A delegation led by Brendan Hanrahan, Director of the US State Department’s Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, visited the Armenian Genocide Memorial Complex in Yerevan on September 12.
The delegation was welcomed by Edita Gzoyan, Director of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute (AGMI), who accompanied the guests to the memorial, presenting the history of its creation. Gzoyan also spoke about the three khachkars (cross-stones) erected in memory of the Armenians massacred during the late 20th century pogroms in Sumgait, Kirovabad (Ganja), and Baku, as well as about the five freedom fighters buried near the Memorial Wall during the Artsakh War, emphasizing the historical link between these events and the Armenian Genocide.
Brendan Hanrahan laid a wreath at the eternal flame commemorating the victims of the Armenian Genocide. Members of the delegation then placed flowers at the memorial and observed a moment of silence in honor of the victims.
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Gzoyan also guided the visitors to the Memorial Wall, where small urns containing soil from the graves of prominent foreign statesmen, public figures, intellectuals, and missionaries — who had raised their voices against the massacres and genocide of Armenians in the late 19th and early 20th centuries — are interred.
She highlighted the efforts of Henry Morgenthau, the US Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire during the genocide, and Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, noting that thanks to their work, the American public was well informed about the atrocities. Gzoyan stressed that the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by the United States was also a tribute to their legacy.
At the conclusion of the visit, Gzoyan presented Brendan Hanrahan with books on the Armenian Genocide as a token of gratitude.