The President of the Republic, Vahagn Khachaturyan, participated and made a welcome speech at the 5th Global Forum “Against the Crime of Genocide.”
“I am pleased to welcome you to the 5th Global Forum Against the Crime of Genocide.
Before 1948, when Raphael Lemkin defined the term “genocide,” this crime had various names but had neither international guarantees of punishment nor legal instruments of prevention.
The Republic of Armenia, as the state of the heirs of the people who went through the tragedy of the Armenian Genocide, since its independence and membership in the United Nations, has assumed a pioneering role in international multilateral platforms in advancing the issues of genocide prevention, punishment, and memory of the victims.
For nearly ten years, the Global Forum Against the Crime of Genocide has brought together the voices, vision, alarm, and call of political leaders, leading academics, civil society, and victim and survivor advocates to make the promise of “never again” an irreversible reality.
I can confidently say that we can consider this initiative to discuss and find solutions to the most pressing and urgent problem of international politics and history. Still, unfortunately, crimes against humanity, genocides, and the danger of their repetition remain more than current today.
In the context of the current deepening global security crisis, the content orientation of the 5th Global Forum is timely and in demand. Over the next two days, the toolkit for preventing genocide and other crimes against humanity will be discussed to understand its gaps and, why not, its strengths and to focus our attention on those mechanisms. , which must be continuously strengthened. The prevention of genocides, the protection of the civilian population, respect for international law, and the exclusion of impunity are primarily the responsibility of states.
Today, our state’s principal position is to build and maintain peace based on a stable international justice system. We are sure that early prevention is the key to international security and must be one of the pillars of a functioning system.
I am sure that during the two-day forum, our guests and Armenian participants will be able to offer practical solutions in the direction of strengthening human rights mechanisms, the activities of multilateral bodies, the vital role of international courts, steps to implement their judgments, and making the voices of civil society and the scientific community more audible.”
