French Armenians mark 90th anniversary of Treaty of Sevres signing

April 12, 2010 - 12:58 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Armenian community of France marked the 90th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Sevres. Nearly 250 people, including Armenian Ambassador to France Vigen Tchitetchian, Primate of the Armenian Diocese of France, Bishop Norvan Zakarian, leaders of the Armenian, Chaldean, Assyrian, Kurdish and Greek communities, attended the ceremony, freelance French journalist Jean Eckian told PanARMENIAN.Net

Under auspices of the mayor of Sevres, M. Francois Kosciusko-Morizet, and National Association of Armenian Veterans, the mayor of the Chaville Jean-Jacques Guillet briefed on the history of the Treaty signing.

For her part, Mrs. Hilda Tchoboian, the chairperson of the European Armenian Federation, said that “the Treaty of Lausanne did not obliterate the Treaty of Sevres.”

“These are two separate documents,” she said, adding that the Treaty of Sevres was the signal of the resurrection of the Armenian nation and that the past cannot be forgotten.

The Treaty of Sevres

The Treaty of Sevres was signed on August 10, 1920. Article 89 of the Treaty reads that “Turkey and Armenia as well as the other High Contracting Parties agree to submit to the arbitration of the President of the United States of America the question of the frontier to be fixed between Turkey and Armenia in the Vilayets of Erzerum, Trebizond, Van and Bitlis, and to accept his decision thereupon, as well as any stipulations he may prescribe as to access for Armenia to the sea, and as to the demilitarization of any portion of Turkish territory adjacent to the said frontier.”