LONDON—Baroness Caroline Cox on Monday called on a key committee in the UK House of Lords to recognize the Armenian Genocide, reported ArmeniaNow.com.
She raised the issue during an hour-long question answer session with a government minister in the Grand Committee of the House of Lords.
In her comments, Cox, appealed to the committee to “recognize the massacres committed against Armenians in Ottoman Turkey as Genocide.”
Presenting the historic facts to support recognition of the crime, the Baroness said “It is high time to join the civilized nations which recognized the Armenian Genocide, especially given the fact that this year marks the 95th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide committed in 1915.”
Baroness Glenys Kinnock of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office argued against Cox, saying the move to recognize the crime would torpedo efforts to normalize relations between Armenia and Turkey.
Prior to the discussions, the UK-based Armenian Solidarity Organization (ASO) released and distributed a statement and special booklets to British lawmakers criticizing the Secretary of State for Justice, Lord Chancellor Jack Straw, for his efforts to block passage of genocide recognition legislation.
According to ASO representatives, Erdogan met with Straw on his trip to London earlier this month. During their talks, Straw pledged he would prevent parliament from adopting a draft resolution recognizing the Armenian Genocide.
The statement circulated by the ASO, therefore, called on British lawmakers to “put pressure upon the UK prime minister to reprimand Jack Straw for the denial of the Armenian Holocaust.”
Jack Straw was the young left wing firebrand leader of the Students Union in the 60's. He had a conscious; his activities were closely monitored by the wary intelligence services in the UK. Now, in his mid sixties, he has grown into a reactionary with no sentiments bar that of ensuring that Turkey is not offended at all cost. It is a great pity that the minister for Justice should act in this an unjust manner.
Here are a few words for Mr. Jack Straw to consider:
QUOTE
“In 1915 the Turkish Government began and ruthlessly carried out the infamous general massacre and deportation of Armenians in Asia Minor. Three or four hundred thousand men, women, and children escaped into Russian territory and others into Persia or Mesopotamia; but the clearance of the race from Asia Minor was about as complete as such an act, on a scale so great, could well be… . There is no reasonable doubt that this crime was planned and executed for political reasons. The opportunity presented itself for clearing Turkish soil of a Christian race!”
WINSTON CHURCHILL
The World Crisis, vol. 5, “The Aftermath” (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1929)
UNQUOTE