IS IT STILL A PRIORITY?

A1+
April 21, 2009

"I still believe that there can be no progress in the Turkish-Armenian
reconciliation without progress in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
settlement," told "A1+" Armenian National Congress representative
Davit Shahnazaryan.

Shahnazaryan underscored that the developments in the past weeks made
the predictions of the ANC a reality. The Armenian National Congress
had foreseen that the issue concerning the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
is much more important for the Turks than genocide recognition and
other issues when it comes to opening of borders and establishment
of diplomatic relations.

Davit Shahnazaryan believes that Turkey and Azerbaijan "carried out
a well-planned and diplomatic scenario".

"Turkey had to solve a tactic problem related to U.S. President
Barack Obama pronouncing the word "genocide" in his annual address,"
says Shahnazaryan. He knows for a fact that Obama will not say the
word and says that the Turks are rest assured that they have nothing
to worry about anymore.

"They already got what they could only dream of a couple of years
ago. This refers to the creation of a committee of historians at
the governmental and presidential levels. If such a committee is
formed or a document is signed, that will completely put an end
to the Armenian Genocide international recognition process," says
Davit Shahnazaryan. He considers this to be the wrong policies led
by Armenia starting from 1998 when Armenian authorities declared that
genocide recognition is a priority in Armenia’s foreign policy.

"Nobody, including me, knows whether the Armenian authorities still
have that goal. I think Serzh Sargsyan was obligated to state whether
that is in effect or not. This is yet another error, just like the
error he made when he agreed to form a committee of historians. Turkey
feels that things are going just the way it planned and that is why
it is bringing up the Karabakh conflict," says Shahnazaryan.

But recently Serzh Sargsyan stated a couple of times that the issue of
genocide is not up for debate. In response to this, Shahnazaryan said:

"It would be right to ask Serzh Sargsyan and his administration
because they must explain those statements."

Shahnazaryan believes that Armenia plays a weak role in the
Turkish-Armenian reconciliation and the developments go to show that
unfortunately, Armenia is not calling the shots and the issue is in
Ankara, not Yerevan. In general, Shahnazaryan is of the belief that
there is no need to expect advancements in Turkish-Armenian relations
when Armenian authorities continue to deepen the domestic crisis and
recalled that there are currently 55 political prisoners in Armenia.