Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

It feels as though this is the 50th occasion, at least, on which I have stood in this place and urged the Australian parliament to properly recognise the genocide committed in the last century by the Ottomans against the Armenian people and indeed the Assyrian and Hellenic peoples. On this occasion, I again call on this parliament to recognise the events that occurred as genocide. I recognise friends from the Armenian community and representatives from the Assyrian and Hellenic communities in the gallery, and their ongoing struggle to have this matter properly recognised by parliaments around the world.

Over recent months, unquestionably, we have witnessed a sea change in events across the Middle East, as people have come out from under years of oppression, expressing their desire for freedom and democracy. Part of the way of delivering freedom and democracy is to properly recognise the injustices of the past. Indeed, recognition is always a precursor to reconciliation.

We as a nation should no longer fail to recognise the truth of history—truth that was recorded even by the Australian media as it was occurring, at the beginning of the 20th century—and so I officially call on our parliament again to recognise the genocide of the Armenians that occurred in Ottoman Turkey between 1915 and 1923. There are countless stories of violence, bashings, brutal murders, starvation and related horrendous activities committed systematically against the Armenians for one reason alone: their race. This is not an issue under discussion. This is not an issue of definition. Any systematic eradication of a race is genocide, regardless of the political or social unease it may bring. To avoid this, recognition understates the magnitude of suffering that the Armenians and others, such as the Assyrians and Hellenics, experienced.

When international jurist Raphael Lemkin coined the term 'genocide', he described the deaths of Armenians from 1915 to 1923 as a defining example. I note the chilling words of Adolf Hitler in the course of his mad justification of the Jewish Holocaust; he remarked at the time, 'No-one remembers the Armenians.' Well, since then, more than 20 nations have recognised the Armenian genocide as a crime against humanity, as have a number of international organisations, including the International Association of Genocide Scholars, the European Parliament, the World Council of Churches and South American parliamentarians. So Australia should be next. Our country has a strong association with the events beginning in 1915. The Ottomans began their genocide of the Armenian people on 24 April 1915—the day before the first Australian soldiers landed at Anzac Cove—and many Australian soldiers witnessed the tragic events the Armenian race suffered at the hands of the Ottomans.

To commemorate and recognise this, almost 100 years after the genocide, we have present in the gallery the Chairman of the Armenian National Committee World Council, Mr Hagop Der Khatchadourian. Mr Der Khatchadourian has the challenging task of representing the more than seven million members of the Armenian diaspora. There are double the number of Armenians living outside of Armenia than living in Armenia—a relic of the millions of Armenians driven from their country, their homeland and their way of life as a result of the genocide.

I myself have Armenian heritage, albeit untraceable because history did not record in writing what happened to many of the individuals involved. What I do know is that my grandfather, who was born in Aleppo, had members of his own family flee Armenia as a result of their persecution by the Ottomans. So that history, whilst unwritten, must be recorded in this parliament and must be recorded by all people who have a sense that they need to speak out against genocide. I again call on this parliament to join other parliaments around the world in recognising the Armenian genocide. (Time expired)

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