TURKEY: PRESIDENT TO MAKE HISTORIC VISIT TO ARMENIA

Adnkronos International English (AKI)
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Sept 4 2008
Italy

Ankara, 4 Sept. (AKI) – Turkish President Abdullah Gul will become
the country’s first head of state to visit Armenia on Saturday in an
historic visit aimed at restoring diplomatic relations between the
two countries.

Gul will travel to the Armenian capital, Yerevan, on Saturday to
attend a World Cup qualifying football match between the two countries.

Armenia’s President Serge Sarkisian invited Gul last month to attend
the qualifying match for the 2010 World Cup final to mark "a new
symbolic start in the countries’ relations".

Turkish media reports said that Turkish diplomats and security
officials had been in Yerevan this week making final preparations
for the visit.

"We believe a visit around this match will create a new climate
of friendship in the region," said a statement from the Turkish
president’s office.

"It is with this in mind that the president has accepted the
invitation. This match could lift the obstacles blocking the coming
together of two peoples who share a common history and can create a
new foundation."

The Turkish presidency said it hoped the visit means "an opportunity
for a better mutual understanding."

Gul will arrive in Yerevan two hours before the match and go directly
to Sarkisian’s office.

The two leaders are expected to discuss the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute,
which erupted in armed conflict between ethnic Armenians and Azerbaijan
between 1988 and 1994, and a proposal for a Caucasus alliance.

Turkey was one of the first countries to recognise Armenia when it
declared independence in 1991.

But the two neighbours which straddle Europe and the Middle East,
have no official diplomatic relations and their shared border has
has been closed for several years.

The long-running animosity between the two countries also stems from
the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks around the time of
World War I.

Historians estimate 1.5 million Armenians were killed by Ottoman
Turks during the fighting.

Turkey has consistently rejected allegations of genocide, claiming
that both Christian Armenians and Muslim Turks died in the bloodshed.