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AAA: Armenian Orphan Rug To Go On Public Display, White House Says

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  • AAA: Armenian Orphan Rug To Go On Public Display, White House Says

    PRESS RELEASE
    April 30, 2014

    ARMENIAN ASSEMBLY OF AMERICA
    Contact: Taniel Koushakjian
    Email: [email protected]
    Phone: (202) 393-3434
    Web: www.aaainc.org


    ARMENIAN ORPHAN RUG TO GO ON PUBLIC DISPLAY, WHITE HOUSE SAYS


    Washington, D.C. - With Members of Congress and the Armenian Assembly of
    America (Assembly) weighing in, the White House has agreed to release the
    Armenian Orphan Rug for public display as early as this fall, reported the
    Assembly.

    The Assembly welcomes this development as a previous one-day exhibition of
    the carpet planned at the Smithsonian Institution last December was
    cancelled. According to a letter from National Security Advisor Antony
    Blinken to Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) last year, `Loans from the White House
    collection are made for fully developed exhibits, not for one-day private
    events.' The Assembly expects the Armenian Orphan Rug to be prominently
    displayed to the American public this year.

    News reports surfaced about Turkish pressure on the White House last year
    and the cancellation of the event, which led to an outcry by Members of
    Congress, including Senator Edward Markey (D-MA), along with Reps. Adam
    Schiff (D-CA) and David Valadao (R-CA), who spearheaded a letter to
    President Obama signed by over 30 Members of Congress calling on him to
    release the rug.

    With the Coolidge rug unavailable, the Assembly launched a campaign to
    display the Armenian Orphan `Sister Rug.' Since then, the sister rug has
    been displayed in Boston, Massachusetts and Boca Raton, Florida, and was
    planned to be displayed at an event on Capitol Hill with Congressman Schiff
    in March, but was postponed due to a snowstorm.

    `I'm extremely touched,' Dr. Martin Deranian told the Assembly upon
    learning the news of the decision to display the Armenian Orphan Rug. =80=9CI
    have faith in the American government, that it will do the right thing in
    the end,' he said. Dr. Deranian authored the book `President Calvin
    Coolidge and the Armenian Orphan Rug.' `I appreciate the work of our
    elected officials in Washington as well as the Armenian Assembly for
    helping to secure this commitment,' he said.

    In 1925, Dr. John H. Finley, editor-in-chief of the New York Times and
    vice-chairman of the congressionally chartered Near East Relief
    organization presented a rug made by orphans of the Armenian Genocide to
    then President Calvin Coolidge. The rug was made in appreciation of
    America's generosity in aiding the survivors of the first genocide of the
    20th Century. As previously reported, the carpet was displayed at the White
    House in 1984 and 1995, but not since, an issue which the Assembly has
    raised with successive Administrations.

    `The display of this tangible expression of gratitude for America's
    humanitarian intervention to save the survivors of the Armenian Genocide is
    a positive development,' stated Assembly Executive Director Bryan Ardouny.

    Established in 1972, the Armenian Assembly of America is the largest
    Washington-based nationwide organization promoting public understanding and
    awareness of Armenian issues. The Assembly is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt
    membership organization.

    ###

    NR: # 2014-026

    Photo Caption: Dr. Martin Deranian (3rd from right) with the Armenian
    Orphan Sister Rug at the Assembly's Annual Holiday Briefing in Boston,
    Massachusetts. December 5, 2013.

    Available online: http://bit.ly/1n3uGv1

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