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Reverend the Hon. FRED NILE [9.20 p.m.]: I would like to bring to the attention of the House a very important event that occurred on 24 April last. It was the ninetieth anniversary of the Armenian genocide. This commemorative event was held at the Willoughby Civic Centre, which was packed with mainly Australian Armenians, including some of those who survived the genocide that commenced on 24 April 1915. The commemorative program included the singing of the Australian and Armenian national anthems by the Armenian school children's choir, youth addresses in Armenian and English, moving violin music and an Armenian string ensemble.
Statements were made on behalf of the Prime Minister, John Howard, by the Hon. Joe Hockey; on behalf of the Hon. Kim Beazley by Mr Tony Burke, MP, recently of this House; and on behalf of the Premier, Bob Carr, by the Hon. John Watkins; MP, and by the Hon. John Brogden, Leader of the Opposition. The key address was given by Mrs Hilda Tchoboian, President of the European Armenian Federation. The closing prayer and blessings were given by His Eminence Archbishop Aghan Baliozian, Primate of the Armenian Apostolic Church of Australia and New Zealand.
Special mention was made that Ryde City Council had recently passed a motion marking the ninetieth anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. Ryde City Council passed the following motion, which was moved by an Armenian member of the council, Independent councillor Mr Sarkis Yedelian:
That this Council:
(1) acknowledges this year as marking the occasion of the 90th anniversary commemoration of the Genocide of the Armenians perpetrated by the then Ottoman Government between the years 1915 and 1922;
(2) joins with the Armenian community of Ryde in honouring the memory of the 1.5 million men, women and children who died in the first genocide of the twentieth century;
(3) recognises 24th April every year as a day of remembrance of the Armenian genocide;
(4) condemns the genocide of the Armenians and all other acts of genocide committed as the ultimate act of racial, religious and cultural intolerance;
(5) calls on the Commonwealth Government to officially condemn:
(i) the genocide of the Armenians
(ii) any attempt to deny such crimes against humanity.
On 24 April this year, on the eve of the ninetieth anniversary of the Anzac landings, Armenians the world over, including the many thousands of Armenian Australians living in Ryde, will commemorate the ninetieth anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. In 1915, in anticipation of the Allied invasion, the Ottoman Empire set in motion a plan to exterminate the entire Christian Armenian population living on their ancestral lands of eastern Anatolia, part of what is today the Republic of Turkey. This state-sponsored program resulted in the brutal extermination of some 1.5 million Armenian men, women and children. Councillor Yedelian, in moving the motion, said:
As the first Australian Councillor of Armenian ancestry, and son of a survivor of the Armenian Genocide, I feel honoured to have moved this motion. The importance of this commemorative motion, however, goes beyond the Armenian-Australian community, many thousands of whom call the City of Ryde home.
In stark contrast to post-Nazi Germany, which has acknowledged and sought to atone for the crimes of the Nazi regime, successive Turkish governments have refused to come to terms with their own history. The 'industry of genocide denial' by successive Turkish States has set a very dangerous precedent, which has already been relied upon by at least one mass murderer, Hitler, for his genocidal crimes, and cannot be left without redress.
As the City of Ryde has one of the largest and growing Armenian Australian constituencies, it is fitting that Ryde council has added its name to the growing list of multinational, national, State, provincial and municipal legislative bodies, including the New South Wales Parliament—as honourable members know, we have a memorial here in our parliamentary gardens—that have commemorated and reaffirmed the historical truth of the Armenian Genocide, and which have provided a resounding response to Hitler's self-justifying question in 1939, before he embarked on his genocidal deeds during World War II against the Jewish people and others, "Who remembers now the destruction of the Armenians?" That was the statement of Adolf Hitler, assuming he had won the war, to excuse what he had done to Jewish people. As with a similar motion passed unanimously by the New South Wales Parliament in 1997, the Ryde Council motion also calls on the Federal Parliament to add its voice to this important call. [Time expired.]