Biden Must Call the Armenian Genocide by Its Name, Los Angeles Times

United States President Joe Biden has the opportunity this month, nearly a century after the mass slaughter of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, to use the accurate term—genocide—to describe these events. According to Armenpress, this is stated in an editorial by the Los Angeles Times.

“It is astonishing that the very question of whether to label the events that occurred to Armenians as ‘genocide’ is even up for debate,” the Los Angeles Times writes, referring to it as “a crime against humanity, the pain of which has only grown over history as governments hesitate to recognize it.”

The publication notes that as a result of the Armenian Genocide, the population of Armenians in Turkey decreased from about 2.1 million to several hundred thousand.

The Los Angeles Times emphasizes that while the Turkish government continues to deny the committed atrocities, asserting that these were the consequences of war and that not only Christian Armenians, but also Jews and Muslims died, in reality, Armenians were targeted based on their ethnic identity.

Comparing it to the genocide against the Jews, the publication states that it is similar to contesting the event by saying, “it wasn’t that bad, others died as well.” “That is an absurdity of insulting proportions,” writes the Los Angeles Times.

The publication highlights that although the Turkish government continues to firmly deny the events, many countries around the world justly recognize and officially refer to it as the “Armenian Genocide.”

According to the Los Angeles Times, the issue is particularly acute in the US, given that Turkey, a NATO member, is a military ally of the United States with an American military base located in Incirlik. Nevertheless, Turkish-American relations have deteriorated in recent years due to Turkish-Russian relations. This led the U.S. Senate to officially recognize the Armenian Genocide in 2019.

However, the decision-maker in US foreign policy is the White House. The publication recalls that the 44th President Barack Obama had a golden opportunity to fulfill his campaign promise and recognize the historical fact on the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. Nonetheless, Obama stepped back at the last minute and instead used the term “Meds Yeghern,” which is used in Armenian for Genocide. The same approach was taken by the administration of his successor, Donald Trump.

The Los Angeles Times points out that President Biden is one of the rare recent presidents who deeply understands US foreign policy in a comprehensive way, following George Herbert Walker Bush. “However, he has also positioned himself as a moderate pragmatist. Undoubtedly, foreign policy can be thought of as a multi-dimensional chess game, where the idea is not necessarily to win but to ensure that your opponent is losing. However, here the truth and the just recognition of history are important. Biden must call the Armenian Genocide by its name,” states the Los Angeles Times editorial.