Agence France Presse
April 26 2009
Crisis warms Turks to opening Armenia border
KARS, Turkey (AFP) ‘ Hit by a bruising economic crisis, residents of
Kars, in eastern Turkey, are increasingly warming to the idea of
opening the border with Armenia, hoping that revived trade links would
provide a lifeline to the impoverished region.
The border’s closure in 1993 — ordered by Turkey to back Azerbaijan
in a territorial conflict with Armenia — has had heavy economic
consequences not only for Armenia but also this Turkish city of
80,000.
The border crossing, some 70 kilometres (43 miles) away, was once
massively used to export cattle — Kars’ main wealth — to the
Caucasus and Russia through the only railway linking Turkey to its
northern neighbours.
The halt of trade has cost the province of Kars nearly one-twelfth of
its population, which dropped from 356,000 to 326,000 between 1990 and
2000.
The prospect of re-opening the border, boosted by ongoing talks
between Ankara and Yerevan, has become even more important now that
the global economic turmoil is biting Turkey, sending unemployment up
and slowing down the economy.
"Of the 300 members of the chamber of commerce, 280 believe the border
should be opened immediately," said Fuat Doganay, owner of the largest
restaurant in Kars.
"Business has gone down… I have to save my business and pay my
debts. The government has to understand that," he said.
Many here believe Turkey’s embargo is hurting Kars more than Armenia
as Armenians can fly to Istanbul to work and shop, and Turkish
products end up in Armenia via Georgia.
Kaan Soyak, co-chairman of a Turkish-Armenian business group, said the
annual volume of bilateral trade — mostly via Georgia — stood at
around 100 million dollars.
With the expected re-opening of the border "we expect the exchanges to
immediately reach four to five billion dollars per year," Soyak said,
buoyed by the announcement Wednesday that Ankara and Yerevan had
agreed a "roadmap" on normalising ties. Kars businessman Alican
Alibeyoglu complained that Turkish entrepreneurs were worst affected
by the entangled political problems in the region.
"I have been to Georgia and Armenia many times. In both countries I
saw hundreds of joint businesses between Armenians and Azeris, but
when it comes to Turkey, it is not possible," he grumbled, adding that
50,000 people in Kars signed a petition in 2004 for the re-opening of
the border.
The sealed frontier however is not the only problem: Yerevan claims
that up to 1.5 million of Armenians were victims of "genocide" at the
hands of Ottoman Turks during World War I.
Ankara, which categorically rejects the accusation, has refused to
establish diplomatic ties with Yerevan until it drops its
international campaign to have the killings recognised as genocide.
During a visit to Turkey in early April, US President Barack Obama
encouraged the dialogue between the two neighbours and called for a
swift normalisation of ties.
Obama said Friday reckoning with the past was the best way for the
Turkish and Armenian people to work through their "painful history" in
a "way that is honest, open and constructive."
But such appeals fail to impress many in Kars, which is home to
several thousand Turks of Azeri origin.
"The Armenians have to solve the Nagorny-Karabakh problem," said Ali
Guvensoy, head of the Kars chamber of commerce, referring to the
Armenian-majority enclave which broke away from Azerbaijan in the
early 1990s.
"They also have to stop putting allegations of genocide on the table,"
he added, summarising Ankara’s official line on the dispute.
But Soyak, who has for years campaigned for Turkish-Armenian
reconciliation, was optimistic.
"We expect a happy ending soon… We expect a settlement within three
or four months," he said.
The businessman stressed Azerbaijan’s inclusion into the fence-mending
process was a must "if we want a full economic development" in the
region.
"I think it is going to be step by step: first normalisation of
relations between Turkey and Armenia… The next step will be to
include Azerbaijan," he said.