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TURKEY'S EU MINISTER CALLS ON GERMANY TO OPEN ARCHIVES REGARDING ARMENIANS
Cumhuriyet
http://en.cumhuriyet.com/?hn=313974
Feb 8 2012
Turkey
Turkey's European Union (EU) minister and chief negotiator, Egemen
Bagis, has called on Germany to open archives regarding Armenians to
help illuminate the issue.
BERLIN- German Welt Online posted Egemen Bagis' remarks on its web-site
and quoted the minister as saying that Germany should open its archives
regarding Armenians and help illumination of the issue.
"Germany was a strong ally of Armenians in 1915, therefore Germans
should open their archives and give documents to historians to be
examined," Bagis said.
Bagis said all documents he had seen regarding the issue did not
define the incidents of 1915 as "genocide", and freedom of thought
was among European values.
"There are people who see incidents of 1915 as genocide and there are
as many people as those people who do not see them as genocide. There
is not any inconvenience in expressing this view," Bagis said.
Bagis said both nations had losses during the World War I, and almost
2.5 million Muslims and 650,000 Armenians died.
Politicians had a responsibility about the future, not the past,
he said. Bagis said politicians were elected to make laws for the
future, not to pass laws regarding 500 years before, adding that it
was nonsense for parliaments to decide how history would be written.
French Senate adopted a law which penalizes the denial of Armenian
allegations regarding 1915 incidents during Ottoman Empire period.
Under the law, people, who deny the Armenian allegations, are sentenced
to one year in prison and 45,000 euro fine. On Tuesday, 77 senators
and 65 parliamentarians in France applied to French Constitutional
Council for the annulment of the law. The Council will announce its
decision within a month.
Cumhuriyet
http://en.cumhuriyet.com/?hn=313974
Feb 8 2012
Turkey
Turkey's European Union (EU) minister and chief negotiator, Egemen
Bagis, has called on Germany to open archives regarding Armenians to
help illuminate the issue.
BERLIN- German Welt Online posted Egemen Bagis' remarks on its web-site
and quoted the minister as saying that Germany should open its archives
regarding Armenians and help illumination of the issue.
"Germany was a strong ally of Armenians in 1915, therefore Germans
should open their archives and give documents to historians to be
examined," Bagis said.
Bagis said all documents he had seen regarding the issue did not
define the incidents of 1915 as "genocide", and freedom of thought
was among European values.
"There are people who see incidents of 1915 as genocide and there are
as many people as those people who do not see them as genocide. There
is not any inconvenience in expressing this view," Bagis said.
Bagis said both nations had losses during the World War I, and almost
2.5 million Muslims and 650,000 Armenians died.
Politicians had a responsibility about the future, not the past,
he said. Bagis said politicians were elected to make laws for the
future, not to pass laws regarding 500 years before, adding that it
was nonsense for parliaments to decide how history would be written.
French Senate adopted a law which penalizes the denial of Armenian
allegations regarding 1915 incidents during Ottoman Empire period.
Under the law, people, who deny the Armenian allegations, are sentenced
to one year in prison and 45,000 euro fine. On Tuesday, 77 senators
and 65 parliamentarians in France applied to French Constitutional
Council for the annulment of the law. The Council will announce its
decision within a month.