Turkish Press
April 15 2005

Erdogan’s Letter To Armenian President Kocharian

ANKARA – Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan sent a letter to
Armenian President Robert Kocharian officially proposing the
formation of a joint commission to undertake researches about the
developments and incidents that took place in 1915.

A Foreign Ministry statement noted on Thursday that Prime Minister
Erdogan said in his letter that the Turkish and Armenian peoples who
shared a common history and geography in a critical region of the
world lived together for long years, but there were differences
between them in their interpretations and evaluations of a part of
their common history.

Erdogan said in his letter that those differences which left painful
memories to both peoples didn’t facilitate the improvement of the
relations, noting that main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal also
shared that view.

Prime Minister Erdogan proposed in his letter (as the common proposal
of the Turkish ruling and opposition parties) the formation of a
group to be composed of both Turkish and Armenian historians and
experts who would investigate the developments and incidents of 1915
by using not only Turkish and Armenian archives, but also all
archives found in third countries and to announce their findings to
the international public opinion.

Foreign Ministry said that Erdogan stressed in his letter that such
an attempt would both enlighten the history and serve normalisation
of the relations between Turkey and Armenia, expressing his hope that
Armenia would accept it. ”If Armenia accepts Turkey’s proposal,
Turkey is ready to discuss the details of the proposal,” Erdogan
added in his letter.