教宗方濟各主持彌撒紀念種族滅絕屠殺一百年

Pope Francis marked the 100th anniversary of the mass killing of Armenians, using the word "genocide" during a special ceremony on Sunday. The term is likely to severely strain diplomatic ties with Turkey.

Francis said during a Mass at Saint Peter's Basilica that the killing of around 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks about the time of World War One was "the first genocide of the 20th century."

He told the congregation that "concealing or denying evil is like allowing a wound to keep bleeding without bandaging it."

Turkey angrily denies that the massacre constituted genocide, saying that the toll has been inflated and that those killed were victims of civil war and unrest.

Pope John Paul the Second and the Armenian patriarch issued a joint statement in 2000 calling the massacre "genocide," but Sunday was the first time the word had been used during a Mass in Saint Peter's Basilica.羅馬天主教宗方濟各主持彌撒，紀念大批亞美尼亞人被屠殺100週年。教宗方濟各在星期天的特別祈禱中使用了“種族滅絕屠殺”的措辭。這很可能嚴重影響梵蒂岡和土耳其之間的關係。

教宗方濟各在聖彼得教堂的彌撒中說，在第一次世界大戰期間，奧斯曼土耳其人殺死150萬亞美尼亞人的行爲是20世紀第一次“種族滅絕屠殺”。

他對參加彌撒的信衆說，掩蓋或否認惡行如同任由傷口流血，不予包紮。

土耳其堅決否認有種族滅絕屠殺發生，並說死亡人數被大大誇大，死者都是由於內戰和騷亂而喪生。

前羅馬天主教宗約翰保羅二世和亞美尼亞主教曾經在2000年發表聯合聲明，把亞美尼亞人的被殺稱爲種族滅絕屠殺，但是這個措辭是第一次在聖彼得大教堂的彌撒中使用。