Regnum, Russia
Sept 12 2008

Slowing down of Genocide recognition will be result of
Armenian-Turkish talks

The Heritage Party (Armenia) has always welcomed development of
economic relations of Armenia with its neighbors, including energy
supply to Turkey, declared Vardan Khachatryan, member of the Heritage
opposition party faction at a briefing in the Armenian parliament on
September 12. `But, on the other side, expectations of Armenian
society, including a long-term purpose of opening the Armenian-Turkish
border is not a matter of the near-term prospect. Heritage considers
that until a serious anticorruption program is carried out and
corruption risks minimized in Armenia, it is not preferable to begin
such process, which is the opening of the Armenian-Turkish border,’
stressed he.

Talking about a Turkish initiative of establishing a Security Platform
in Caucasus, the member of the opposition underscored that Turkey is
concerned over the unstable situation in the region. It is facing a
threat of formation of Kurdistan. `Different forces serve to this
idea, and there is no confidence today, that the borders are
infrangible, and proportion of existing ethnic groups will not change,
¦ it follows that activation of Turkey and the Security Platform
explicitly mean the isolation of Iran,’ said he, at the same time
underlining the regional significance of Iran.

Khachatryan believes the exclusion of Iran from the project of
security in the Caucasus implies, that Turkey is serving to a `certain
vector of development, which is to be studied in order to imagine what
kind of benefits stand for it.’ At the same time, the member of the
parliament stresses that there is still a lack of actual material for
estimations.

In its turn, Artashes Shakhbazyan, member of the Armenian Revolution
Faction Dashnaktsutyun touching upon the attempts to change the OSCE
Minsk Group negotiations format on the Nagorno Karabakh conflict
settlement, underscored that Turkey and Azerbaijan had always operated
hand in hand. `When a question is put by Turkey, it obviously becomes
weightier. Changing the format, when the sides already have achieved
something ‘ means to fail negotiations,’ said the MP stressing that
`Armenia must strongly support existing achievements’.

Commenting on a statement of Abdullah Gul published by Azerbaijani
media that during the meeting with Armenian President Sargsyan in
Yerevan an agreement concerning the return of the Azerbaijani
territories was achieved, Shakhbazyan said that a phrase looked as
pulled out from the context, it is necessary to wait for more
information in order to understand what they were talking about. `On
the whole bearing in mind that mass media of Azerbaijan and Turkey
often lie, we must more carefully follow it and to specify heard,’
said he, underlining that if the statement is true, than it is already
cause for concern.

Speaking on energy supply to Turkey, he underlined that `one should
not take episodic steps without getting an answer for basic
questions.’ Stressing acceptability of economic contacts between
Armenia and Turkey in the future, he underlined that Armenia must be
careful in the dialog with Turkey `The only thing that can be stated
today that the result of the negotiations with Turkey will be the
slowdown of the process of the Armenian Genocide recognition. As
Babadzhan said, Turkey will say to the whole world, that is having a
dialog with Armenia `and one should not interfere’. Turkey with
Azerbaijan will speak from the position of force, and show to everyone
that they are communicating with us,’ said he.

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