Pope Francis, during a meeting Monday with a delegation led by Nerses Bedros XIX, Catholicos Patriarch of Cilicia of the Armenian Catholics at the Vatican reiterated his earlier recognition of the Armenian Genocide, Asbarez reported quoting Diario Armenia.

Meeting one of the descendants of the Armenian Genocide victim, Pope said “the first genocide of the 20th Century was that of the Armenians.”

Earlier he made similar statement when he headed the Catholic Church in Buenos Aires as Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio

Seven years ago, during events marking the 91st anniversary of the Armenian Genocide in Buenos Aires, then Archbishop of Buenos Aires Jorge Mario Bergoglio urged Turkey to recognize the Genocide as the “gravest crime of Ottoman Turkey against the Armenian people and the entire humanity.”