Thousands mark Armenian genocide

A rally in Times Square Sunday afternoon marked the centennial of the deaths of as many as 1.5 million Armenians under the Ottoman Empire — today’s Turkey.

The rally drew several thousand people demanding the U.S. government deem the deaths during the First World War a genocide.

The international dispute over the killings focuses on that one word.

Turkey denies that the deaths constituted genocide. They say the toll has been inflated and that those killed were victims of civil war and unrest.