Raphael Lemkin (Polish: Rafał Lemkin; 24 June 1900 – 28 August 1959) was a prominent Polish lawyer of Jewish descent, renowned for coining the term "genocide" and vigorously advocating for the establishment of the Genocide Convention. During World War II, he actively worked to raise international awareness about the atrocities occurring in Axis-occupied Europe, seeking to foster a global response to these horrific events. It was in this context that Lemkin developed the term "genocide" to specifically articulate the systematic extermination policies of Nazi Germany against Jews and Poles.

His interest in laws against mass atrocities was sparked in his youth when he learned about the Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire.

Because Raphael Lemkin's huge contribution to the institutional protection of human rights and nations and the introduction of the legal term Genocide into international legal conventions, the NATIONAL CENTER Development Foundation in partnership with the Armenian Genocide Museum Institute and the Polish WSG University, initiated the creation and installation of the Monument in his honor in Yerevan.