The Eternal Flame
A conversation about identity with the Primate of the Eastern Diocese of the Armenian Church
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January 07, 2008
AXA Insurance Company Compensates Armenian Genocide Descendants
FRANCE24 reports on Paris-based AXA insurance company's settlement with descendants of the Armenian Genocide who can finally lay claim to life insurance policies signed before WWI. Alexis Govciyan, president of AGBU Europe, was interviewed by the media outlet for his thoughts on the issue and its resolution:
“Money is not the essential issue here,” Alexis Govciyan, chairman of the Coordination Council of Armenian Organisations of France and president of the Armenian General Benevolent Union of Europe, told FRANCE 24. “The compensation is symbolic, since it amounts to about 2,000 dollars per family. We are proud of the work accomplished by our lawyers.” ...
“Of the 7,000 files relevant to the case,” explains Govciyan, “just over one thousand applications have been sent in. A third of the claimants live in France, a third in Armenia and the remaining third are part of the worldwide diaspora.”
AGBU will be among three charities to receive funds from the settlement, it is a symbolic gesture as many of the families with policies were completely decimated by the Armenian Genocide and left no descendants:
AXA agreed to pay a lump sum of 17.5 million US dollars. The descendants were to split 11 million dollars; 3 million dollars went to humanitarian organizations (the Armenian General Benevolent Union, the Blue Cross and the French-Armenian Fund); and the rest went to the lawyers.
The AXA settlement follows an earlier settlement with the American life insurance company, New York Life, which was extensively covered in AGBU News Magazine in April 2004 and April 2007.
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