TURKEY AND ARMENIA TO DISCUSS 1915 INCIDENTS IN ISTANBUL MEETING
Hurriyet
Nov 20 2008
Turkey
Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan will discuss Armenian claims
regarding the incidents of 1915 at a meeting with his Armenian
counterpart next week, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said.
Babacan will hold talks with Eduard Nalbandian in Istanbul on Nov. 24,
ministry spokesman Burak Ozugergin told Bloomberg News on Thursday.
"Everything is on the table," Ozugergin said. "We are not precluding
anything. The two leaders will take up bilateral issues, including the
1915 events and perhaps regional issues that could include relations
with Azerbaijan."
Armenia, with the backing of the diaspora, claims up to 1.5 million
of their kin were slaughtered in orchestrated killings in 1915.
Turkey rejects the claims saying that 300,000 Armenians, along with at
least as many Turks, died in civil strife that emerged when Armenians
took up arms, backed by Russia, for independence in eastern Anatolia.
The initiative follows a visit by Turkish President Abdullah Gul
to Armenia two months ago, the first such trip by a Turkish head
of state. The 1915 incidents were not discussed during the visit,
Gul said at the time.
There is no diplomatic relations between Armenia and Turkey, as
Armenia presses the international community to admit the so-called
"genocide" claims instead of accepting Turkey’s call to investigate
the allegations, and Armenia’s aggression against Azerbaijan.
Turkey has offered to form a joint commission to investigate what
has really happened in 1915 and opened up all official archives,
but Armenia is dragging its feet in accepting the offer.
Turkey is also embroiled in a dispute with Armenia over
Nagorno-Karabakh. Turkey closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in
protest of Armenia’s invasion of 20 percent of Azerbaijani territory.