports.
“The Armenian nation passed through the horrors of genocide at the beginning of the 20th century. Therefore, Armenia has a special obligation to unite efforts to prevent genocide,” Armenia’s Permanent Representative to the UN Mher Margaryan said in his opening remarks.
The genocide was preceded by events in which the rights and fundamental freedoms of the country’s most vulnerable groups were suppressed, Margaryan noted.
Simon Adams, Executive Director of the Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect , who hosted the conference, reminded that April 24, 2020 will mark the 105th anniversary of start of the “targeted killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire on April 24, 1915.”
“As a result of these actions more than one and a half million lives were destroyed. The United Kingdom, France, and Russia in May 1915 accused the Ottoman Empire of committing crimes against humanity – the first time that term was used to describe the extent of the atrocities,” he added.
In September 2015, the United Nations General Assembly established 9 December as the International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and of the Prevention of this Crime at the initiative of Armenia.
The 9th of December is the anniversary of the adoption of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (the “Genocide Convention”). This year marks the 70th anniversary of the Convention.
The purpose of the day is to raise awareness of the Genocide Convention and its role in combating and preventing the crime of genocide, as defined in the Convention, and to commemorate and honor its victims.
In adopting the resolution, without a vote, the 193-member Assembly reiterated the responsibility of each individual State to protect its populations from genocide, which entails the prevention of such a crime, including incitement to it.
