LOS ANGELES–The Lincy Foundation pledged to match all donations (up to $600,000) received by the United Armenian Fund for the recovery of the Armenian community of Turkey from last month’s devastating earthquake.
The August 17 quake which registered 7.4 on the Richter scale killed more than 15,000 people and destroyed thousands of houses in the Istanbul area.
Archbishop Mesrob Mutafyan–the Patriarch of Turkey–announced that the quake caused $1.2 million of damage to several Armenian churches–schools and the headquarters of the Patriarchate. Scores of Armenia’s were killed or injured.
At the invitation of the Western and Eastern Dioceses of the Armenian Church–Patriarch Mutafyan will visit New York and Los Angeles from the end of September through early October to participate in a series of fund-raising events. Since the earthquake–several other Armenian-American organizations have also announced their own fund-raising efforts for the needs of the Armenian community of Turkey.
The Lincy Foundation will support all of these fund-raising activities by matching all funds up to $600,000 forwarded to the United Armenian Fund by Dec. 31–1999. The UAF will then donate the total amount thus raised–hopefully the entire $1.2 million or more–to the Armenian Patriarchate of Turkey for the repair and reconstruction of the damaged Armenian institutions.
Tax-deductible contributions may be sent to any one of the Armenian charitable organizations raising funds for this purpose.
