May 20, 2002 - 23:25 AMT
GREEK GENOCIDE IN OTTOMAN TURKEY COMMEMORATED IN ARMENIA
Yesterday in Armenia as well as in many countries of the world the commemoration day of the genocide of the Pontian Greeks was marked. A procession moved to the memorial of the Armenian genocide victims on the initiative of "Patrida" non-governmental organization, which unifies the Greeks residing in Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh. Armenian parliament deputies, Greek embassy officers, Greek community representatives, figures of a number of political and non-governmental organizations commemorated the millions of Armenians and Greeks, who died in Turkey at the beginning of the last century. Let us remind that beginning with 1916 the Young Turk government and them Kemalists pursued a policy aimed at extermination of Greeks. Over 300 thousand Pontian Greeks were killed as a result, some 1.5 million escaped. The Greek community of Armenia, as well as a number of parties address the country authorities the question of the necessity of official recognition of the fact of the genocide of the Pontian Greeks in Ottoman Turkey. As it is known, 1996 the Greek parliament recognized the fact of the Armenian genocide of 1915.