PROTEST TARGETS PROPOSED FRENCH LAW ON ALLEGED ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

NTV MSNBC, Turkey
May 17 2006

France prepared draft legislation making it a crime to deny the
so-called Armenian genocide.

NTV-MSNBC
Guncelleme: 10:50 TSÝ 17 Mayýs 2006 CarþambaANKARA – The French
embassy in Ankara was the target of a group protesting against a
proposal before the French parliament to make it a criminal offence
to deny the Ottoman Empire committed an act of genocide against its
Armenian citizens during the years of the First World War.

A group calling itself the “Great Project 2006” kicked off the first of
what are intended to be a series of protests described as a “warning
on duty” by closing the road to the French Embassy on Monday.

The protestors included some parliamentary deputies of the opposition
Republican People’s party (CHP), the Turk-Is trade union, the Ataturk
Thought Association and the Workers Party (IP).

Ferit Ilsever, the Secretary General of the IP, called on France to
immediately withdraw the proposed legislation. Ilsever said that if
the law was passed Ankara should consider boycotting French goods,
downgrade its diplomatic relations with Paris and withdraw from its
negotiation process for European Union membership.

French parliament is expected to debate the draft on May 18.

–Boundary_(ID_/1SFP7aqDxsNH8457Zwcyg)–