For your unwavering support and unprecedented generosity in donating to Near East Relief’s humanitarian efforts, New Mexico, We Thank You!

As we travel across the country, LA2DC is honoring the accomplishments of individuals and organizations doing the difficult work of genocide and mass atrocity detection and prevention, and providing survivor relief. Among the first to mobilize Americans to rescue victims of the Armenian Genocide was the group Near East Relief, now known as Near East Foundation.

New Mexico was an integral supporter of Near East Relief

Col. Twitchell of Santa Fe who worked with the Ministerial Alliance of Albuquerque and Judge M.E. Hickei, Chairman of the City Board of Education, facilitated the visits of NER serviceman and missionaries to local community meetings throughout New Mexico to educate the populace about the plight of the Armenians and secure donations from concerned citizens eager to assist with the relief efforts overseas.

School children throughout New Mexico contributed to the NER’s efforts because they had learned that schools in the Near East tending to the needs of Armenian orphan children lacked pens, ink or paper and were left with outdated books.

“The American people, (and the Southwest has always done her share) have kept these little waifs alive for three years,” reported New Mexico’s Estancia News Herald in an article published on December 22, 1922, referring to the Armenian orphans under the care of NER. The article further publicized NER’s efforts to save the children of Armenia for one more winter. Specifically, the article was pleading for “the mere lives of hundreds of thousands who are homeless and hungry…Relief must go now or never. At the Christmas season it is most fitting that every man, woman and child in this Christian land makes some sacrifice, however small, for the situation of the children in Armenia.”

The Near East Relief movement literally saved the Armenian nation from total annihilation.

LA2DC is organized and supported by Americans of all backgrounds and faiths and Armenian-Americans who believe that it’s time to eliminate genocide as a war tactic. On the centennial of the first large-scale genocide of the 20th century, LA2DC demands recognition and prevention of such atrocities and calls on world leaders to stop future genocides.