Serj Tankian: Why I became an activist
Learning about his grandparent鈥檚 Armenian background in his early teens prompted Serj Tankianhim, the frontman of heavy metal band System of a Down to become an activist, he said.
He told 大象传媒 Hardtalk that it was a huge 鈥渓earning experience for me as to what transpired to my people鈥� in the last days of Ottoman Empire.
The mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World War One remains a highly sensitive issue.
The total number of Armenian dead is disputed. Armenians say 1.5 million people died. The Republic of Turkey estimates the total to be 300,000. According to the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS), the death toll was more than a million.
Turkey has resisted widespread calls for it to recognise the 1915-16 killings as genocide, while historians continue to argue about the events.
