100th anniversary of Armenian massacre marked worldwide

French President Francois Hollande joined with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and other foreign dignitaries who came to lay a single yellow rose each in a wreath of forget-me-nots marking the 100th anniversary of the massacre of Armenians by Ottoman Turks who feared that Christian Armenians would “side with Russia” during World War I after many of them formed volunteer battalions to help the Russian army fight against the Turks in the Caucasus region. Examiner writes.

It is estimated that more than 1.5 of them were either killed or deported in forced marches at the time. Although modern Turkey vehemently protests the term “genocide,” even Pope Francis recently called upon the world to recognize it as such. However, President Obama deliberately stopped short of using the term for fear of angering an important American ally, as citizens here held their own memorials in cities throughout the US.

The memorial service, which took place yesterday, marked the day when approximately 250 Armenian “intellectuals” were rounded up as a prelude to the mass killings and expulsions, and was attended by some 30,000 people participating in a torchlit parade before assembling at the memorial site known as Tsiternakaberd over looking the nation’s capital. In the meantime, Turkey’s Minister in charge of the country’s relations with the European Union, Volkan Bozkir, attended a separate service in Istanbul at the Armenian Patriarchate, despite Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s vehement insistance that their nation’s predecessors “never committed genocide.”

At the same time, churches throughout Jerusalem tolled their bells 100 times before ecumenical services Friday at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to mark the anniversary. The Armenian community in East Jerusalem, is one of the oldest outside of Armenia, itself, and has existed there for centuries, with many new Armenian emigrants coming to settle there following the Soviet Union’s collapse.