Nicosia, April 4 (IANS): Cyprus has criminalised the denial of the 1915 genocide of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in a law published in the official gazette on Friday.

The Cypriot parliament modified an existing law by declaring that no prior conviction by an international court is required to make it a crime to deny the genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, Xinhua news agency reported.

The modification was made unanimously by parliament on the occasion of a visit to Cyprus by Galust Sahakyan, the president of the Armenian National Assembly on Thursday.

Cyprus and Armenia maintain close relations as the eastern Mediterranean island is home to thousands of Armenians.

They are descendants of refugees fleeing their homes during the genocide and later during the advance of the Turkish army in 1922 when millions of Greeks and Armenians fled the western coasts of Asia Minor.

Cypriot Parliament President Yiannakis Omirou said it was "a historic day" as the modification allowed restoration of historical truth.

The Turkish foreign ministry dismissed the move as "null and void and not worthy of comment".

Turkey vehemently denies the genocide both of the Armenians and of the Greeks of the Black Sea region, though historians have said that that up to 1.5 million people, including women, children, elderly and infirm, perished at the time during death marches and in labour camps across Turkey.

The issue of the Armenian genocide is also a source of tension between Turkey and several Western countries, most notably France and the US.