Tag: Turkey-Armenia

Armenia Rejects Turkish Warnings To U.S. Congress

Armenia — Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian at a news conference on March 2, 2010.

02.03.2010

Emil Danielyan

Official Yerevan dismissed on Tuesday Turkish warnings that a U.S. congressional resolution describing the 1915 massacres of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire as genocide would set back the normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations. (UPDATED)

It also emerged that a group of mostly pro-government Armenian parliamentarians is heading to Washington in an apparent effort to facilitate the passage of the resolution introduced by pro-Armenian U.S. legislators a year ago.

The Foreign Affairs Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives is scheduled to discuss and vote on the proposed legislation on Thursday. It urges President Barack Obama to “accurately characterize the systematic and deliberate annihilation of 1,500,000 Armenians as genocide.”

The Turkish Foreign Ministry warned on Monday that its approval by the House committee would harm not only U.S.-Turkish relations but also efforts by Turkey and Armenia to normalize bilateral ties. “We would like to believe that the members of the committee are aware of the damage… the endorsement of the resolution will bring and, in this context, act responsibly,” the ministry said in a statement.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan reportedly issued a similar warning over the weekend. He said passage of the genocide resolution to would bring the U.S.-backed Turkish-Armenian reconciliation process to a halt.

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian brushed aside the warning, saying that the biggest threat to that process emanates from Ankara’s “preconditions” for the implementation of the Turkish-Armenian normalization agreements which were set by Ankara months before the House panel scheduled a debate on the resolution.

“It is statements made in Turkey and the return to the language of preconditions that deal a blow to the process of normalizing Turkish-Armenian relations,” Nalbandian told a news conference. “We hope that Turkey will rid itself of artificial complexes created by the Turkish side and that we will be able to move forward in accordance with our understandings.”

Nalbandian stopped short of explicitly urging U.S. lawmakers to recognize what many historians consider the first genocide of the 20th century. But in a sign of Yerevan’s tacit support for the resolution, four members of Armenia’s parliament will fly to Washington on Wednesday at the invitation of Frank Pallone and Mark Kirk, the two U.S. lawmakers co-chairing the congressional Caucus on Armenian Issues. The bipartisan group, currently numbering 150 House members, has long been pushing for Armenian genocide recognition.

An official in the National Assembly told RFE/RL’s Armenian service that Pallone and Kirk asked their Armenian colleagues to “present their views on and approaches to issues of mutual interest” to U.S. legislators and foreign policy-makers. The genocide resolution will be the main focus of their meetings in Washington, said the official.

A similar delegation of Turkish parliamentarians is already in Washington, meeting with U.S. officials and lobbying against the resolution. “My impression is that the (Obama) administration is not fighting against it very effectively,” one of them, Sukru Elekdag, said on Monday, according to Reuters.

Obama has so far declined to openly endorse or, as past U.S. administrations did, oppose the measure. The Associated Press cited aides to senior Democratic and Republican lawmakers on the House Foreign Affairs Committee as saying last week there has been no pressure against the resolution from the White House yet. According to a spokesman for the pro-Armenian committee chairman, Howard Berman, the Obama administration was informed about Thursday’s vote ahead of time.

Obama repeatedly pledged to recognize the Armenian genocide when he ran for president, earning the overwhelming backing of the Armenian Americans. However, he has refrained from using the word “genocide” since taking office, implicitly citing the need not to undermine the Turkish-Armenian rapprochement.

“His view of that history has not changed,” US National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer said last week. “Our interest remains the achievement of a full, frank, and just acknowledgement of the facts.”

“The best way to advance that goal is for the Armenian and Turkish people to address the facts of the past as a part of their ongoing efforts to normalize relations,” said Hammer. “We will continue to support these efforts vigorously in the months ahead.”

Some observers have speculated that Washington is using the prospect of U.S. recognition of the genocide to try to get the Turks to ratify the two Turkish-Armenian protocols signed in October. The Turkish ambassador to the United States, Namik Tan, seemed to give weight to this view on Saturday.

“The greatest lobbyist in Washington is the administration,” Tan said, according to the Associated Press. “We have not seen them around enough on this.”

Still, Erdogan expressed confidence on Tuesday that Obama will display “common sense” on the matter. Speaking before parliament deputies from his Justice and Development Party, he said he conveyed the Turkish concerns to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at their recent talks in Qatar.

“I separately discussed with her what would be the cost of an adverse result from that,” “Hurriyet Daily News” quoted the Turkish premier as saying. “I am calling on everyone once more to act with common sense. I’d like to say it would be more accurate to research genocide claims not at the House of Representatives but at universities and archives.”

https://www.azatutyun.am/a/1972355.html

March 2, 2010
Armeno-Turkish Relations: Pitfalls and Possibilities

The Armenian Revolutionary Federation

NY and NJ Committees

Present

Armeno-Turkish Relations:

Pitfalls and Possibilities

A public forum

Featuring

John Evans

Former US Ambassador to Armenia

Ken Hachikian

Chairman, ANCA

Richard Hovannisian

AEF Chair in Modern Armenian History, UCLA

Dennis Papazian

Emeritus Professor of History, University of Michigan-Dearborn

Sunday, March 7

4:30 pm

New York Hilton Hotel

1335 Ave. of the Americas (at 53^rd St)

Admission is Free

For more information, contact the ARF at (718) 651-1530 or (201) 945-0011

__._,_.___

February 28, 2010
Shukru Elekdag on protocols between Turkey and Armenia

[ 26 Feb 2010 17:16 ]
Baku. Mahbuba Gasimbayli – APA. “The delegation of the members of Turkish parliament’s Foreign Affairs Commission will leave for Washington on Sunday on the eve of the discussion of the resolution on the so-called Armenian genocide in the U.S. Congress on March 5.

I represent our party in the delegation. We will hold a meeting in the Committee on foreign Affairs and try to impede the discussion of the “Armenian genocide” resolution,” member of Turkish parliament’s Foreign Affairs Commission, former Turkish ambassador to Washington, former undersecretary at the Foreign Ministry, parliamentarian from Republican People’s Party (CHP) Shukru Elekdag told APA.

To the question “It seems this time the situation is not pleasant” Elekdag said:
“Armenian Constitutional Court rewrote the protocols signed in Zurich on October 11. It is impossible to explain differently the court’s comments on the protocols. After that it will be difficult for Turkey to say “There was no genocide”. To admit the decision of Armenian Constitutional Court means to admit Armenia’s Declaration of Independence. In that declaration Armenia does not recognize Turkey’s borders and has claims for our eastern territories. We should work hard to bring the Khojaly genocide to the attention of the world, while Armenians try to raise “genocide” claims in the Congress. The most large-scale genocide by Armenians in the past 105 years was committed against our Azerbaijani brothers,” he said.

Answering the question “Would you like the Azerbaijani parliamentarians to be with you during your meetings in the Congress?” the diplomat underlined the importance of joint struggle.
“The only way to achieve peace in the region is the complete withdrawal of Armenians from the occupied Azerbaijani territories. No other way will cause the discussions between Turkey and Armenia and it will become difficult to establish peace in the region,” he said.

February 26, 2010
Armenia Again Threatens To Scrap Turkey Accord

Armenia — President Serzh Sarkisian addresses the parliament’s Audit Chamber on January 22, 2010.

26.02.2010

President Serzh Sarkisian made late on Thursday his most explicit threat yet to annul Armenia’s normalization agreements with Turkey in what appeared to be a tense conversation with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu reported the next day. (UPDATED)

The two men spoke in Kiev on the sidelines of the swearing-in of Ukraine’s newly elected president, Viktor Yanukovich. Davutoglu told Turkish journalists there that the “meeting” centered on Turkish-Armenian relations and the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

“We reviewed the Turkish -Armenian normalization relationship in its entirety with open hearts today, including our anxieties and the obstacles we face,” Davutoglu said, according to “Hurriyet Daily News.” “We spoke about Armenian- Azerbaijan relations and the activities of the Minsk Group as related to the Karabakh issue.”

Sarkisian’s press office clarified that the two held on talks as such, saying that Davutoglu “approached and exchanged views” with the Armenian president during a reception hosted by Yanukovich. It said Sarkisian told him that the ratification of the Turkish-Armenian “protocols” must be completed “within the shortest possible time.”

“Or else, as was stated before, the Republic of Armenia will withdraw its signatures from the protocols,” the office said in a statement circulated on Friday.

Sarkisian first publicly warned of such possibility in early December. He instructed the Armenian government to draft legal amendments regulating Yerevan’s possible pullout from international treaties. The Armenian parliament adopted them in the final reading on Thursday.

Sarkisian was quoted by his office as also telling Davutoglu that Turkey could open its border with Armenia before ratifying the protocols. “A country dreaming about a region without borders should take the first step and end Armenia’s blockade,” he said, scoffing at Ankara’s stated efforts to promote peace and stability in the South Caucasus.

“If Azerbaijani pressure does not allow Turkey’s parliament to ratify the protocols, then nothing keeps Turkey’s executive authority from opening, even before the protocol ratification, the border between the two states which it itself had closed,” he added.

Sarkisian also ruled out any Turkish involvement in the Karabakh peace process. He pointed to Turkey’s “unilateral military assistance” to Azerbaijan and “biased statements” on Karabakh made by Turkish leaders.

In a related development, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reaffirmed on Thursday Washington’s support for the quick and unconditional ratification of the protocols. “We are working very hard to assist Armenia and Turkey in their efforts and we would like to continue to support that effort and not be diverted in any way at all,” Clinton told U.S. lawmakers.

“The normalization process, which carries important benefits for both sides, should take place without preconditions and within an obvious, reasonable timeframe,” she said.

https://www.azatutyun.am/a/1969087.html

February 26, 2010
COMMUNITY ALERT

THIS SUNDAY FEBRUARY 28, CBS-60 MINUTES WILL AIR A SEGMENT ON THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

PLEASE BE SURE TO WATCH. TELL YOU FRIENDS & FAMILY!

–USE THE ‘FORWARD EMAIL’ link below.

–SHARE THE NEWS ON FACEBOOK / TWITTER

It is anticipated that the segment will also be available for viewing after broadcast on the 60 MINUTES WEBSITE.

AGBU/CHICAGO BOARD

60 MINUTES
PROGRAM DESCRIPTION:
“BATTLE OVER HISTORY” Bob Simon reports on what the Armenians call their holocaust – the 1915 forced deportation and massacre of more than a million ethnic Armenians by the Turks – an event that the Turks and our own government have refused to call genocide. Michael Gavshon and Drew Magratten are the producers.

February 26, 2010
U.S. Official ‘Praises’ Armenian Stance On Turkey

Armenia — President Serzh Sarkisian (R) meets with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Philip Gordon in Kiev on February 25, 2010.

25.02.2010

Emil Danielyan

A top U.S. diplomat was reported to praise Armenia’s position in the stalled normalization process with Turkey at a meeting with President Serzh Sarkisian on Thursday.

Sarkisian and Assistant Secretary of State Philip Gordon met in the Ukrainian capital Kiev after attending the inauguration of Ukraine’s newly elected president, Viktor Yanukovich.

A statement by Sarkisian’s office said the talks focused on the U.S.-backed efforts to normalize relations between Armenia and Turkey. It said the Armenian leader reaffirmed Yerevan’s commitment to an unconditional implementation of the agreements to that effect which were signed by the two governments in October.

The statement quoted Gordon as describing this position as “constructive” and saying that the Armenian and Turkish parliaments should ratify the two protocols “without linking them to other existing problems.”

It was a clear reference to Turkish leaders’ statements making Turkish ratification conditional on a resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict that would satisfy Azerbaijan. The Armenian government says this “precondition” contradicts the essence of the protocols, which make no reference to the Karabakh dispute.

Ankara also attributes its reluctance to ratify the protocols to the Armenian Constitutional Court’s recent interpretation of the protocols’ implications which it says ran counter to the letter and spirit of the deal. Gordon, who coordinates U.S. policy on Europe and the former Soviet Union, dismissed the Turkish claims last month.

U.S. officials have yet to publicly comment on Yerevan’s threats to wake away from the agreements if the Turks continue to drag their feet. Acting on those threats, the Armenian parliament passed on Thursday, in the second and final reading, legal amendments that facilitate such a move.

Adding a new twist to the normalization process is a decision by a U.S. congressional committee to discuss and possibly vote on March 4 on a resolution describing the 1915 massacres of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire as genocide. A Turkish parliamentary delegation is expected to visit Washington this week to lobby U.S. lawmakers to block it.

The U.S. State Department opposed similar resolutions drafted by pro-Armenian legislators in the past, citing Turkey’s geopolitical significance for the United States. Department officials have so far pointedly refrained from criticizing the latest genocide bill. Some observers believe Washington will use it to press Ankara to ratify the protocols.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu clearly alluded to such possibility when he condemned the bill earlier this month. He said the prospect of U.S. recognition of the Armenian genocide will not force his government to soften its stance on protocol ratification.

Davutoglu insisted this week that the Turkish-Armenian rapprochement has not reached an impasse. “Negotiations and the process are going on,” he said, according to the Regnum news agency.

https://www.azatutyun.am/a/1968518.html

February 25, 2010