NEWS FEATURE: US SEEKS TO CONTAIN FALLOUT WITH TURKEY
Mike McCarthy, dpa
EUX.TV, Netherlands
Oct 12 2007
Washington (dpa) – President George W Bush’s administration scrambled
Thursday to limit diplomatic fallout with Turkey after a congressional
measure declaring as "genocide" the deaths of more than 1 million
Armenians at the end of the Ottoman Empire.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice planned phone calls to Turkish
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and President Abdullah Gul to
express the Bush administration’s opposition to the bill, and the White
House urged Congress against holding a final vote on the resolution.
But Turkey, which had already warned that the declaration would harm
relations, reacted quickly, sharply criticizing Congress and reportedly
ordering its ambassador to Washington, Nabi Sensoy, to come home.
While acknowledging the tragedy of the mass killings of up to 1.5
million Armenians between 1915 and 1923, Bush argued that the bill
would damage relations with an important NATO ally providing a transit
point for equipment and supplies for the US military in Iraq.
The House Foreign Affairs Committee ignored the warnings and approved
the measure by a 27-21 tally. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi vowed to
bring it to the floor for a full vote, but no date has been set.
Lower-level US diplomats have been in regular contact with their
Turkish counterparts to convey the Bush administration’s opposition
to the resolution, US State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey
said. Bush telephoned Erdogan Friday with the same message as a vote
in favour of the bill appeared inevitable last week.
Rice intends to tell Erdogan and Gul of "the regret that the
administration has over the passage of this resolution," Casey said.
The dialogue between administration and Turkish officials has not
stopped the heavy criticism coming out of Turkey. Gul in a statement
posted on the embassy’s website accused Congress of using the measure
to score political points with Armenian-Americans at the cost of good
relations with Turkey.
"It’s a pity that some politicians in the United States closed their
ears to calls of common sense," he said.
Pelosi, who represents a district in California, which has a large
community of Armenian descent, shrugged off speculation that the US-
Turkish ties will worsen, saying that the US and Turkey have a "very
strong relationship" based on common interests.
"This isn’t about … the Erdogan government. This is about the
Ottoman Empire," she said.
The State Department said the recalling of the ambassador will not
impair the ability of US officials to convey the Bush administration’s
views on the resolution, but that Ankara’s decision to withdraw Sensoy
did not come as a major surprise.
"The Turkish government has telegraphed for some time, been very vocal
and very public about its concerns about this and has said that they
did intend to react in a fairly forceful way," spokesman Casey said.
The US military is worried that Turkey could take additional steps
such as curtailing the flow of equipment into Iraq. The US is also
reliant on Turkish airspace for operations in Iraq.
"Access to airfields and to the roads and so on in Turkey would be
very much put at risk if this resolution passes and the Turks react
as strongly as we believe they will," Defence Secretary Robert Gates
said hours before Wednesday’s vote.