As the Italian Spondasud agency reports, leader of the Armenian Diocese of Damascus, Bishop Armash Nalbandian is in Italy to participate in a conference devoted to the 100^th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, according to Artsakhpress.

The agency notes that Bishop Nalbandian represents one of the oldest religious communities of Syria and, as Nalbandian mentioned, the Armenians have never felt like strangers there. The leader of the Armenian Diocese of Damascus talked about the Armenian Genocide that took the lives of 1.5 million Armenians and 500,000 Assyrians and expressed certainty that the events taking place in modern-day Syria can not only draw the international community’s attention to the human tragedies that have taken place in that region in the past, but can also show the trials and tribulations that the men and women of the Near East undergo today.

“Today, more than 4 million citizens of Syria live with means provided by the World Food Programme. The victims are not only Christians, but all the residents of Syria as well,” Bishop Armash Nalbandian mentioned.

Nalbandian visited Geneva where he met with members of the local Armenian community and said the following: “We are a small nation, but we’re not scared of problems. We have a strong weapon, and that’s our prayers. Continue to pray for us Armenians.”