Alabama has become the 49th U.S. state to officially recognize Ottoman-era killings and deportations of Armenians as genocide.
Kay Ivey, Governor of the State of Alabama, proclaimed April 2019 as Genocide Awareness Month.
“We welcome this proclamation by Governor Ivey, making Alabama the 49th state in the union to officially re-affirm this international crime against humanity,” said Armenian National Committee of America-Eastern Region Board Chairman Steve Mesrobian.
“This proclamation serves as a powerful reminder that truth about genocides should never be held hostage to the denial of its perpetrators and those who continue to profit from that crime.”
Thus, all U.S. states except Mississippi have recognized the Armenian Genocide.
Since the 1960s, the Armenian community of the United States has sought Washington’s reaffirmation that the massacres of 1.5 million Armenians in Ottoman Turkey in 1915 constituted genocide and its condemnation of the crime. However, the White House leaders have generally avoided the use of the term genocide in their annual addresses and offered their support in the reconciliation of Armenians and Turks.
The 44th and 45th U.S. Presidents, Barack Obama and Donald Trump, used the Armenian expression “Meds Yeghern” in their April 24 messages.
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