15.03.2015


This unique photo was taken during one of Soghomon Tehlirian’s trial sessions in June 1921 in Berlin.



Operation Nemesis was carried out to punish the Young Turk criminals responsible for the Armenian Genocide who had escaped justice.

On March 15, 1921 in Berlin Soghomon Tehlirian assassinated the former Ottoman Interior Minister Talaat Pasha. The latter had moved to Germany by changing his appearance and personal details.

In June 1921 the trail of Soghomon Tehlirin took place over 2 days in Berlin.

During the trial a German high ranking officer Liman von Sanders, a famous public figure Johannes Lepsius and survivors of the Armenian Genocide witnessed against Talaat Pasha. Tehlirian was being defended by famous German defense attorneys. To prove Talaat’s crime the attorneys used original telegrams, containing orders for deportations and exterminations of the Armenians issued by the former Ottoman Interior Minister.

Based on the facts and witness testimonies the German Court acquitted Soghomon Tehlirian.

A young Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin also participated in the trial, which greatly influenced his life: some years later an already experienced lawyer coined the term “Genocide” and by his direct efforts a General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in1948.

“Soghomon Tehlerian is just a symbol, who concentrated a pain of a contempt race and who revenges in a hopeless self-defense.”

Armin Theophil Wegner
A German officer in the Ottoman Army 1915-1916
An eyewitness of the Armenian Genocide

The source of the photo: Tessa Hofmann, Armenier in Berlin-Berlin und Armenien, Berlin, 2005.
From “100 Photographic Stories of the Armenian Genocide” book