Kim Kardashian on Saturday praised President Joe Biden for formally recognizing the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century as “genocide.”
“After more than a century of fighting for truth and acknowledgement, today the Armenian people received the recognition we have all been hoping and praying for, with President Biden declaring the massacre of 1.5 million Armenians in 1915 a genocide,” Kardashian wrote in a post on Instagram.
Kardashian, whose paternal great-great-grandparents fled Armenia for the U.S. in the early 1900s, said she’s “so proud” of her heritage. She said she’s “grateful” to Biden for granting “every Armenian this day, and this truth.”
“Although nothing will ever bring back the Armenians who were murdered, I hope that their families will now feel a sense of peace,” wrote Kardashian, a billionaire entrepreneur and reality TV star.
“Thank you President Biden, for your courage to speak the truths others chose not to,” she added.
Biden used a presidential proclamation to make the formal declaration on Saturday, which was Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day.
“Let us renew our shared resolve to prevent future atrocities from occurring anywhere in the world,” Biden said in his proclamation. “And let us pursue healing and reconciliation for all the people of the world. The American people honor all those Armenians who perished in the genocide that began 106 years ago today.”
U.S. presidents have avoided using the term “genocide” to describe the systemic killings of Armenians that took place during World War I out of concern it would escalate tensions with Turkey.
The Turkish government condemned Biden’s declaration, claiming his statements about the genocide have no “scholarly” or “legal” basis.
“This statement ... will open a deep wound that undermines our mutual trust and friendship,” the country’s foreign ministry said in a statement. “We call on the U.S. President to correct this grave mistake.”