Armenia marks centennial of massacre of 1.5M by Turks

Anna Arutunyan | Special for USA TODAY

Corrections & Clarifications: An earlier version of this article misstated the number of nations that recognize the mass killings of Armenians a century ago by Turks as "genocide." There are 22.

YEREVAN, Armenia — One-hundred years after up to 1.5 million Armenians were massacred by Turks from the Ottoman Empire, this mountainous, landlocked republic struggles to define its future.

This week, Armenians commemorated a century since the atrocities with concerts, marches and demands that other countries join 22 nations that recognize the killings as genocide, the term used by many historians to define the mass killings.

In the United States, where 43 states formally recognize the massacre as genocide, President Obama has avoided using the term. The White House sent Treasury Secretary Jack Lew to lead the U.S. delegation to Yerevan's commemoration events.

For some locals in Armenia's capital Yerevan, Obama's position draws continued disappointment.

"For me, America is a symbol of higher education and after that, what (Obama) did was not good," said Artur Ovanesyan, a historian who now drives a cab. "We waited for a gesture in Armenia. Now I feel I have been hurt."

The city was dotted with violet and gold forget-me-nots, the adopted symbol of the massacre. Billboards in English, Armenian and Russian urged locals and visitors to "remember and demand," while other posters spelled out the numbers "1915" using swords, hatchets and other instruments used in the killings.

Turkey has long insisted that those killed, mostly Christian Armenians by Muslim Turks, were victims of a civil war and unrest as the Ottoman Empire collapsed during World War I.

There was some low-key display of anti-Turkish sentiment. One car was spotted dragging a Turkish flag over the pavement and a few other cars displayed posters ridiculing neighboring Azerbaijan, a former Soviet republic with close cultural ties to Turkey that was embroiled in a conflict with Armenia following the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Locked between Turkey to the West, Iran to the South, Azerbaijan to the East and Georgia to the North, Armenia remains in a precarious geopolitical position, worsened by Turkey's refusal to recognize the killings as genocide.

Armenia's border with Turkey is patrolled by Russian troops and has remained closed over Armenia's support of the de facto independent Armenian enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan, where an ethnic conflict sparked a war in the early 1990s.

Deadly clashes continue to flare up between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the status of Nagorno-Karabakh. In the latest conflict between the breakaway republic and Azerbaijan on Wednesday, Azerbaijan's Defense Ministry said five Armenians were killed, although the Nagorno-Karabakh Defense Ministry said one Azerbaijani was killed and there were no Armenian casualties.

Seeking a powerful ally, Armenia joined the Eurasian Economic Union with Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus earlier this year. Russia's President Vladimir Putin was one of four world leaders, together with the presidents of France, Serbia and Cyrpus to visit Armenia's capital on Friday.

"April 24, 2015 is a sorrowful date linked to one of the most tragic and dramatic events in the history of humanity — the genocide of the Armenian people," Putin said in an official statement published on the Kremlin's website. "One hundred years later, we bow our heads before the memory of all victims of this tragedy, which our country has always seen as its own pain and sorrow."

On Friday Putin, along with French President François Hollande, placed a yellow rose inside a wreath at the Tsitsernakaberd memorial complex during a two-hour ceremony.

In Yerevan, most of the centennial events focused on remembrance, not politics.

"For us Armenians, remembrance is a moral obligation and, at the same time, an inalienable individual and collective right," Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said Tuesday.

On Thursday, Armenia's Apostolic Church canonized the up to 1.5 million victims in an unprecedented ceremony. Thousands of people turned up to Etchmiadzin, the seat of the Armenian Apostolic Church, a half-hour's drive from Yerevan.

For many locals, the emotions from recognizing the victims as saints were too strong to put into words.

"This is a very difficult day for us," said Alvina Seropyan, who came to Etchmiadzin with her 3-year-old son and was standing on the lawn holding a branch of lilacs near where the ceremony was being held. "For so many years I didn't come to Etchmiadzin, now I felt I had to. It is so difficult to describe what I feel right now."

According to clergy, recognizing the sainthood of the victims was intended as a psychological reconciliation for the people.

"I cannot say anything about the political side of it. But spiritually, morally speaking, we are elevating them from being victims to the rank of victory," said Bishop Bagrat Galstanyan, who took part in the ceremony.

"It's a psychological change. Since the genocide of 1915 we have been perceiving them as victims. Now we will be accepting them as those who have made victory over death."