SYDNEY: The Hon. Walt Secord MLC condemned the Turkish government for its continued denial of the Armenian Genocide in a powerful address on the floor of the Legislative Council during the first sitting of the NSW parliament in 2012.
In a clear and unequivocal statement on public record, Secord declared that the Turkish government’s denial of the Armenian Genocide was unacceptable.
“It is repugnant for Turkey to deny the deaths of the 1.5 million Armenians,” said the co-deputy chair of the NSW Parliament’s Armenia Australia Parliamentary Friendship Group.
“It is time for Ankara to accept the past and unequivocally recognise the Armenian genocide.”
In his address entitled ‘Genocide Study Tour’, Secord also discussed his recent visits to the Armenian Genocide Museum Institute in Yerevan, the Concentration Camp in Auschwitz and Halabja in Iraq.
He spoke of the lack of a just resolution to the Armenian Genocide as a factor that paved the way for the destruction of European Jewry during the Holocaust.
“Sadly too few of us know of the Armenian Genocide. It was that very denial of history that allowed communities to silently watch the transports to and the smoke of Auschwitz,” said Secord.
The Legislative Council Member thanked the Armenian National Committee of Australia for supporting his recent visit to Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh and pledged to continue encouraging the advocacy efforts of the organisation.
“I would like to thank the Armenian National Committee of Australia's Varant Meguerditchian, Mr Giro Manoyan in Armenia and Mr Sassoon Grigorian of Sydney,” he said.
“Their help made this journey and this education possible. I thank them sincerely and hope to do justice to their efforts and ongoing advocacy.”
ANC Australia Executive Director Varant Meguerditchian immediately contacted Secord to thank him for bringing to light the denial of genocide and sharing his learnings from his “Genocide Study Tour” with his parliamentary colleagues.
“Denial is considered by scholars as the final stage of one genocide and the first stage of the next genocide,” said Meguerditchian.
“We thank Mr Secord for bringing awareness to this issue of humanity by highlighting the relationship between the denial of the Armenian Genocide and the persecution of Jews during the Holocaust.”
