ARMENIA "SURPRISED" AT STORM OVER GENOCIDE VOTE

Reuters
Fri Oct 26, 2007 8:56am EDT

YEREVAN (Reuters) – Armenia said on Friday it was "surprised" that
concerns about damaging U.S.-Turkish ties had been allowed to stall
a resolution recognizing as genocide the 1915 killings of Armenians
in Ottoman Turkey.

Backers of the resolution in the U.S. Congress said this week they
would postpone plans to put it to a full vote after a storm of
criticism from U.S. ally Turkey — which denies the killings were
genocide — and from the White House.

Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian told Reuters in an interview
he believed that Nancy Pelosi, the Democrat speaker of Congress,
would still put the resolution to a full vote.

"We are far from disappointed," said Oskanian. "They tell me the
resolution will be put to a full vote at the right time. Speaker
Pelosi has not pulled it. With all such matters, timing is a political
decision."

But he added: "We remain surprised that the U.S.-Turkey relationship
is thought to be so fragile that this non-binding resolution or other
verbal acknowledgements appear to pose a problem."

U.S. President George W. Bush has said the resolution, by angering
Ankara, could hurt Washington’s strategic interests because Turkey
is a key military ally in the Middle East region.

The resolution was being debated just as Washington is trying to
persuade Turkey not to launch possible military attacks into northern
Iraq against Kurdish separatist rebels.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress