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ANKARA: Minister: Armenia Gate Won't Be Opened Unless Conditions Met

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  • ANKARA: Minister: Armenia Gate Won't Be Opened Unless Conditions Met

    MINISTER: ARMENIA GATE WON'T BE OPENED UNLESS CONDITIONS MET

    Today's Zaman
    May 26 2008
    Turkey

    Turkey will not open its border with neighboring Armenia, closed for
    more than a decade, unless Yerevan resolves its problems with Ankara
    and regional ally Azerbaijan, a government minister has said.

    Economy Minister Mehmet Å~^imÅ~_ek, while attending a meeting on
    regional development in the far eastern province of Igdır, located
    near the border with Armenia, said Turkey, with its large purchasing
    capacity of $950 billion, does not need economic ties with Armenia,
    emphasizing that Armenia should be the one to take steps to normalize
    its ties with Turkey. "We don't need them, they need us. Turkey wants
    good economic ties with its neighbors. If they see this fact and take
    a step toward us, we will take a step toward them," Å~^imÅ~_ek said.

    "We have no commercial or political dialogue with the Armenians
    due to the problems caused by them. Opening of the border gate is
    unfortunately not possible for the time being without Armenia resolving
    its problems with Azerbaijan and changing its stance toward Turkey,"
    Å~^imÅ~_ek, who was accompanied by Rıza Nur Meral, chairman of the
    Turkish Confederation of Businessmen and Industrialists (TUSKON), and a
    200-strong delegation of investors and businessmen, said late Saturday.

    Turkey severed its diplomatic ties and closed the border gate with
    landlocked Armenia in the last decade, following Armenian occupation of
    Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian enclave within Azerbaijan. The Armenian
    occupation of the Azerbaijani territory has been maintained. Ankara
    also refuses to normalize its relations with Yerevan because Armenia
    seeks a worldwide recognition for claims that 1.5 million Armenians
    were subject to genocide at the hands of the late Ottoman Empire
    during World War I in eastern Anatolia and fails to declare that it
    has no territorial claims on eastern Anatolia despite Turkish demands
    to that effect.

    Hopes for reconciliation between the two countries resurfaced when
    President Abdullah Gul sent a congratulatory message to Serzh Sarkisian
    following his election to power in February. Prime Minister Recep
    Tayyip Erdogan and Foreign Minister Ali Babacan had also sent similar
    messages to their Armenian counterparts following the establishment of
    the new government in the neighboring country, expressing hopes for a
    new era that will contribute to regional peace, stability and welfare.

    But no visible progress has been achieved on the contentious
    issues. Armenia rejected a 2005 call from Turkey to jointly examine
    archives to find out what happened during World War I and Sarkisian
    vowed in April to step up efforts for international recognition of
    the genocide claims.

    Å~^imÅ~_ek said trade with neighboring countries was vital for
    the economy of the border provinces and lamented that Igdır and
    neighboring Kars lagged behind compared to provinces located on borders
    with other neighbors. He noted that the government would continue to
    channel funds to regional development projects, supporting particularly
    the agriculture and livestock sectors, and also emphasized that Mount
    Agrı (Ararat) could become a tourist attraction.

    --Boundary_(ID_YLeMiQDninC9gkTk08zKpw )--
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