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NG: THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE RECOGNITION PROCESS BECOMES IRREVERSIBLE
PanARMENIAN.Net
April 5, 2010 - 15:38 AMT 10:38 GMT
"Washington is making every effort in order Ankara-Yerevan
reconciliation process not to be stalled. Rapid start, marked by
mutual visits of Turkish and Armenian presidents Abdullah Gul and
Serzh Sargsyan to football matches between their national teams and
called soccer diplomacy, was backed by signing the "Swiss Protocols",
or "road map" over settlement of relations on October 10, 2009 in
Zurich. According to the Protocols, Yerevan and Ankara are starting
the political approximation, which in the short term will be crown by
establishment full-fledged good-neighborly relations," Nezavisimaya
Gazeta wrote.
However, according to the newspaper, local publics and conservative
political circles were not ready to what seemed to be appropriate by
political leaders of Turkey and Armenia. "In Turkey, there was an
opinion that defrosting relations with Yerevan imply that Turkey's
strategic partner - Azerbaijan will become abandoned, with the
unresolved Nagorno Karabakh problem.
The same view was expressed by official Baku, tightened its pricing
policy on gas supplies to brotherly Turkey. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan pledged to save a strategic partnership, making statements
towards Yerevan, like, no normalization take place unless Armenia
return to Azerbaijani jurisdiction Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent
territories and unless Armenia abandon its international campaign
on recognition of the 1915 Genocide in the Ottoman Empire. In
response, Yerevan tightened its position and Armenia announced that
its parliament ratifies the "Swiss Protocols" only after Turkish
counterparts do that. In turn, the Turkish parliament "lost" the Swiss
Protocols in one of its committees, "remembering" either Karabakh
with adjacent territories separated from Azerbaijan, or a permanent
campaign on the Armenian Genocide recognition, the article wrote.
Recognition of the Armenian Genocide by the U.S. House Committee on
Foreign Affairs, and the parliament of Sweden resulted in Erdogan's
announcement about the halt of the Armenian-Turkish reconciliation.
Armenia did not bat an eye and tried to boost the initiative, reminding
to Barack Obama about his promise during the election campaign to
recognize the Armenian Genocide, 95th anniversary of which will be
marked on April 24 and 25.
"The international process of Genocide recognition became
irreversible, many experts say in Yerevan. Such statements do not seem
overoptimistic, if we take into account some serious events in Turkey.
Several local historians, lawyers and jurists in Turkey in interviews
to leading newspapers concurrently called on the authorities not to go
against the flow and accept the facts of mass murder and expulsion of
the Armenians started in the late XIX century and culminated in 1915,
thus finishing that tragic page of the history of Turkish state.
Unlike past years when such statement or confessions were severely
punished by law, the scientists are free now. Like the mayor of
Diyarbakır city Osman Baydemir, who at a regional conference brought a
formal apology to the Armenian people, "almost half of the population
of Diyarbakır before 1915 ", he said. He called upon Armenians to
return to their homeland: "No apology can relieve this tragedy ... You
were forced to leave, but be sure: not you - who lost, but we, those
who left here. Because you have taken with you good fortune and peace".
This would be a foreign and local background of talks Erdogan will
hold with Barack Obama and, perhaps, Serge Sargsyan on painful for
Ankara issues. His threats and ultimatums have not proved to be too
effective. And so it's possible that now, Erdogan after the stick
will have to exercise the carrot policy," NG concluded.
PanARMENIAN.Net
April 5, 2010 - 15:38 AMT 10:38 GMT
"Washington is making every effort in order Ankara-Yerevan
reconciliation process not to be stalled. Rapid start, marked by
mutual visits of Turkish and Armenian presidents Abdullah Gul and
Serzh Sargsyan to football matches between their national teams and
called soccer diplomacy, was backed by signing the "Swiss Protocols",
or "road map" over settlement of relations on October 10, 2009 in
Zurich. According to the Protocols, Yerevan and Ankara are starting
the political approximation, which in the short term will be crown by
establishment full-fledged good-neighborly relations," Nezavisimaya
Gazeta wrote.
However, according to the newspaper, local publics and conservative
political circles were not ready to what seemed to be appropriate by
political leaders of Turkey and Armenia. "In Turkey, there was an
opinion that defrosting relations with Yerevan imply that Turkey's
strategic partner - Azerbaijan will become abandoned, with the
unresolved Nagorno Karabakh problem.
The same view was expressed by official Baku, tightened its pricing
policy on gas supplies to brotherly Turkey. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan pledged to save a strategic partnership, making statements
towards Yerevan, like, no normalization take place unless Armenia
return to Azerbaijani jurisdiction Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent
territories and unless Armenia abandon its international campaign
on recognition of the 1915 Genocide in the Ottoman Empire. In
response, Yerevan tightened its position and Armenia announced that
its parliament ratifies the "Swiss Protocols" only after Turkish
counterparts do that. In turn, the Turkish parliament "lost" the Swiss
Protocols in one of its committees, "remembering" either Karabakh
with adjacent territories separated from Azerbaijan, or a permanent
campaign on the Armenian Genocide recognition, the article wrote.
Recognition of the Armenian Genocide by the U.S. House Committee on
Foreign Affairs, and the parliament of Sweden resulted in Erdogan's
announcement about the halt of the Armenian-Turkish reconciliation.
Armenia did not bat an eye and tried to boost the initiative, reminding
to Barack Obama about his promise during the election campaign to
recognize the Armenian Genocide, 95th anniversary of which will be
marked on April 24 and 25.
"The international process of Genocide recognition became
irreversible, many experts say in Yerevan. Such statements do not seem
overoptimistic, if we take into account some serious events in Turkey.
Several local historians, lawyers and jurists in Turkey in interviews
to leading newspapers concurrently called on the authorities not to go
against the flow and accept the facts of mass murder and expulsion of
the Armenians started in the late XIX century and culminated in 1915,
thus finishing that tragic page of the history of Turkish state.
Unlike past years when such statement or confessions were severely
punished by law, the scientists are free now. Like the mayor of
Diyarbakır city Osman Baydemir, who at a regional conference brought a
formal apology to the Armenian people, "almost half of the population
of Diyarbakır before 1915 ", he said. He called upon Armenians to
return to their homeland: "No apology can relieve this tragedy ... You
were forced to leave, but be sure: not you - who lost, but we, those
who left here. Because you have taken with you good fortune and peace".
This would be a foreign and local background of talks Erdogan will
hold with Barack Obama and, perhaps, Serge Sargsyan on painful for
Ankara issues. His threats and ultimatums have not proved to be too
effective. And so it's possible that now, Erdogan after the stick
will have to exercise the carrot policy," NG concluded.