Today’s Zaman, Turkey

Astana meeting to gather Gül, Sarksyan at the same table

The presidents of estranged neighbors Armenia and Turkey will gather
around the same table along with 12 other heads of states in Astana
today and tomorrow when they participate in festivities for
celebration of the 10th birthday of the Kazakhstan capital city.

Turkish President Abdullah Gül departed Ankara yesterday for
Kazakhstan at the invitation of his Kazakh counterpart, Nursultan
Nazarbayev, to attend the ceremonies as "the guest of honor." Speaking
at a press conference ahead of his departure, Gül said briefly that he
would meet with leaders of other countries in the region and exchange
views on regional and international issues.

"There will be 14 heads of states there in total and the Armenian
president is one of them. Naturally, there will be the usual plethora
of breakfasts, luncheons, dinners, etc. And it also natural that then
the presidents of Turkey and Armenia will sit around the same
table. There may also be a casual handshake," Turkish diplomatic
sources told Today’s Zaman yesterday.

Ankara has recognized Yerevan since the former Soviet republic won
independence in 1991, but nevertheless refuses to establish diplomatic
ties because of Armenian efforts to secure international condemnation
of the controversial World War I era killings of Anatolian Armenians
as genocide.

Armenians claim up to 1.5 million of their kin were slaughtered in
orchestrated killings during the last years of the Ottoman
Empire. Turkey categorically rejects the claims, saying that 300,000
Armenians along with at least as many Turks died in civil strife which
emerged when the Armenians took up arms for independence in eastern
Anatolia and sided with the Russian troops that were invading Ottoman
lands.

The same diplomatic sources, who requested anonymity, did not exclude
the possibility of a bilateral meeting between Gül and his Armenian
counterpart, Serzh Sarksyan. "It is of course at Mr. President Gül’s
discretion if the Armenian side conveys willingness for such a
bilateral meeting in Astana. And one should not forget that we are not
enemies with Armenia, despite the absence of diplomatic recognition,"
the sources said when asked whether such a bilateral meeting could be
scheduled during the summit in Astana.

05 July 2008, Saturday
EMINE KART ANKARA