PETER SEMNEBY: TURKEY TALKS ON ARMENIA "PAUSED"

armradio.am
18.06.2009 13:25

Turkey has taken a "tactical step backwards" on normalizing relations
with Armenia because of hostile domestic reaction to the move, the
EU’s envoy to the region said in an interview.

"A step back was taken by the Turkish side … but this is not a
U-turn," said EU South Caucasus envoy Peter Semneby. "We expect the
conversations will continue."

Semneby said in the interview, conducted at the end of a visit to
Moscow last week, that it was important the "pause" in the peace
process between Turkey and Armenia did not last too long because of
the risk that impetus would be lost.

"The normalization (with Armenia) became the subject of quite
widespread and heated discussion in Turkey," he added in earlier
remarks to a small group of reporters. "It seems to me, this discussion
became more heated than was expected." Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip
Erdogan promised Azerbaijan during a visit to Baku last month that
Ankara would not open its border with Armenia – closed since 1993 —
until Armenia ended what he termed its occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh.

"I see this as a Turkish tactical step backwards," Semneby told
Reuters.

"But fundamentally, the new foreign policy that has been pursued by
the Erdogan government, I don’t see that this policy is changing."

Semneby believes real progress is being made in the Karabakh settlement
process.

"It is clear that if you look at the negotiating process, it is
intensifying," he told Reuters. "We had in a month two meetings and
there will be another relatively soon between the presidents."

Asked about the risk of conflict, Semneby said it would be foolish
to neglect it but he felt both sides understood the enormous costs
which would be involved in any large-scale military engagement.

"Even with this very dangerous posturing that we see sometimes and the
fact that the forces are not separated and there are incidents all the
time, the two sides are by now used to managing incidents," he said.

"If anything, the Georgia war (last year with Russia), demonstrated
the risks of military engagement … it was also a wake-up call to
both countries how vulnerable they are."