Aghet – Ein Völkermord (Aghet – A Genocide; Aghet being Armenian

Armenian language

The Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenian people. It is the official language of the Republic of Armenia as well as in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The language is also widely spoken by Armenian communities in the Armenian diaspora...

 for "catastrophe") is a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 2010 documentary film

Documentary film

Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...

 on the Armenian Genocide

Armenian Genocide

The Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...

 by the Young Turk government of the Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

 during World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. It is based on eyewitness reports by European

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

 and American personnel stationed in the Near East

Near East

The Near East is a geographical term that covers different countries for geographers, archeologists, and historians, on the one hand, and for political scientists, economists, and journalists, on the other...

 at the time, Armenian

Armenia

Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...

 survivors and other contemporary witnesses which are recited by modern German actors. The visual material partly consists of secretly shot photographs of the death march

Death march

A death march is a forced march of prisoners of war or other captives or deportees. Those marching must walk over long distances for an extremely long period of time and are not supplied with food or water...

es, Turkish

Turkish people

Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...

 atrocities and suffering of the Armenian deportees.

Aghet – Ein Völkermord was awarded the 2010 Deutscher Fernsehpreis

Deutscher Fernsehpreis

The Deutscher Fernsehpreis is a German award for television programming, created in 1999 by German television channels Das Erste, ZDF, RTL and Sat.1. It was created as a equivalent to the Emmy Awards though it is not organized by an academy and is awarded annually in September or October...

 and the 2011 Grimme Award, two of the most prestigious awards of German television

German television

Television in Germany began in Berlin on March 22, 1935, broadcasting for 90 minutes three times a week. The German television market had approximately 36.5 million television households in 2000, making it the largest television market in Europe...

. According to its director, German journalist Eric Friedler, the documentary was presented to many members of the US Congress and US Senate who have expressed astonishment on how well documented the genocide actually is. An official presentation at Capitol Hill took place in July 2010.

Aghet won the 2010 Armin T. Wegner

Armin T. Wegner

Armin Theophil Wegner was a German soldier and medic in World War I, a prolific author and a seminal figure in German Expressionism, a human rights activist, and a victim of Nazi persecution...

 Humanitarian Award in Los Angeles

Los Ángeles

Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

 and received international recognition on the Montreal World Film Festival

Montreal World Film Festival

The Montreal World Film Festival , founded in 1977, is one of Canada's oldest international film festivals and the only competitive film festival in North America accredited by the FIAPF...

 the same year. It was set to be shown before large audiences at Harvard and Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

. The documentary has been praised for introducing "Aghet", the Armenian term for the Turkish massacres, to an international audience.

The advocacy group of the Turkish community in Germany has protested against the film.

See also

• Documentaries on the Armenian Genocide
• Holocaust

External links

• Website (incl. trailer)