NOBEL WINNER PAMUK SLAMS FRENCH PARLIAMENT’S GENOCIDE LAW

Deutsche Presse-Agentur
October 14, 2006 Saturday 9:56 AM EST

DPA POLITICS Turkey Diplomacy France Pamuk Nobel winner Pamuk slams
French parliament’s genocide law Ankara Turkish Nobel Literature Prize
winner Orhan Pamuk has hit out at a French parliament decision to
make it a crime to deny the massacres of Armenians during the First
World War,

describing the move as a blow to freedom of speech.

Speaking to the private NTV television station, Pamuk said late
Friday the move was not in the French tradition – but that Turkey
should not overreact.

"We all know of the French traditions which defend freedom of
speech… We have all been affected by this. This move however does
not fit with the traditional French ideals," Pamuk said.

Pamuk was awarded the Nobel prize on Thursday, the day the lower
house of the French parliament passed a bill making it a criminal
offence to deny that a genocide took place in Turkey by Ottoman Turks

on Christian Armenians.

While Turkey admits that massacres took place, it vehemently denies
that the deaths of Armenians during the war were part of a planned
genocide.

Earlier this year Pamuk was has himself on trial for "insulting
Turkishness" for his comments on the matter.

He was tried, but found not guilty on a technicality, for having told
a Swiss newspaper "30,000 Kurds and a million Armenians were killed
in these lands and nobody but me dares talk about it."

While no official sanctions have been announced by the Turkish
government, public campaigns have already begun to boycott French
goods.

Pamuk though warned that Turkey should not go too far in reaction to
the French move, saying "one should not burn the whole quilt for the
sake of a single flea".

Pamuk’s winning the Nobel prize has been widely welcomed by Turks
although nationalists have claimed the prize was awarded not for
his writing but for his politics, in particular his comments on the
killings of Armenians.