Southeast European Times, MD
Sept 25 2005

Conference on Armenian Massacres Held With Support from Turkish
Leaders
25/09/2005

ANKARA, Turkey — Following two failed attempts earlier this year,
the first-ever public debate about the early 20th century mass
killings of Armenians was held in Turkey Saturday (24 September),
with the backing of senior Turkish leaders who cited the
participants’ right to freedom of expression. The conference,
attended mostly by academics, took place at the Bilgi University in
Istanbul under tight security as nationalists demonstrated outside,
calling the event “traitorous”.

Last week, a court had banned the event, prompting Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan to say that the ruling was timed to undermine
the country’s efforts to join the EU. “I want to live in a Turkey
where freedoms are enjoyed in their broadest sense,” Erdogan said
Saturday. Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul also defended the event,
saying the ban showed that Turks “are so good at shooting themselves
in the foot”. The EU condemned the court’s move as a “provocation”
and warned the conference would be considered a test of freedom of
expression in Turkey, an EU hopeful.

As many as 1.5 million Armenians are thought to have been killed
between 1915 and 1923, in what Armenia and several governments around
the world have termed a genocide. Turkey, however, denies the charge,
arguing that the death toll is inflated and that Turks as well as
Armenians perished in civil unrest and intercommunal fighting as the
Ottoman Empire collapsed.