U.S. official: Washington supports rapprochement between Turkey and Armenia

AP Worldstream
May 03, 2005

A senior U.S. diplomat said Tuesday that the United States supported
rapprochement between Turkey and neighboring Armenia, which have no
diplomatic ties.

Laura Kennedy, U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state for European
and Eurasian Affairs, said it was “encouraging” to see a recent
exchange of letters between leaders of the two countries on how to
address the killings of Armenians during World War I, which Armenians
say amounted to genocide.

Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently sent a letter
to Armenian President Robert Kocharian inviting Armenia to set up a
committee of historians to jointly research the killings.

But Armenia rejected the Turkish proposal Saturday, saying diplomatic
relations should be established first and without any preconditions.

Kennedy urged the two sides to reconcile their proposals.

“Why not have both?” Kennedy said. “For our part, we very strongly
encourage rapprochement between the two governments.”

Erdogan reportedly said political relations could be established if
the two sides first agreed on forming the committee.

Turkey, which denies a genocide was committed, is scheduled to start
membership negotiations with the European Union in October and is
under pressure to address the issue.

Armenians say some 1.5 million of their people were killed as the
Ottoman Empire forced them from eastern Turkey between 1915 and 1923
in a deliberate campaign of genocide.

Turkey says the death count is inflated and insists that Armenians
were killed or displaced in the civil unrest during the collapse of
the Ottoman Empire.