Turkish News Agency
Oct 24 2008

BILL THAT POISONED RELATIONS WITH TURKEY WILL NOT PASS THE SENATE

The French Senate will not adopt the bill aiming to criminalize the
denial of the Armenian claims of genocide, a prominent leader in the
French Senate told the Turkish Daily News yesterday.

"This issue is over. It is impossible for the Senate to adopt this
law," said Hubert Haenel, president of the Senate’s Commission for
European Union Affairs.

In 2006 the French National Assembly adopted the bill criminalizing
the denial of the mass killings of Armenians at the hands of the
Ottomans as genocide.

The bill would have to be passed by the Senate to become a law, but
the vote in the lower house of the parliament dealt a heavy blow to
bilateral relations.

Haenel, in Turkey to attend a seminar titled, "The Republic in France
and Turkey," at Bilgi University in Istanbul, told the TDN that the
bill was blocked in the Senate, adding that French intellectual
circles had also criticized the bill, as it prejudged the studies of
historians. Haenel said the atmosphere between the two countries had
changed, implying also that there was a different conjecture that
would also make it difficult for the Senate to make a decision that
would damage bilateral relations.

France discovers Turkey’s strategic importance

Haenel, who spoke at the seminar organized jointly by the French
Institute for Anatolian studies and the Institute of Political Studies
of Grenoble, gave optimistic messages on France’s outlook on
Turkey. "The crown makes the king wiser," said Haenel, talking about
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is known to be a vocal opponent
of Turkey’s entry into the EU.

"With all the crises going on near the borders of Turkey, the
stand-off in the Caucasus being the most recent one, we rediscover
Turkey’s strategic importance," said the French senator. Referring to
the meeting Sarkozy had with all the French ambassadors during the
summer, Hanael said it was significant that the French president said
during the meeting that French troops in Afghanistan were serving next
to Turkish troops.

"The French leadership is rediscovering Turkey’s historic, economic,
political and cultural place," he told the TDN after the
panel. Referring to the meeting between the leaders of Turkey, France,
Qatar and Syria in Damascus last month, Hanael said the pictures of
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan next to Sarkozy along with
Syria’s Bashar al-Assad and Qatar’s Khalifa al-Thani made a big
impression in France.

He did admit though that it would be wrong to expect a change in
Sarkozy’s views on the Turkish EU bid. Hanael said, however, that the
French presidency has not taken any step to obstruct membership
negotiations.

France currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency until January.

"We in the Senate rejected a measure that would have made a referendum
on Turkey’s membership in the EU mandatory. The vote was 297 to
seven," he said, giving this as an example that France is not blocking
Turkish membership.

"Who can have the legitimacy of saying no to Turkey? Turkey has its
place in the EU. To those skeptics of Turkey I ask: What will become
of Turkey and the EU and the world in 10 years time?" he said at the
seminar.

When asked about the slow pace in the negotiation process, Hanael said
Turkey has also slowed down its reform process. "I am not being
judgmental. For understandable reasons, Turkey has not been able to
continue the reform process," he said.