ARMENIAN PRIME MINISTER HOPES FOR PASSAGE OF U.S. CONGRESSIONAL GENOCIDE RESOLUTION
International Herald Tribune, France
The Associated Press
Oct 23 2007
WASHINGTON: Armenia’s prime minister said that he hopes that the
U.S. Congress will pass a resolution declaring the World War I-era
killings of Armenians a genocide, but that his country is not lobbying
on the issue.
Serge Sarkisian said that he has had other issues including economic
and security cooperation to discuss with U.S. officials in meetings
that began last week. He said that Armenia has tried to stay out of
a U.S. political debate.
Turkey has lobbied intensively against the resolution, while
Armenian-American groups have pressed for its passage.
The resolution did not come up in talks last week with U.S. officials
including Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Robert
Gates or in a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid,
Sarkisian said. After a meeting with Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice on Tuesday, the State Department said that the two had discussed a
joint economic task force aimed in part at monitoring economic reform
in Armenia.
Sarkisian said that he believes that the resolution is being held up in
Congress because of Turkish pressure not because there is disagreement
in the House of Representatives over whether a genocide took place.
"So there is nothing to discuss," he said in an interview at the
Armenian embassy. "We are convinced that the genocide occurred and
that the sooner the Turks admit this, the better for both the Armenians
and the Turks."
Sarkisian’s trip comes at a time that relations between Washington
and Ankara have reached a recent low, as Turkey has protested the
congressional foray into a sensitive historical matter.
At issue is the killing of up to 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman
Turks around the time of World War I, which many genocide scholars
consider the first genocide of the 20th century. Turkey denies that the
deaths constituted genocide, contending the toll has been inflated,
and those killed were victims of civil war and unrest that killed
Muslims as well as the overwhelmingly Christian Armenians.
The resolution was approved by a House committee earlier this month,
but appears stalled by an erosion of support. Some lawmakers have
removed their names from the sponsorship of the measure amid concern
that Turkey could retaliate by cutting off important supply routes
to Iraq or by withdrawing lucrative business deals.
Turkey has also said that passage of the resolution would undermine
hopes of improving relations with Armenia. Turkey closed its border
with Armenia in 1993 during a war between Armenia and Azerbaijan,
a Muslim ally of Ankara. The countries currently have no diplomatic
relations.
"I don’t understand what the Turks are saying," Sarkisian said. "We
have no relations now. We cannot harm something that is non existent."
But Sarkisian said that resolving the historical dispute over the
killings of Armenians should not hold up efforts to restore relations.
"It is not a precondition for re-establishing relations between the
two states," he said.
He said that he expected to discuss with Rice efforts to resolve the
conflict with Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh region. The area
been controlled by Armenian and ethnic Armenian forces since a shaky
1994 cease-fire ended one of the bloodiest conflicts that followed
the collapse of the Soviet Union.