Madam Speaker, it is an honour to enter into the debate on private members’ Motion No. 328. I commend the member for Laval Centre for bringing the motion forward. We had a discussion earlier about the issue. It is very clear how strongly she feels and how committed she is to the cause.
We recently had another debate similar to this on a motion brought forward by the member for Brampton Centre. We had the same debate with him as well. There are certainly a lot of strong feelings about this issue.
The whole debate surrounds the terrible massacre of human lives between 1915 and 1923, with estimates in excess of a million and a half men, women and children who died.There was violence, deportations, internments, mass murders and all kinds of atrocities we in the House can hardly imagine.
To put it into perspective for me, we were all so moved and concerned about the September 11 tragedies in the United States. For every person killed in the United States in that horrible terrorist act, 250 people died in the period from 1915 to 1923. The Armenians were the victims. To put that into perspective, the disaster was 250 times worse than what we experienced in North America. We cannot imagine what these atrocities were like and what families and people lived through. We cannot imagine parents and grandparents seeing their families wiped out through mass murders, atrocities and deportations.
Obviously the events between 1915 and 1923 were terrifying and horrifying. They resulted in the terrible deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. The Armenian people were the victims and suffered greatly, more than anyone else.
The opposition coalition abhors any mass slaughter or killings, whether they occur in Rwanda, the Middle East or Europe and by any country or any group. It is important that we remember these issues. This is exactly what the motion is doing today. It is helping all of us understand and learn about issues we have never been exposed to before. Personally it has been a learning curve. I appreciate the input by all the members who have shared their thoughts with me and the House.
Perhaps by discussing these issues and bringing them forth continually we will maintain public awareness. The healing process and reconciliation will be helped by the fact that we in the Canadian parliament are discussing these issues. Perhaps these discussions and motions will help avoid such atrocities in the future, although recent events are not very encouraging.