Regnum, Russia
Oct 13 2006
Expert: Ankara’s next step will be charging the US with the genocide
of Indians in North America
As you may know, after the visit of French President Jacques Chirac
to Armenia and his statement during a press-conference in Yerevan
that the French Parliament was drafting a bill on criminal
responsibility for denying the Armenian Genocide of 1915-1923, they
in Turkey and Azerbaijan have launched a large-scale anti-French
campaign. Expert of the Caucasus analytical center Sergey Shakaryants
comments on the matter.
He says that the situation when Turkish politicians are charging
France with `genocide in Algeria’ is more like the childish `You are
fool yourself!’ style than an attitude of conscious political or
public figures to a serious problem. `Instead of recognizing or
producing real facts and documents to disprove the Armenian Genocide
perpetrated in Western Armenia and other parts of the former Ottoman
Empire, the Turks are trying to charge with genocide the countries
who have taken steps to recognize and condemn the crime committed by
Turkish chauvinists. In such a case, the Turks will have no end of
work to do – for example, their next step may be charging with a
genocide of North American Indians almost all the US states whose
national assemblies have passed resolutions recognizing and
condemning the Armenian Genocide.’
`True, Turkey will hardly dare to be as blackmailing to even one US
state as it is now to France. Old Continent is a different story –
they are burdened with the necessity of negotiating EU membership
with Ankara and are absolutely at a loss what to do with the problem
of yearly swelling Muslim and Turkish gastarbeiter communities in
almost all European states,’ says Shakaryants.
He believes that Azerbaijan’s solidarity with Turkey in the matter
comes more from self-interest than barely from commitment to the
recent Azeri-Turkish agreements on mutual support in `fighting the
Armenian lobby’ worldwide. `This can be seen in the recent behavior
of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Foreign Minister Elmar
Mammadyarov, who have begun to actively argue for the deployment of
some `international peacekeepers’ in the Karabakh-Azerbaijani
conflict zone. Their point is that, since the OSCE MG states have,
allegedly, no right to provide their military contingents for such
`peacekeeping,’ they, in tandem with Ankara, will succeed in `pushing
through’ the scenario of Turkish peacekeeping presence, like was the
case in Lebanon,’ says Shakaryants.
`However, the attempts of Turkey and Azerbaijan to blackmail the
international community and Armenia with NKR are a priori doomed to
failure. It was not without purpose that Turkey was debarred from any
active part in the OSCE MG – Yerevan and Stepanakert are unanimous
that Turkey, who, de facto, took part in the war (to remind, any form
of blockade by any country, in fact, even by the UN, is considered to
be a form of waging or partaking a war) had and has absolutely no
right to take part in the affairs of the South Caucasus, not
mentioning the Karabakh peace process. The Armenian Genocide issue
will always be `a sword of Damocles’ for Ankara if it actually wants
to join United Europe – at least, because there are still many
descendants of Armenian Genocide victims living in many European
countries,’ says Shakaryants.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress