October 9, 2009                                                        Contact: Roupen Kouyoumdjian

 

Ottawa – The Canadian-Armenian communities of Montreal and Toronto will hold two protest rallies this Friday and Saturday and a public gathering to express their frustration and opposition to the signing of “so-called” protocols that will guide the establishment and development of relations between Turkey and Armenia, which was jointly announced on August 31 2009 by the foreign ministers of Armenia, Turkey and Switzerland.

 

The first public protest in Montreal will take place on Friday October 9, 2009 at 9 PM in front of the Armenian Genocide monument in Montreal (in the park on the corner of Avenue Henri-Bourassa and L'Acadie). The second rally will be a youth rally in Toronto, on Saturday October 10 2009 at 2 PM at Nathan Phillips Square-Winston Churchill Statue/Speakers Corner. There will also be a public gathering on Sunday, October 11, 2009 at 2 PM at the Armenian Youth Centre of Toronto (50 Hallcrown Place, Victoria Park Ave. and Highway Heroes).

 

Armenians in Canada and around the world are opposing the protocols because they protect the denialist ambitions of Turkey and abuse the vulnerability of the Armenian Government vis-à-vis its economic, social and geopolitical problems. These protocols are especially adverse to the Armenian Nation’s inalienable rights and interests. Turkey wants to hinder the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide of 1915, by creating historical sub-commissions to examine the events of 1915. Numerous countries and organizations including the Canadian Parliament in April 2004 and the Canadian Government in 2006, the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) in June 1997, June 2006 and October 2006, have accepted the Armenian Genocide. The International Centre of Transitional Justice (ICTJ) that studied the Armenian case requested by a similar historical sub-commission, Turkish-Armenian Reconciliation Commission (TARC), has already concluded that the events of 1915 constituted a Genocide.

Armenians also oppose other parts of the protocols which force Armenia to accept the current borders of Turkey, thus validating the dispossession of Western Armenia and waiving the right of the Armenian Nation to negotiate fully over Armenian Genocide reparations. Turkey wants to force Armenia to accept the current de-facto borders between the two countries. In the Treaty of Sevres, which was the peace treaty signed between the Ottoman Empire and Allies at the end of World War I, there is the arbitral award regarding the borders of Armenia imposed by U.S. President, Woodrow Wilson, and in that award Armenia's border encompassed several provinces of present day Turkey. This was a Binding Decision which was final, without appeal.

 

Armenians are also concerned that the protocols indirectly aim to detract from a just resolution of the Nagorno-Karabagh conflict. The “so-called” protocols call for  ensuring the principles of non-internvention in the internal affairs of other states, and the territorial integrity and inviolability of frontiers of its neighboring States. Turkey wants to use this to affect ongoing negotiations for a just resolution of the Nagorno-Karabagh conflict, call for Armenian withdrawal from the region and ignore the right of the self-determination of the people of Nagorno-Karabagh. Armenians in Nagorno-Karabagh expressed their will for independence twice by referenda in 1992 and 2006.  

 

The rallies in Montreal and Toronto are among a number of public protests being held in Canada, across the world, as well as in Armenia. Armenians around the world, in Los Angeles, Paris, Beirut and elsewhere, have organized protests against Turkish denialism and fascism (a word that we do not hesitate to use, especially when Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on May 23 2009, used it to criticize the Turkish Republic). In Canada hundreds of Armenian Youth gathered on Friday October 2^nd 2009 at the Armenian Community Centre in Toronto and protested against these unfair protocols. Petitions are being signed, and calls to redress the situation are also being communicated to the Foreign Minister and President of Armenia.

 

 

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The ANCC is the largest and the most influential Canadian-Armenian grassroots political organization. Working in coordination with a network of offices, chapters, and supporters throughout Canada and affiliated organizations around the world, the ANCC actively advances the concerns of the Canadian-Armenian community on a broad range of issues.

 

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Le CNAC est l'organisation politique canadienne-arménienne la plus large et influentielle. Collaborant avec une série de bureaux, chapitres et souteneurs à travers le Canada et des organisations affiliées à travers le monde, le CNAC s'occupe activement des inquiétudes de la communauté canadienne-arménienne.