Turk PM raps Armenia on genocide claims at meeting

WARSAW, May 17 (Reuters) – Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan
scolded Armenia on Tuesday for raising the issue of the alleged
genocide of its people 90 years ago during a summit of a pan-European
human rights watchdog.

Armenia says some 1.5 million of its people were killed in a
systematic genocide by Ottoman Turks during and after World War One.
Turkey denies any genocide, saying the Armenians were victims of a
partisan war in which many Turks also died. Addressing a session of
the Council of Europe, the continent’s top human rights body, Erdogan
said it was for historians, not governments or parliaments, to judge
what actually happened on Ottoman territory nearly a century ago.

“We do not appreciate these efforts to lobby (in favour of the Armenian
claims), lobbying that has no basis in historical documents and facts,”
said Erdogan, clearly irritated.

Armenian President Robert Kocharyan mentioned the genocide issue
during his address to the Council on Monday and he thanked those
countries which backed Yerevan’s stance.

Turkey is worried the Armenian claims could harm its plans to begin
European Union entry talks in October. Some EU politicians, notably
in France, home to Europe’s biggest Armenian diaspora, say Ankara
must accept the genocide claims.

Erdogan renewed an appeal to Armenia to open its archives from the
period to historians to demonstrate its good faith.

“We opened our archives, one million classified documents. We ask
Armenia to open its archives and we ask other countries to contribute
too… If there are decisions to be taken after that, they will be
taken. But not on the basis of lobbying and parliamentary decisions
based on such lobbying,” he said.

Several parliaments, including those of France, Canada and most
recently Poland — which is hosting the Council of Europe talks —
have passed resolutions backing the genocide claims.

Turkish media said Erdogan had cancelled a planned meeting in Warsaw
with Kocharyan which had been designed to underline Turkey’s desire
for better ties with Armenia as a protest against the reference to
the genocide issue.

Turkey broke off diplomatic ties with the tiny ex-Soviet republic
in 1993 over Armenia’s occupation of territory inside Azerbaijan,
a regional Turkic-speaking ally of Ankara.

05/17/05 10:46 ET

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress