NOBEL PRIZE WINNERS URGE ARMENIAN-TURKISH RECONCILIATION
Elie Wiesel

Voice of America
April 10 2007

Fifty three Nobel prize winners are urging Armenia and Turkey to
normalize relations and improve their human rights situations.

The letter was released Monday by the Elie Wiesel Foundation for
Humanity. Wiesel, who established the foundation, is a famed Holocaust
survivor and Nobel Peace Prize winner.

The Nobel laureates call on Armenia and Turkey to open their common
border and increase diplomatic contacts, saying this would lead to
deeper understanding between their peoples.

The laureates also ask Armenia to change what they call its
authoritarian policies and allow free and fair elections. They want
Turkey to end racial and ethnic discrimination and scrap a law that
criminalizes insulting Turkish identity.

Turkey has long denied responsibility for genocide in the deaths of
more than one million Armenians during and after World War I.

Turkey says the people died during violence surrounding the collapse
of the Ottoman Empire.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress