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TURKEY ABOLISHES TURCO-FRENCH INTER-PARLIAMENTARY FRIENDSHIP GROUP
Today's Zaman
Dec 23 2011
Turkey
Hundreds of Turkish lawmakers have resigned en masse from the
Turkey-France Inter-parliamentary Friendship Group, abolishing the
mechanism and adding to a massive flow of reactions from Turkish
officials following the approval of a controversial bill in the lower
house of the French parliament on Thursday.
Speaking on behalf of the resigned ruling party lawmakers
participating in the friendship mechanism, Parliament Speaker Cemil
Cicek announced on Friday that Turkey had abolished the group following
the resignations of most of its members. "There is no point remaining
friends with such a country [France]," Cicek told a group of reporters
a day after the French parliament approved a bill that proposes making
it illegal to deny that mass killings of Armenians in 1915 by Ottoman
Turks was genocide and forwarded it to be put on the agenda of the
French senate.
"The French National Assembly's approval of the mentioned bill is
clearly a hostile attitude," Oktay Vural of the opposition Nationalist
Movement Party (MHP) said as he announced that MHP lawmakers of the
friendship group were also suspending their memberships until the
"French senate drops the bill." Vural stressed that the approval
defied ties of friendship between Turkey and France.
The inter-parliamentary group consisted of 357 members, most of
whom were lawmakers from the ruling Justice and Development Party
(AK Party).
Today's Zaman
Dec 23 2011
Turkey
Hundreds of Turkish lawmakers have resigned en masse from the
Turkey-France Inter-parliamentary Friendship Group, abolishing the
mechanism and adding to a massive flow of reactions from Turkish
officials following the approval of a controversial bill in the lower
house of the French parliament on Thursday.
Speaking on behalf of the resigned ruling party lawmakers
participating in the friendship mechanism, Parliament Speaker Cemil
Cicek announced on Friday that Turkey had abolished the group following
the resignations of most of its members. "There is no point remaining
friends with such a country [France]," Cicek told a group of reporters
a day after the French parliament approved a bill that proposes making
it illegal to deny that mass killings of Armenians in 1915 by Ottoman
Turks was genocide and forwarded it to be put on the agenda of the
French senate.
"The French National Assembly's approval of the mentioned bill is
clearly a hostile attitude," Oktay Vural of the opposition Nationalist
Movement Party (MHP) said as he announced that MHP lawmakers of the
friendship group were also suspending their memberships until the
"French senate drops the bill." Vural stressed that the approval
defied ties of friendship between Turkey and France.
The inter-parliamentary group consisted of 357 members, most of
whom were lawmakers from the ruling Justice and Development Party
(AK Party).