"ERDOGAN’S GOVERNMNENT WILL BE FORCED TO ESTABLISH NORMAL RELATIONS WITH ARMENIA SOONER OR LATER"
By H. Chaqrian

AZG Armenian Daily
17/08/2007

Raffi Hovhannisian’s Strategic and National Research Center of
Armenia have always kept an eye on the development of p[olitical
events in Turkey, knowing well that they have essential influence
on the relations between Armenia and Turkey. Of all those events the
victory of Prime Minister Erdogan’s "Justice and Prosperity" party on
the July 22 elections seems to be the most remarkable. This victory
ensured the unitary rule of the party in Turkey for five more years.

This means that the Turkish Government will keep on trying to
balance the pressure of the USA with rapprochement with the European
Union. Such policy will only intensify the difficulties between Turkey
and America, the cornerstone of which will still remain the issue of
de-facto independent Kurdistan on the territory of North Iraq.

What about Armenian-Turkey relationships, Turkey was forced by both the
EU and the USA to improve its negative attitude to Armenia. Although
Turkey gave up the claims about "not mentioning the events of 1915" and
"establishing Azerbaijan’s authority in Nagorno Karabakh" and suggested
creation of a joint Armenian-Turkish commission for studying the events
of 1915, expecting from Armenia a similar gesture in the Karabakh
issue, there is still no evident progress in Armenia-Turkey relations.

Therefore, actually, Erdogan’s party did not abolish its pre-conditions
for Armenia, irrespective of their phrasings, and the economical
blockade of Armenia is still in place. Time will tell whether the
newly formed "Justice and Prosperity" government is to improve its
relations with Armenia, or no. Yet it is certain that because of the
inconsistence of Turkey’s policy on Armenia Erdogan’s government is
facing the necessity of normalizing the relations with Armenia.

All those issues were commented in details by Jane’s Research Center
expert Richard Kirakosian on a conference organized by the Strategic
and National Research Center of Armenia on August 14.

Mr. Kirakosian assured that Turkey has come to realize that the
blockade does not work for its original purpose, while poor
contact with Armenia makes Turkey to depend on Azerbaijan in
regional policy. In this way Turkey’s influence on South Caucasus
is considerably reduced, which makes even the military authorities
of Turkey to think seriously about establishing normal relations
with Armenia.

Decision of opening the Armenian-Turkish border may become the basis of
further improvement of relations between the two states. Evidently this
necessity is accepted by the authorities of Turkey. This is proved by
Barcin Yinac’s "Counterpoising The Armenian Resolution With Gestures
to Yerevan" article, published in "Reference" newspaper on August 11
and "CNN-Turk" website on August 15.

The article author factually confirms Richard Kirakosian’s conclusions,
stating that the new government shall work on the Armenian Resolution
submitted to the US Senate as an issue of prime importance. He relates
that in late August Councilor of the Turkish Foreign Ertugrul Apakan
is to leave for Washington, DC to discuss the issue of the Resolution
with his colleague from the United States Nicolas Burns. "218
votes are enough to pass the Resolution, while it was signed by 226
persons. This means that in September, when Congress starts its work,
the Resolution shall sway over our heads as the Sword of Damocles,"
concludes Barcin Yinac. The article also says that the Foreign Ministry
of Turkey shall submit a number of projects to the new Government,
and projects referring to the improvement of Armenia-Turkey relations
surely shall be among them.

"There is no obstacle to hold back from bald moves the ‘Justice
and prosperity’ party, which gained 46,5% of votes on the
elections," writes Yinac, "By now Yerevan took no notice of Ankara’s
steps. Therefore one wing of the Foreign Ministry stands for making
the propositions to Armenia more attractive so as to insure Armenia’s
involvement in bilateral negotiations, while the other wing considers
that Armenia will never give up its maximalist positions, especially
in case Ankara’s positions are shaken by the adoption of the Armenian
Resolution".

Then the author goes on, "Although the activity of the Armenian
Diaspora will be hardly restrained by the normalization of
Ankara-Yerevan relations, as the Genocide issue is used to preserve
the existence of the Diaspora, not the Republic of Armenia. Moreover,
even if Turkey succeeds to fail the aforementioned resolution, Armenia
will go on tying Turkey down with the allegations of the Genocide,
never forgetting though that ‘Justice and Prosperity’ party is also
good at avoiding fetters. And for that reason the Government of
Turkey will eventually start the process of normalization of the
relations with Armenia. Of course, this will not make the Diaspora
stop seeking recognition of the alleged genocide. But it is also
obvious that thereafter they shall find it difficult to make allies
worldwide. Why can’t this be considered and achievement?"