On 24 April every year the Armenian people remember the anniversary of the Metz Yeghern (Great Evil), the genocide perpetrated by the government of the Young Turks in 1915 to annihilate the Armenian minority in the Ottoman-dominated lands. In Armenia thousands of people flock to the capital Yerevan for the annual procession to the Dzidzernagapert (Hill of Swallows), the site of the mausoleum that commemorates the victims of the massacres.

At the end of the ceremony the ashes – or a fistful of earth from the burial place – of a Righteous person are entombed in the Wall of Remembrance, as a sign of gratitude on the part of the Armenian people. In addition, a tree is planted in that person's name in the Garden of the Righteous for the Armenians, beside the Genocide Museum.

This place of remembrance was created in 1995 by the museum director Laurenti Barseghian and by Pietro Kuciukian, founder of the International Committee of the Righteous for the Armenians – Memory is the future. The Committee assigns the title to those who strove to rescue the persecuted or to stop the massacres and denounce the responsibility of the government of the Young Turks to the world.

Alongside the Righteous and the witnesses of that time, the site also honours those who are still struggling to safeguard the memory of those tragic events.

Certain streets and schools, in Armenia, are dedicated to these Righteous people.