Today Swedish Parliament votes on recognition of genocides in Ottoman Empire

March 11, 2010 - 14:36 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - Today the Parliament of Sweden will vote the recognition the Armenian Genocide , the genocides of Assyrians and Pontic Greeks in the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. The opposition opposes the recognition.

Minister for Foreign Affairs of Sweden Carl Bildt is also against the Armenian Genocide recognition, because, in his opinion, it would spoil relations with Turkey. Bildt also advocates for Turkey's EU bid.

According to a number of Swedish media, one tempts to assume that the foreign policy of Sweden is designed in Ankara. "The Swedish Parliament, like the parliaments of other EU countries, must recognize the atrocities against Christians in the Ottoman Empire, modern Turkey, in 1915 as genocide. It is about respecting the rights of minorities and peoples, the right to practice their own religion, it is about the most basic - human rights," Swedish newspapers wrote.

Sweden has become home for thousands of Armenians, Syrians, Assyrians and Greeks, who are descendants of massacres' victims and survivors.

The date of the onset of the genocide is conventionally held to be April 24, 1915, the day that Ottoman authorities arrested some 250 Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople. Thereafter, the Ottoman military uprooted Armenians from their homes and forced them to march for hundreds of miles, depriving them of food and water, to the desert of what is now Syria.

To date, twenty countries and 44 U.S. states have officially recognized the events of the period as genocide, and most genocide scholars and historians accept this view. The Armenian Genocide has been also recognized by influential media including The New York Times, BBC, The Washington Post and The Associated Press.

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

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.