Marie Elizabeth Harf, Acting Spokesperson for the U.S. Department of State, has failed to give direct answers when commenting on the Pope's statement and the United States' official stand on the Armenian Genocide.
The official website of the U.S. Department of State quotes Marie Harf as saying, "The [U.S.] President and other senior Administration officials have repeatedly acknowledged as historical fact and mourned the fact that 1.5 million Armenians were massacred or marched to their deaths in the final days of the Ottoman Empire, and stated that a full, frank, and just acknowledgement of the facts is in all our interests, including Turkey's, Armenia's, and America's."
She refused to comment on the Pope's recent statement. "Nothing beyond what I just said," she noted.
When asked to remind candidate Obama's position in the 2008 campaign because "it's interesting how many candidates run on that, as that as part of their platform, and then upon winning change their minds because Turkey is a NATO ally and no one wants to upset them. Is that why the President has revised his position on whether what happened was a genocide?" Marie Harf replied, "I'm happy for you to check with the White House on the President specifically. I just outlined what our position is very clearly."
To recall, on April 12 during a Mass in St. Peter's Basilica Pope Francis said that the annihilation of 1.5 mln Armenians in the Ottoman Empire was "the first Genocide of XX century". He called the Genocide one of the three massive and unprecedented tragedies of XX century along with Nazism and Stalinism. Vatican's ambassador to Ankara was summoned to the Foreign Ministry for explanations and the Turkish ambassador to Vatican was recalled "for consultations".