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The Star Phoenix (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan)
December 23, 2011 Friday
Final Edition
Turkey cuts ties as France passes genocide bill
by John Irish And Ibon Villelabeitia, Reuters
PARIS
France moved on Thursday to make it illegal to deny the 1915 mass
killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks amounted to genocide, prompting
Ankara to cancel all economic, political and military meetings.
Lawmakers in France's National Assembly - the lower house of
parliament - voted overwhelmingly in favour of a draft law outlawing
genocide denial, which will be debated next year in the Senate.
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan described the bill put forward
by members of French President Ni-colas Sarkozy's ruling party as
"politics based on racism, discrimination, xenophobia."
He said Sarkozy, was sacrificing good ties "for the sake of political
calculations," suggesting the president was trying to win the votes of
ethnic Armenians in France in an election next year.
Erdogan said Turkey was cancelling all economic, political and
military meetings with its NATO partner and said it would cancel
per-mission for French military planes to land, and warships to dock,
in Turkey.
French Foreign Affairs Minister Alain Juppe, speaking to journalists
after the vote, had urged Turkey not to overreact to the assembly
decision and called for "good sense and moderation."
Juppe said Turkey had also recalled its ambassador from France, a
decision he regretted.
"What I hope now is that our Turkish friends do not overreact about
the French National Assembly decision. We have lots of things to work
on together," Juppe said.
Armenia, backed by many historians and parliaments, says about 1.5
million Christian Armenians were killed in what is now eastern Turkey
during the First World War in a deliberate policy of genocide ordered
by the Ottoman government.
Successive Turkish governments and the vast majority of Turks feel the
charge of genocide is an insult to their nation. Ankara argues that
there was heavy loss of life on both sides during fighting in the
area.
"I don't understand why France wants to censor my freedom of
expression," Yildiz Hamza, president of the Montargis association that
represents 700 Turkish families in France, told Reuters outside the
National Assembly.
Earlier, about 3,000 French nationals of Turkish origin demonstrated
peacefully out-side the parliament ahead of the vote, which came 32
years to the day since a Turkish diplomat was assassinated by Armenian
militants in central Paris.
The authorities in Armenia's capital, Yerevan, welcomed the vote. "By
adopting this bill, (France) reconfirmed that crimes against humanity
do not have a period of prescription and their denial must be
absolutely condemned," Armenia's Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian
said in a statement.
France passed a law recognizing the killing of Armenians as genocide
in 2001. The French lower house first passed a bill criminalizing the
denial of an Armenian genocide in 2006, but it was rejected by the
Senate in May this year.
The latest draft law was made more general to out-law the denial of
any genocide, partly in the hope of appeasing Turkey.
The proposed legislation could still face a long pas-sage into law,
though its backers want to see it completed before parliament is
suspended at the end of February ahead of elections in the second
quarter.
National Assembly speaker Bernard Accoyer said on Wednesday that he
doubted the bill would pass by the end of the current parliament, as
the government had not made the bill priority legislation.
From: Baghdasarian
December 23, 2011 Friday
Final Edition
Turkey cuts ties as France passes genocide bill
by John Irish And Ibon Villelabeitia, Reuters
PARIS
France moved on Thursday to make it illegal to deny the 1915 mass
killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks amounted to genocide, prompting
Ankara to cancel all economic, political and military meetings.
Lawmakers in France's National Assembly - the lower house of
parliament - voted overwhelmingly in favour of a draft law outlawing
genocide denial, which will be debated next year in the Senate.
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan described the bill put forward
by members of French President Ni-colas Sarkozy's ruling party as
"politics based on racism, discrimination, xenophobia."
He said Sarkozy, was sacrificing good ties "for the sake of political
calculations," suggesting the president was trying to win the votes of
ethnic Armenians in France in an election next year.
Erdogan said Turkey was cancelling all economic, political and
military meetings with its NATO partner and said it would cancel
per-mission for French military planes to land, and warships to dock,
in Turkey.
French Foreign Affairs Minister Alain Juppe, speaking to journalists
after the vote, had urged Turkey not to overreact to the assembly
decision and called for "good sense and moderation."
Juppe said Turkey had also recalled its ambassador from France, a
decision he regretted.
"What I hope now is that our Turkish friends do not overreact about
the French National Assembly decision. We have lots of things to work
on together," Juppe said.
Armenia, backed by many historians and parliaments, says about 1.5
million Christian Armenians were killed in what is now eastern Turkey
during the First World War in a deliberate policy of genocide ordered
by the Ottoman government.
Successive Turkish governments and the vast majority of Turks feel the
charge of genocide is an insult to their nation. Ankara argues that
there was heavy loss of life on both sides during fighting in the
area.
"I don't understand why France wants to censor my freedom of
expression," Yildiz Hamza, president of the Montargis association that
represents 700 Turkish families in France, told Reuters outside the
National Assembly.
Earlier, about 3,000 French nationals of Turkish origin demonstrated
peacefully out-side the parliament ahead of the vote, which came 32
years to the day since a Turkish diplomat was assassinated by Armenian
militants in central Paris.
The authorities in Armenia's capital, Yerevan, welcomed the vote. "By
adopting this bill, (France) reconfirmed that crimes against humanity
do not have a period of prescription and their denial must be
absolutely condemned," Armenia's Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian
said in a statement.
France passed a law recognizing the killing of Armenians as genocide
in 2001. The French lower house first passed a bill criminalizing the
denial of an Armenian genocide in 2006, but it was rejected by the
Senate in May this year.
The latest draft law was made more general to out-law the denial of
any genocide, partly in the hope of appeasing Turkey.
The proposed legislation could still face a long pas-sage into law,
though its backers want to see it completed before parliament is
suspended at the end of February ahead of elections in the second
quarter.
National Assembly speaker Bernard Accoyer said on Wednesday that he
doubted the bill would pass by the end of the current parliament, as
the government had not made the bill priority legislation.
From: Baghdasarian