Irvine residents plan to gather at upcoming Armenian genocide memorial in Great Park
The memorial is being planned by a committee formed between the two main Armenian churches in Orange County. Photo by SIMRAH AHMAD, staff photographer
Worldwide, Armenian community members gather annually on April 24 to remember victims of the Armenian genocide. For many years, this memorial has been hosted at two Armenian churches in Orange County: St. Mary Armenian Apostolic Church and Forty Martyrs Armenian Apostolic Church. But this year, community members will instead gather at the Great Park in Irvine for the service.
Between 1915 and 1917, 1.5 million Armenians were killed in what is considered genocide. The genocide specifically targeted Armenian Christians in the Ottoman Empire during World War I.
Yet according to Garo Madenlian, the chairman for the Orange County Armenian Center and the Armenian Cultural Foundation of Orange County, the Armenian genocide is not something of the past.
“It is still happening today,” Madenlian said in an interview with The Panther. “It is important for people to know that we are not just saying, ‘Let's recognize what happened over a hundred years ago.’”
In 2020, Azerbaijan launched attacks on Armenia with the help of Turkey. There is currently an ongoing blockade on the Lachin corridor, a road that connects Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. The blockade started in December 2022 and has caused a halt in traffic as well as accessibility to residents.
Kev Abazajian, a physics and astronomy professor of Physics at the University of California, Irvine, said that the reason he is in California is because of the genocide. His great-grandfather met his great-grandfather during the genocide. They fled together and have since started their family.
Abazajian says that the resilience of his grandparents represents the resilience of the Armenian people.
“I don’t mean that this memorial should be for my family, it should be for the one and half million souls that were lost in the genocide,” Abazajian said during the Irvine City Council meeting on March 9.
Abazajian says that this resilience represents the resilience of the Armenian people.
“The memorial will be able to let us have the commemoration at the Great Park, and having an appropriate space for that to happen is one of the goals,” Abazajian told The Panther.
The Irvine memorial will be meant to serve as a place for the Armenian community to gather and find a sense of peace and ease.
Edward Barsoumian, a spokesperson for the Armenian National Committee’s Western region, said that this memorial will have a tangible impact and palpable effect on the community.
“This creates an opportunity for commemoration to extend beyond April 24th, rather providing a space to heal as a community, and for members of other communities to stand alongside us in solidarity,” Barsoumian told The Panther.
According to Barsoumian, there is a need for awareness about the importance of remembrance for the Armenian community, and there is a threat of other genocides taking place and history repeating itself.
One example of this continued threat is the current invasion of Azerbaijan on the indigenous people of Artsakh, Armenia. Armenia and Azerbaijan have had conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh territory since the 1980s. Both sides are claiming control over the territory, yet it is a region that is mainly made of ethnic Armenians.
The second Artkash war ended in 2020. Almost 4,000 Armenians died in the war, and more than 100 have gone missing. Since the ceasefire, there have been more than 20 Armenians killed by Azerbaijan armed forces.
“We are witnessing the beginning stages of a renewed campaign of genocide against the Armenian people,” Barsoumian said
He said that he experienced racism throughout his childhood in San Fransisco — a notable instance was when a community center near his church was burned down. The community center was home to the Armenian National Committee of America San Francisco office and other Armenian community organizations
There is currently an ongoing FBI investigation to find those responsible for the hate crimes, yet there is suspicion that it was carried out by a Turkish-Azerbeijani hate group, Barsoumian told The Panther.
What happened to Barsoumian’s hometown is said to be connected to other events across the Bay Area and Southern California, where schools and churches have been vandalized.
There has been a rise in hate crimes in recent years against the Armenian-American community with a rise in school shootings and vandalism connected to anti-Armenian sentiment.
“I call upon everyone to stand with their Armenian friends,” Barsoumian said.
According to him, the Armenian National Committee Western Region has done outreach and found that there is a fear amongst Armenians of publicly collectivizing for activism against hate due to concerns for their safety.
Because of this tangible fear, this new safe place can mean a lot more to Armenian Americans.
“It means that in this city, you are welcome and we are with you,” Barsoumain said.
This comes after Irvine Mayor Farrah Khan was criticized by the Armenian Community for her behavior in a video that surfaced last year. In the video, Khan appears to be joking with representatives of local Turkish groups during a meeting in 2020. According to Madenlian, the people that Khan was having a meeting with are known to be genocide deniers.
“It was very hurtful and very offensive to make jokes about the disappearing of Armenians,” Madenlian told The Panther.
Madenlian said it’s important to being comments like Khan’s to attention so “that nobody else will think about joking or making comments about the genocide.”
Through emails and activism, members of the Armenian community were able to bring the Great Park memorial to the table. The memorial is currently in the planning phase, and it is set to be built within the next five to seven years.
A committee is currently being formed that will work out the layout of the memorial.
“Our organization and community have worked tirelessly toward further institutionalizing Armenian genocide recognition,” Barsoumian said. “Through the construction of this memorial space, we hope to see this as an indication of the city’s commitment to stand on the side of justice — on the right side of history — with this tangible reminder that the Armenian Genocide took place.”