Mr. President. let us consider the events of the Armenian genocide in a historical context. In 1915. the Ottoman government. controlled by the Young Turk Committee. began to use deportation and massacre as it implemented a policy of annihilation directed at Armenians living in the empire. Because the United States remained the sole major Western state with a diplomatic presence in the Ottoman Empire. our Embassy in Constantinople became the primary contact for those reporting on the escalating violence against the Armenians. Therefore. the United States Archives hold some of the most comprehensive documentation in the world concerning the Armenian genocide. The edict of deportation was promulgated on May 27. 1915. However. this act simply formalized a governmental policy which had its roots in the reign of the Ottoman Sultan Abdul Harid II. under whose rule some 300.000 Armenians were massacred from 1894 to 1896. Once the edict was announced. Armenians throughout the empire were deported with little notice. The men were often separated and killed. The women. children. and the elderly were forced to march across Asia Minor and Turkish Armenia into the Syrian desert.
Keywords matched
deported deportation