Your trusted source

A group of deputies from Akhalkalaki City Assembly (Sakrebulo), representing the opposition party “The Alliance of Patriots of Georgia” released a statement, urging the Georgian Parliament to recognize and condemn the Armenian Genocide, Jnews reported.

The statement, released by city hall delegates Zakar Zakaryan, Samvel Petrosyan, Genadi Elizabaryan, Simon Mananyan, and Sargis Uzunyan reminds that in September 2015, at the initiative of Armenia the United Nations General Assembly established December 9th as the International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and of the Prevention of this Crime.  The 9th of December was chosen as it was the anniversary of the adoption of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. 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. In that context reference was made to the Armenian Genocide as the first genocide of the 20th century when up to 1,5 million Armenians living in Turkey were eliminated from their historic homeland through forced deportations and massacres. It was noted that had the Armenian Genocide been condemned and acknowledged at the time, such crimes would not reoccur in the future.

The statement calls, among other things, to hold a minute of silence for the victims of peoples who have suffered genocide - most horrific of human rights violations, ask the Georgian Parliament to follow the path of most developed countries in recognizing and condemning the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire, enable a MP from a single-mandate constituency in Javakheti (predominantly Armenian-populated region of Georgia) to address the plenary session over the topic  with the follow-up adoption of a decision.