LAWMAKERS INTRODUCE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE RESOLUTION

PR-Inside.com
March 17 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) – In a move that could complicate relations with
Turkey, U.S. lawmakers introduced a resolution Tuesday that would
call killings by Ottoman Turks almost a century ago genocide.

The resolution, if passed, could undermine efforts by the Obama
administration to win help on key foreign policy goals from NATO
ally Turkey.

But it was unclear whether the resolution has sufficient support
to pass in the House of Representatives. Lawmakers almost passed a
similar resolution two years ago, but congressional leaders did not
bring it up for a vote after intense pressure from then-President
George W. Bush and top members of his administration.

President Barack Obama, who called the killings genocide while running
for office, has not said whether he will support the resolution. Its
introduction comes as he is reaching out to Turkey for help on Middle
East peace, ending Iran’s nuclear ambitions and other top foreign
policy goals. The issue will be awkward when he travels to Turkey
early next month as part of his overture.

Sponsors of the resolution argue that the United States has a moral
obligation to speak plainly on the issue regardless of the foreign
policy implications.

"The facts of history are clear, well documented, and nonnegotiable,"
said Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, one of the sponsors of the
resolution. "It has never served our national interest to become
complicit in the denial of genocide, and it never will.

Historians estimate that up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed by
Ottoman Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely viewed
by genocide scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century. Turkey
denies that the deaths constituted genocide, however, contending the
toll has been inflated, and the casualties were victims of civil war
and unrest.