After recognition of Sayfo genocide by French Senate, resolution submitted to Assemblée Nationale for inclusion in law

PARIS – On February 8, the French Senate adopted, by 302 votes to 2, a resolution which recognized the Sayfo Genocide of 1915-1918 and called for official government recognition and establishment of April 24 as the annual day of commemoration of this genocide.

The resolution has now been submitted to the Assemblée Nationale by Republican Member of Parliament Raphaël Schellenberger, reports the Association of Assyrian-Chaldeans in France.

The proposed text holds to 2 articles to be included in French law; (1) “France publicly recognizes the genocide of the Assyrians-Chaldeans, perpetrated during the First World War,” and (2) “France commemorates each year on April 24 the memory of the victims of the Assyrian genocide of the First World War.”

The Turkish government has not yet officially responded to the French proposal to legislate the Sayfo Genocide. Throughout the history of the Turkish Republic (est. 1923), it has always had an official position of genocide denial.

Even last week, the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the Mexican Senate’s adoption of a resolution recognizing the Armenian Genocide, dismissing it as “a null and void attempt which dares to rewrite history for political purposes.” According to the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, lawmaking bodies should not take up the role of historian or judge.

The following is a provisional translation of the proposed French legal text.

Why should France recognize the Assyrian-Chaldean genocide of 1915-1918?

Our country has a role of protection of the Christians of the East, which is the legacy of a long history dating back to the Capitulations signed by François I with Sultan Soliman the Magnificent in 1535.

Memory and history contribute to the identity of peoples. Forgetting and denial undermine the respect of the victims. France must honor its historical and moral duty to protect the Christian minorities of the East.

A century ago, the genocide of the Assyrians-Chaldeans-Syriacs was ignored, and it continues to be ignored, just as is today the genocide of the Christians of the East.

This genocide, however, provoked the massive exodus of these populations in the Caucasus, in Syria, in Iraq and in the rest of the world. Their flight continued until the 1970s, because they were reduced by the Turks to ” second-class citizens”.

Although the Assyrian genocide took place during the same period and in the same context as the Armenian and Pontic Greek genocides, it is still not recognized by France today, even though France was bound by the Sykes-Picot agreements of 1916 and by its role as protector.

The Assyrian genocide refers to the mass murder of the « Assyrian » population of the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. The Assyrian population in northern Mesopotamia was forcibly displaced and massacred by Ottoman and Kurdish forces.

Estimates of the total number of deaths vary but the number of deaths is upward of 250,000, which is more than half of the population at the time.

The Assyrian population under the Ottoman Empire numbered over 500,000 in the early twentieth century and was largely concentrated in what is now northwestern Iran, Iraq, and Turkey. Like other Christians in the empire, they were treated as second-class citizens and were denied access to certain positions. Many Assyrians were subjected to Kurdish brigandage, massacred or forcibly converted to Islam, as was the case with the Assyrian and Armenian communities of Diyarbakir during the massacres of 1895 and 1896.

The Treaty of Sèvres, signed on August 10, 1920, recognized the Assyrians-Chaldeans by virtue of Article 62 (Section III, Kurdistan). It is within this framework that, through the Assyrian associations of the diaspora, the European Union has tried to exert pressure on the Turkish government to have this people recognized.

In 2007, the International Association of Genocide Scholars reached a consensus that “the Ottoman campaign against the Christian minorities of the Empire between 1914 and 1923 constituted genocide against the Armenians, Assyrians and Pontic Greeks of Anatolia” and adopted with an overwhelming majority (83% of the votes) a resolution officially recognizing the Assyrian genocide.

Unlike the Armenian genocide, which was recognized by many countries and international organizations and considered one of the four genocides officially accepted by the UN, the Assyrian massacre suffered from the lack of recognition as a genocide.

This lack of recognition is probably due to the fact that the Assyrian nation is often misunderstood. Indeed, having been reduced by more than half in 1915-1918, this people suffered politically as well as socially, economically, in terms of identity and demography. However, since the mass emigration of Assyrians to Europe, the United States and Oceania during the 1970s to 1990s, caused by the persecution they continued to suffer in their native land (Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Iran and Lebanon), a growing struggle for recognition is being organized. This explains why the recognitions are quite recent.

Initiatives have been taken in several states and with political, civil and moral authorities, at the federal, parliamentary and governmental levels (Sweden, USA, Germany, Australia, Republic of Armenia, the Vatican…).

Because we are at the same time historical protectors of the Christians of the East, but also the country of Human Rights, these “genocides” of the twentieth century, as well as of the twenty-first century, must not face the passivity of the international community. The fight against barbarism must mobilize all the countries of the world and we must recognize the genocide of the Christians of the East.

The acts committed by the Ottoman forces 100 years ago, as they are committed today by the Islamic State of Daesh, must be considered as a crime of genocide under Article 6 of the Convention of Rome and as crimes against humanity under Article 7 of the same text.

Unfortunately, today, we can only deplore the passivity of the UN in protecting these minorities, victims of torture and ethnic cleansing (exile of thousands of Christians, Kurds and Yazidis). This is why it is imperative that the complaint filed with the International Criminal Court by the Coordination des Chrétiens d’Orient en Danger succeed.

As Joseph Yacoub explains (1), France supported the Assyrians-Chaldeans and Armenians and even denounced the persecutions and massacres. For example, on June 24, 1915, Alfonse Nicolas, then consul in Tabriz, alerted his Minister of Foreign Affairs about the posters calling for Jihad, in the name of Islam, posted in the city of Ourmiah.

In an article published in “Le Figaro” on April 23, 2021, Joseph Yacoub highlights the courage of French diplomats who, at the time, denounced these massacres ([2]).

More recently, Ban Ki-Moon, then Secretary General of the UN affirmed on July 20, 2015, that the actions against Christians could be considered a crime against humanity. But this is a real genocide that is also that of the matrix of our civilization and obliges us to act in the name of History and the commitments of France.

Like the Armenians of Artsakh today, the Assyrians-Chaldeans have been dispossessed of a large part of their places of life, culture and memory. In all, more than 400 churches and monasteries were ruined.

More than 250,000 Chaldeans-Assyrians-Syriacs – more than half of the community – have perished at the hands of the Turks and Kurdish irregulars used for this purpose. All the documents clearly show that these massacres were “combined and concerted” acts by the Ottoman authorities and that they were not isolated or uncontrolled acts.

Let us remember the words of Elie Wiesel, who said: “By denying the existence of a genocide, by forgetting it, we murder the victims a second time”. With this bill and the recognition of the Assyrian genocide of 1915, the French Parliament, as a whole, will honor itself by joining, like other national parliaments, this profoundly democratic approach and will allow us not to forget the Christians of the East who die every day.

PROPOSED LAW

Article 1

France publicly recognizes the genocide of the Assyrians-Chaldeans, perpetrated during the First World War.

Article 2

France commemorates each year on April 24 the memory of the victims of the Assyrian genocide of the First World War.