TURKEY’S PARIS, OTTAWA ENVOYS RETURN TO POSTS IN GENOCIDE ROW

Agence France Presse — English
May 11, 2006 Thursday 1:56 PM GMT

Turkey’s ambassadors to Canada and France have returned to their
posts after being been recalled over disagreements on whether the
massacres of Armenians during World War I constitute genocide,
a Turkish diplomat said Thursday.

Ambassador to Paris Osman Koruturk and Aydemir Erman, the ambassador
to Ottawa, “have returned” to their posts after talks with Turkish
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and foreign ministry officials,
the diplomat told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The foreign ministry said Monday that the two had been summoned to
Ankara “for a short time” for consultations.

Turkey has warned Paris that bilateral ties will suffer if the French
National Assembly adopts a bill that would make it a punishable
offence to “deny the existence of the 1915 Armenian genocide”.

A first reading of the bill, proposed by the opposition Socialist
Party, is scheduled for May 18.

“I believe the French parliament will probably not introduce the
so-called Armenian genocide like a virus between two countries that
have such important ties. I believe common sense will prevail,”
Erdogan told reporters Wednesday.

If approved, the bill, which follows a 2001 French law officially
recognising the Armenian massacres as genocide, would provide for
five years in jail and a 45,000-euro (57,000-dollar) fine for any
person who denies that the 1915-1917 massacres constitute genocide.

Turkey was also angered when Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper
referred to the “Armenian genocide” as fact in a statement during
commemorations of the 91st anniversary of the killings on April 24.

The foreign ministry said at the time that Harper’s words were
“appalling” and would “negatively affect” bilateral ties.

In protest, Turkey withdrew from a planned multi-nation military
exercise to be held in Canada, officials in Ottawa said Wednesday.

In 2002, the Canadian Senate recognised the massacres as the first
genocide of the 20th century and the House of Commons followed suit
two years later.

Armenians claim up to 1.5 million of their kin were slaughtered in
orchestrated killings between 1915 and 1917, as the Ottoman Empire,
modern Turkey’s predecessor, was falling apart.

Turkey rejects the claim, saying 300,000 Armenians and at least
as many Turks died in civil strife when the Armenians took up arms
for independence in eastern Anatolia and sided with Russian troops
invading Ottoman soil.