ARMENIAN FM: ARMENIANS LIVED MOST OF LAST CENTURY IN REGIME EXISTING SOLELY OWING TO TOTAL ABSENCE OF HUMAN RIGHTS PROTECTION

PanARMENIAN.Net - «Armenians have lived most of the last century in a regime, which existed only at the expense of total absence of protection of human rights,» Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian stated when addressing the 61-st session of the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva, the FM Press Service reported. «In the period previous to this one we had the grievous honor to become victims of the first Genocide of the past century and we still continued to fight for the rights of the Armenians of Nagorno Karabakh,» he noted. «As a minority, living in the Ottoman Empire, their call for the application of the lofty principles of liberty, equality and fraternity, led to their death sentence. Today, their survivors, living within and outside the Republic of Armenia expect that the world's avowal of the universality of those same noble principles will lead to recognition that Genocide was committed against Armenians,» Vartan Oskanian stated. When commenting on the calls of the Turkish party to start a historical discussion, the Minister confirmed Armenia's readiness to dialogue. "Let's not confuse the two kinds of dialogue," he said. "One is a debate about history. The other is a political discussion. Periodic calls by various Turkish administrations for historical debate simply delay the process of reconciling with the truth," the minister accentuated.