Italian senators pass bill criminalizing denial of genocides

February 13, 2015 - 11:29 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - Italian senators voted this week in favor of a bill criminalizing the denial of the Holocaust and other genocides, following changes to the proposed law to protect freedom of speech, Asbarez reported, citing Italian news agency The Local.

A total of 234 senators voted for the bill, while eight abstained and three voted against the legislation, which supposes a three-year sentence for promoting, inciting or committing acts of racial discrimination based in part or entirely on the denial of genocide. Crimes against humanity and war crimes are also covered in the bill, which now needs to pass through Italy’s lower house before it can become law.

The Senate vote follows revisions which lawmakers say ensure freedom of speech and the freedom to study are upheld.

Senator Giuseppe Lumia, part of the justice committee, said the vote marked a “turning point” in Italy. “Denying the Holocaust and genocides will be punished as in so many other countries,” he was quoted as saying.

France and Germany are among the European states which have criminalized Holocaust denial. A British bishop was in 2013 convicted of the crime, after giving an interview to Swedish television in which he questioned the number of Jews killed in Nazi concentration camps.

The Armenian Genocide

The Armenian Genocide (1915-23) was the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I. It was characterized by massacres and deportations, involving forced marches under conditions designed to lead to the death of the deportees, with the total number of deaths reaching 1.5 million.

The majority of Armenian Diaspora communities were formed by the Genocide survivors.

Present-day Turkey denies the fact of the Armenian Genocide, justifying the atrocities as “deportation to secure Armenians”. Only a few Turkish intellectuals, including Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk and scholar Taner Akcam, speak openly about the necessity to recognize this crime against humanity.

The Armenian Genocide was recognized by Uruguay, Russia, France, Lithuania, Italy, 45 U.S. states, Greece, Cyprus, Lebanon, Argentina, Belgium, Austria, Wales, Switzerland, Canada, Poland, Venezuela, Chile, Bolivia, the Vatican, Luxembourg, Brazil, Germany, the Netherlands, Paraguay, Sweden, Venezuela, Slovakia, Syria, Vatican, as well as the European Parliament and the World Council of Churches.