TUSIAD PROMOTING INITIATIVE ON CREATING A PLATFORM
By H. Chaqrian

AZG Armenian Daily
20/05/2008

Genocide

Aiming at Investigation of "The Events Concerning the Armenian Citizens
of the Ottoman Empire in the period of World War 1"

TUSAID, the Union of Turkish Entrepreneurs and Manufacturers (Turk
Sanayicileri ve Ýþadamlarý Deneði), has started a campaign against
the international recognition of the Armemian Genocide.

The organization has made arrangement with American lawyer David
Saltzman to prepare a report on H. Resolution 106.

Saltzman’s report, entitled "H. RES. 106: Legal and Factual
Deficiencies", was published on May 16, during the "The Foundations of
the Turkish-American Relationships in the 21st Century" conference,
held in Washington. On May 17, according to "Zaman", TUSIAD spread
a message giving some details on Saltzman’s report.

The message says that the preface for Saltzman’s report was written
by the TUSIAD executive staff and that the organization is preparing
to create a platform for investigating "The Events Concerning the
Armenian Citizens of the Ottoman Empire in the period of World War
1". TUSIAD stresses that the controversies about those events and
their extremely politicized discussions negatively affect Turkey’s
relations with its allies and rouse anti-Turkish attitudes in Europe.

The preface of the report says that the public opinion on those
events is formed with a one-sided point of view. "Due to partial
appraisal of the facts, due to neglecting the counter-arguments and
the historical platform of those events, the present approaches are
enduring," it is said.

The body text of the report says that it has been never legally
approved that there are reasons to qualify the events of 1915 as
Genocide. It says that the materials on Armenians’ deportation, on the
violence occurred during the deportation, on Armenians’ rebellions and
on other factors of reduction of Armenian population in Turkey are open
public research. TUSIAD assures that impartial and open investigation
of those issues is threatened by exceedingly politicized attitudes
and that in such conditions determination of the historical truth
and normalization of Armenia-Turkey relations are impossible.

–Boundary_(ID_HZlS55baKwPnNbp1jE9Gyg )–