Agence France Presse — English
September 4, 2008 Thursday 1:29 PM GMT

Turkish president criticised over planned Armenia visit

by Burak Akinci
ANKARA, Sept 4 2008

President Abdullah Gul on Saturday becomes Turkey’s first head of
state to visit Armenia, but his bid to ease relations with a historic
foe that accuses Turks of genocide has angered nationalists.

Gul will go to Yerevan to attend a football match between the two
countries, which do not have diplomatic relations and remain deeply
divided over the World War I massacres of Armenians under the Ottoman
Empire.

"A visit around this match can create a new climate of friendship in
the region," the Turkish presidency said in a statement.

"It’s with this in mind that the president has accepted the
invitation."

The two countries will face off in a qualifying match for the 2010
World Cup finals and Armenia’s President Serge Sarkisian invited Gul
last month to attend.

While some in the Turkish media have hailed the visit as historic and
a potential breakthrough, the trip remains highly controversial.

Amid a wave of opposition criticism, the ruling Justice and
Development Party (AKP) — which Gul belonged to before being elected
president last year — adopted a very cautious tone.

"I think it is very positive that the president is going. Rejecting
the (Armenian) invitation would have meant sacrificing sports to
politics," Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in televised
remarks.

State Minister Mehmet Aydin appeared to acknowledge the political
significane of Gul’s move.

"The facts that we have do not support the theory that the visit will
resolve all the problems, but it is not right to assume that nothing
will come of it either," Aydin was quoted by the Anatolia news agency
as saying.

Turkey’s main opposition party said Gul’s decision will send the wrong
signal to Armenia over its campaign for the deaths of Armenians in
1915-1917 to be recognised as "genocide".

Armenia says up to 1.5 million people were killed in orchestrated
massacres during World War I as the Ottoman Empire fell apart before
being dismantled in 1920.

Turkey rejects the genocide label and argues that 250,000- 500,000
Armenians and at least as many Turks died in civil strife as Armenians
fought for independence in eastern Anatolia and sided with invading
Russian troops.

"Armenia does not recognise Turkish borders and accuses Turkey of
having carried out genocide," said Mustafa Ozyurek of the main
opposition Republican People’s Party.

"This step will only serve to encourage the opposing party," he said,
referring to Armenia.

The vice president of the MHP nationalist party, Tunca Toskay, called
the visit "totally unjustified while the Turkish people are unjustly
accused through lies of having committed genocide and while Armenia
shows no sign of renouncing its policy in this respect."

The trip, which comes amid heightened tensions in the Caucasus region
following the conflict last month between Georgia and Russia, will
only last a few hours, a Turkish diplomatic source said.

But some Turkish media said it could be enough to begin real change in
relations between the nations, comparing it to the "ping-pong
diplomacy" between the United States and China in the 1970s.

Hasan Cemal of Milliyet newspaper proposed that a minute of silence be
observed in the stadium before the match "in memory of the tragic page
in our common history and the suffering experienced by the Armenians
and Turks in the past".

Turkey has refused to establish diplomatic relations with Armenia
since it became independent from the Soviet Union in 1991, and the key
reason has been Yerevan’s genocide campaign.

In 1993, Ankara closed its border with Armenia over Nagorny Karabakh,
an Armenian-majority region in Azerbaijan which proclaimed
independence.