SWEDISH PARLIAMENT REFUSES TO RECOGNIZE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
PanARMENIAN.Net
12.06.2008
The Swedish parliament, with a vote 245 to 37 (1 abstain, 66 absent),
rejected a call for recognition of the 1915 genocide in the Ottoman
Empire. On June 11, a long debate took place in the Swedish Parliament
in regard to the Foreign Committee report on Human Rights, including
five motions calling upon the Swedish Government and Parliament to
officially recognize the 1915 Armenian Genocide, head of the Armenian
Associations of Sweden Vahagn Avedian told PanARMENIAN.Net.
In its answer (2007/2008:UU9), a majority consisting of the ruling
alliance parties together with the Social Democrats (opposition party)
proposed rejecting the motions, whereby the Green (Miljopartiet)
and the Left (Vansterpartiet) parties announced their reservations,
forcing the Parliament to have a debate in the main chamber before
the proposal was voted on.
The argumentation for why recognition should be rejected was based
on four main assumptions: "no particular consideration regarding the
Armenian situation has ever been in form of an UN Resolution, either
in 1985 or any other occasion; the Committee understands that what
engulfed the Armenians, Assyrian/Syrians and Chaldeans during the reign
of the Ottoman Empire would, according to the 1948 Convention, probably
be regarded as genocide, if it had been in power at the time; there is
still a disagreement among the experts regarding the different course
of events of the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. The same applies
to the underlying causes and how the assaults shall be classified;
[in regard to the development in Turkey] in the time being, it would
be venturesome to disturb an initiate and delicate national process."