PRESS TV, Iran
Sept 6 2008

Gul in Armenia for soccer diplomacy
Sat, 06 Sep 2008 20:21:49 GMT

President Abdullah Gul who attended a soccer match between Turkey and
Armenia in Yerevan, says the game could help end a century of mutual
hostilities.

Attack helicopters escorted the Turkish chief executive’s jet on its
arrival and police and lined the traffic-free streets as his motorcade
sped through downtown Yerevan, the Armenian capital.

Several hundred protesters were seen rallying near the Armenian
presidential offices for Gul’s arrival shouting and chanting,
"Recognition" and "Stop denying the genocide" in reference to
Yerevan’s attempts to have the Ottoman-era massacre of Armenians
recognized as genocide.

Gul is the first Turkish leader to visit Armenia. Ankara and Yerevan
have no diplomatic ties but a relationship that is undermined by the
question of whether ethnic Armenians killed by Ottoman Turks in 1915
in the early years of World War I were victims of systematic genocide.

Gul was invited to attend Saturday’s match at Hrazdan Stadium by his
Armenian counterpart Serzh Sarkisian, who called for closer ties in a
region brimming with tensions in the wake of the Russia – Georgia
conflict.

Departing Ankara, Gul said he hoped the first match between the two
national sides would aid `rapprochement’.

`This match is important beyond being the first match between the
Turkish and Armenian national teams,’ Gul told a news conference.

`I hope today’s match will contribute to removing barriers to the
rapprochement of two peoples with a common history, and contribute to
regional peace and stability.’

Turkey defeated Armenia 2-0 in the 2010 FIFA World Cup qualifier game.

Turkey has never opened an embassy in Armenia and in 1993 Ankara
closed its land border with Armenia in a show of solidarity with
Azerbaijan, a Turkic-speaking ally that was fighting Armenian-backed
separatists over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

But Russia’s decision last month to send its forces into Georgia, an
ex-Soviet state which borders both Armenia and Turkey, has convinced
many that it is time for Ankara and Yerevan to put their differences
aside.

President Sarkisian also said that he had been invited by President
Gul to attend a return football match between the two nations in
Turkey next month.