The Christian minority of the Ottoman Empire, part of which was annihilated in the 19-th century, underwent Genocide under the cover of World War I in the 20-th century, which resulted in the slaughter of some 1.5 million Armenians, as well as ethnic Greek and Assyrian communities that lived in Anatolia. It was stated by former Secretary of the UN Human Rights Commission Alfred de Zayas (Geneva, Switzerland) at Ultimate Crime, Ultimate Challenge: Human Rights and Genocide international conference in Yerevan. In his words, the British and French Governments have qualified the crimes of Turks in 1915 as "crimes against humanity." The UN Genocide Convention, adopted in 1948, was arranged and based among others on the Armenian Genocide, Zayas noted. "According to all international legal norms the crimes committed against Armenians in 1915 fully fit the Genocide concept. The same refers to the facts available. The only thing absent in order for this norms to be applied is the acknowledgement of the crime itself and the compensation of the damage to the victims of the crime," the former Secretary of the UN Human Rights Commission said. He also noted there is the opinion that there is no sense to condemn the Armenian Genocide, as those who have committed it are already dead. "However, does it mean that denouncing those murders is useless today? "To my mind, to solve the historical problem it is necessary to pass a court sentence, a sentence of the world public opinion," stated Alfred de Zayas. Turning to history he reminded that Germany in its time acknowledged the Holocaust and paid many-million compensations. "Turkey does not do it, however continues the occupation of historical Armenian lands, churches, houses. Let us imagine for a minute that Germany occupies Jewish synagogues and uses Jewish property until now. Undoubtedly everyone would call such a situation not normal and intolerable," Zayas summed up, Regnum news agency reported.