Armenian-American groups blast Condoleezza Rice as ‘genocide denier’

Eurasianet reports that Armenian-American groups have not responded well to Condoleezza Rice’s new memoir, in which she discusses her efforts to quash a Congressional resolution labeling the post-World War I killing of ethnic Armenians by Turkey a genocide:

While acknowledging the brutality and the scale of the bloodshed, Rice writes that US recognition of the act as genocide would have antagonized Turkey, a key strategic ally for the US. She argues that she was guided by the raison d’état that labels are best left to historians.  

Not in the view of American-Armenian Diaspora groups or many Armenian-language news services, who have republished a letter from Harut Sassounian, the publisher of Los Angeles’  The California Courier, a weekly catering to the city’s sizable Diaspora Armenian community, that advises Stanford University (where Rice now works as a political science professor, a political economy professor at Stanford’s business school and, lastly, a public policy fellow) to inform the 57-year-old foreign policy veteran that "genocide deniers are not welcome at one of America’s most distinguished institutions of higher learning."

Warming to his task, Sassounian charged that Rice had behaved as “a spineless official of a banana republic” by allegedly caving in to Turkish interests.

These groups seems particularly incensed by Rice’s characterization of the "powerful Armenian-American lobby." The chairman of the Armenian National Committee of America has called on his members to “Help us bring about the day when someone in Rice’s position would never dare compromise America’s standing by so wretchedly playing the genocide card as a political commodity.”

The Obama administration has also studiously avoided using the G-word when talking about the Meds Yeghern, though the president did use it repeatedly as a Senator and candidate. It will be interesting to see whether GOP candidates try to call the president out on this in a bid for Armenian money and votes, or hold back knowing that if they’re elected, they’re basically guaranteed to flip-flop on it.