HJR79 Summary

• Designates April 2019 as Genocide Awareness Month in Alabama in recognition of the Armenian Genocide and its centennial anniversary of first remembrance in April 1919.

• Acknowledges that 1.5 million ethnic Armenian Christians and over one million Greeks, Assyrians, Syriacs, and others were massacred by the Ottoman Turkish Empire between 1915-1923 in the first modern genocide.

• References the term "genocide" coined by Polish lawyer Raphael Lemkin during World War II and acknowledges subsequent genocides including the Holocaust, Cambodia (1975), Bosnia (1992), Rwanda (1994), Darfur, and ISIS targeting of religious minorities.

• Recognizes that Armenia-Americans have enriched Alabama through leadership in business, agriculture, academia, government, and the arts, and that remembrance prevents future atrocities.

• Joins the legislature in mourning humanity's darkest moments and celebrating the survival of Armenian peoples and other genocide victims while offering prayers for world peace.