The 106th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide was marked by protestors outside the Turkish Consulate in Zurich, Switzerland.
The protest was held under the slogan “We have not forgotten the genocide, and we will not let it be forgotten”.
Peoples’ United Revolutionary Movement (HBDH) representatives spoke in a joint statement, condemning the Turkish state’s racist and monolithic policies carried out by the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) against people in Turkey and Kurdistan today.
In addition, European Assyrians Union representatives spoke at the demonstration and said Mar Yakov Church priest Sefer Bileçen was sentenced to two years and one month in prison on the charge of supporting a terror organisation, and stated it was a continuation of the Seyfo massacre.
Armenian Genocide
The Armenian Genocide was the mass murder and ethnic cleansing of around one million ethnic Armenians. It took place in regions of the Ottoman Empire and was carried out by its ruling party, the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), during World War I. An estimated 800,000 to 1.2 million Armenian women, children, and elderly people were sent on death marches leading to the Syrian Desert in 1915 and 1916. Around one million people perished and thousands became homeless and stateless refugees.