SYDNEY: The National Armenian Genocide Commemoration Evening on Wednesday 24th April 2019 - which will honour the 104th anniversary of the 1.5 million Armenians, Greeks and Assyrians who were massacred by Ottoman Turkey in 1915 - will feature strong Federal and New South Wales Parliamentary representation, led by Premier Gladys Berejiklian.
Berejiklian was recently returned to office, this time making history as the first female to be popularly elected Premier of Australia's largest state of New South Wales.
The first female to serve as Premier of New South Wales, and now serving in the Upper House of Australia's Federal Parliament, Senator Kristina Keneally will also be in attendance at The Concourse Chatswood, along with her Federal parliamentary colleagues from the House of Representatives in Trent Zimmerman (Chair of the Armenia-Australia Inter-Parliamentary Union Friendship Group) and John Alexander.
Other NSW State Parliamentarians who will be in attendance includes the new Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, Jonathan O'Dea (Chair of NSW Parliamentary Friends of Armenia), Customer Service Minister Victor Dominello, as well as Members of the Legislative Council Walt Secord (Vice Chair of NSW Parliamentary Friends of Armenia), Abigail Boyd and Fred Nile.
There will be several members of local governments also in attendance, led by the Mayor of the City of Willoughby, Gail Gidney-Giles.
"Our community is honoured to be remembering our fallen ancestors along with friends in politics; elected officials who have stood in Parliaments, advocating for recognition and justice for the Armenian Genocide," commented Armenian National Committee of Australia (ANC-AU) Executive Director, Haig Kayserian.
"Premier Gladys Berejiklian is the granddaughter of Armenian genocide survivors, while the others who have confirmed their attendance are made up of both new and long-time supporters of the Armenian cause," Kayserian added.
The National Armenian Genocide Commemoration Evening, organised by the Armenian Genocide Commemorative Committee (AGCC) of Australia, will include a keynote address by the Vice President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, Dr. Melanie O'Brien. Dr. O'Brien is a Senior Lecturer of International Law at the University of Western Australia, teaching International Humanitarian Law, Public International Law, and Research units.
Dr. O'Brien's keynote address at the National Armenian Genocide Commemoration Evening is titled "Social Death: The Armenian Genocide and Cultural Destruction", where she will be speaking to photographs she has personally taken of specific sites of Armenian heritage that were destroyed, proving that targeting religion and culture is as much a tactic of genocide as physical destruction.
The
National Armenian Genocide Commemoration Evening is an annual event. It will be held at
The Concourse in Chatswood on Wednesday, 24th April 2019 (7pm for 7:30pm start), is regularly attended by approximately 1,000 members of the Sydney Armenian community, religious, political, NGO, media, diplomatic and academic leaders from across the country.
Meanwhile, the
Melbourne Armenian Genocide Commemoration Evening, which will take place at
Springvale Town Hall on the same night and at the same time, will also feature a significant audience of political leaders, led by Federal Parliamentarians, Tim Wilson MP and Senator Raff Ciccone.
Melbourne's keynote address will be delivered by prominent genocide scholar, Dr. Donna-Lee Frieze.
