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Turkey told it must admit to Armenian genocide

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  • Turkey told it must admit to Armenian genocide

    The Irish Times
    September 29, 2005

    Turkey told it must admit to Armenian genocide

    by Paul Cullen in Strasbourg


    TURKEY/EU: Turkey's hopes of acceding to the EU have suffered a fresh
    blow with a demand by the European Parliament that it first
    recognises as genocide the killing of Armenians under Ottoman rule
    almost a century ago.

    Turkey, which vehemently denies there was genocide, claims Armenians
    who rebelled at the end of the Ottoman Empire sided with Russian
    invaders and were killed along with Turks in intercommunal fighting.

    MEPs here also postponed a vote on approving Turkey's extended
    customs union with the EU because of Ankara's failure to recognise
    Cyprus, as well as expressing concerns about human rights issues in
    the country. While the EU Commission had called for ratification of
    the Ankara Protocol, members voted by 311 to 285 to postpone the
    ballot.

    Although parliament endorsed the start of negotiations with Turkey on
    joining the EU next week, it called on the Commission to assess by
    the end of next year whether Turkey has fully implemented the
    protocol extending its customs union with the EU to the 10 new
    accession states.

    During the negotiations, which are open-ended and will not
    automatically lead to Turkish membership, Turkey should be kept under
    "permanent pressure" to ensure it keeps up the pace of reform, MEPs
    resolved. The talks are expected to take at least a decade.

    MEPs also expressed concern about the criminal proceedings against
    novelist Orhan Pamuk and an article of the Turkish penal code which
    criminalises "acts against the fundamental national interest". The
    vote followed an emotional debate in which many deputies, especially
    on the right, poured out their hostility to the prospect of the poor,
    populous, mainly Muslim nation joining the 25-nation EU. No Irish
    MEPs spoke.
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