Assyrian Author Addresses British House of Lords on Genocide

     

Los Angeles – AINA — Rosie Malek-Yonan, author of The Crimson Field who serves on the Board of Advisor at Seyfo Center Europe and U.S. was invited to send a statement regarding genocide to be read at the House of Lords on 12 March 2008, chaired by Lord Rea. Statement of Rosie Malek-Yonan to the House of Lords (London):

“In order to strive for world peace, we must first clean house.
By that I mean we must acknowledge all genocides without exception. So long as these open wounds are not healed, we continue to pass on the hatred and anger towards one another because we feel defenseless. It is time to end the cycle of violence and hatred by opening the dialog about atrocities that have occurred to all people of all nations particularly those nations who have been subjected to genocide. No one nation is above the rest. No one genocide is more important than the rest.

The very definition of genocide is the deliberate killings of a large group of people particularly those of a certain ethnic group or nation. The recognition and acceptance of a genocide, and mass murder of nations is not to merely point a finger at a tyrant guilty of those crimes. It is acceptance of facts and truths with the ultimate goal to mend bridges between the races. It is not to merely condemn but to create the first step towards world peace.” On 24 April 2008, Ms. Malek-Yonan was asked to provide another similar statement to be read at the House of Commons (London) at the Armenian Genocide Day Conference, Sponsored and Chaired by Andrew George M.P.

Statement of Rosie Malek-Yonan to the House of Commons (London)
“The absence of the negotiation of world peace is the single greatest threat to humanity and the future of a violent-free world. In order to achieve freedom from war, we must examine the actions that continually create the cycle of anger and hatred as the catalyst to any conflict between nations.

World peace will always remain a distant thought when reconciliation in the aftermath of genocide is not at the forefront of all discussions of human rights violations relative to those crimes. When we perpetually allow the practice of genocide and holocaust and consent to the denial of such actions to linger for decades as in the case of the Assyrian, Armenian and Pontic Greek Genocide, we are in essence consenting to denial as a compromise. Denial is not compromise.

To the survivors and the children and grandchildren of the survivors of the Assyrian, Armenian, and Pontic Greek Genocide of 1914-1918 in Ottoman Turkey and northwestern Iran, there is no valid justification for the renunciation of facts. With the acknowledgement of past and present genocides we can slowly begin to mend the broken bridges that may ultimately lead the human race to eradicate bloodshed and violence among nations of this world. But so long as we turn a blind-eye to these killings, we are sanctioning the ongoing slaughter such as today’s modern-day Assyrian Genocide occurring in Iraq since the beginning of the 2003 war.

A formal pronouncement by the Turkish government of the Assyrian, Armenian, and Pontic Greek Genocide will bring closure to not only the survivors of the genocide, but also to the Turkish people in that the nearly century-old hatred can begin to give way to human solidarity. Anything short of that will surely continue to threaten all hope of peace.”