Support for Armenian Genocide Resolution

SUPPORT FOR ARMENIAN GENOCIDE RESOLUTION -- (Extensions of Remarks - September 11, 2007)

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SPEECH OF
HON. EDWARD J. MARKEY
OF MASSACHUSETTS
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2007

* Mr. MARKEY. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of passage of H. Res. 106, the Affirmation of the United States Record on the Armenian Genocide Resolution.

* It is long past time for the United States to officially recognize the massacre of one and a half million Armenians early in the 20th century for what it undeniably was: genocide.

* Year, after year, after year, I've been proud to cosponsor the Armenian Genocide resolution. Last year, over 150 House members cosponsored this important legislation to properly recognize the Armenian Genocide. This year, the resolution has already received 226 cosponsorships, a majority of the Members of the House. This impressive number reflects the broad bipartisan support for an official recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

* Countries all around the world have adopted similar resolutions to ensure that the atrocities committed against the Armenian people are properly recognized as acts of Genocide. Canada, France, Switzerland, Greece, and Poland all have passed resolutions affirming the recognition of the Genocide. Properly recognizing the Armenian Genocide here in America is essential to ensure that all past genocides are never forgotten and all future atrocities are never permitted.

* The writer Milan Kundera once wrote that ``The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.''

* There are those that would deny the Armenian Genocide, just as there are those that deny the reality of the Nazi Holocaust. In commemorating the Armenian Genocide as we will do with this Resolution, we collectively engage in that struggle of memory against forgetting. The dangers of forgetting are real--as Adolph Hitler plotted the Holocaust, he was emboldened by the failure of the international community to note the first genocide of the 20th century, writing in 1939 ``Who still talks nowadays of the extermination of the Armenians?'' But this resolution is not just intended as a remembrance of a dark past, but as a way of animating future policies with a commitment to prevent such things from ever happening again, as well as a step towards building a better future for the Armenian people and for all people.

* I commend Representative Schiff for introducing this critical resolution, and again commit myself to work for its timely adoption.

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