Uruguay’s Armenian Youth will march to commemorate Genocide

April 18, 2012 - 21:37 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - Armenian Youth of Uruguay organization has scheduled an April 27 march to commemorate the 97th anniversary of Armenian Genocide in Ottoman Empire.

The march participants will gather at the Faculty of Law of the University of the Republic and proceed to Montevideo city hall.

The organization urges everyone to join the march for promotion of justice and protection of human rights. “We march against the impunity and denial, understanding that the struggle of the Armenian people is the struggle of all peoples, that impunity leads to further atrocities,” the organization’s statement said.

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.