A somber Pope Francis, “with pain in my heart,” paid tribute on June 25
to the Armenians killed in 1915, an event which he has labelled a
“genocide,” risking Turkey’s ire.
Francis, on the second day of
his trip to Armenia, made an early morning stop at the Tzitzernakaberd,
the “Genocide Memorial and Museum,” a towering granite needle flanked by
an eternal flame on a hillside overlooking the Armenian capital.
There,
visibly moved, he took part in a prayer service along with President
Serzh Sargsyan and leaders of the Armenian Apostolic Church.
“Here
I pray, with pain in my heart, so that never again will there be
tragedies like this, so that humanity does not forget and knows how to
overcome evil with good,” he wrote in the guest book in Italian.
On
June 24 night in a speech to the president, the government and
diplomats, Francis departed from his prepared text to use the word
“genocide,” a description that infuriated Turkey when he said it a year
ago.
As of June 25 morning there was no official reaction from
Turkey, which last year recalled its ambassador to the Vatican after the
pope used the “genocide” term. The envoy was kept away for 10 months.
Turkey accepts many Christian Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire
were killed in clashes with Ottoman forces during World War I, but
contests the figures and denies the killings were systematically
orchestrated and constitute a genocide. It also says many Muslim Turks
perished at that time.
“There is no reason not to use this word
in this case,” Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi told reporters
on June 24 night. “The reality is clear and we never denied what the
reality is.”
At the June 25 morning ceremony, Francis chatted
with descendants of Armenian orphans who were sheltered at the papal
summer residence south of Rome at the start of the 20th century.
“May
God grant the beloved Armenian people and the entire world peace and
consolation. May God protect the memory of the Armenian people. Memory
should not be diluted or forgotten. Memory is a source of peace and the
future,” he wrote in the guest book.
After the memorial service
the pope flew to say a Mass in the provincial city of Gyumri, near the
border with Turkey and within sight of Mount Ararat, where the Bible
says Noah’s Ark landed after the Great Flood.