SARKISIAN URGED TO VISIT TURKEY
Ruben Meloyan
Armenialiberty.org
http://www.azatutyun.a m/content/article/1793316.html
Aug 5 2009
A prominent Armenian opposition politician urged President Serzh
Sarkisian on Wednesday to visit Turkey for the second football match
of the two countries’ national football teams, saying that failure to
accept his Turkish counterpart Abdullah Gul’s invitation would be an
"absolute stupidity."
"In my opinion, going [to Turkey] would be the right thing because
even with your enemy you have a normal enmity," said Hrant Bagratian,
a former prime minister and senior member of the main opposition
Armenian National Congress (HAK).
"We have no right to feel vexed," he told reporters. "On the line
are the interests of the state."
Sarkisian made clear late last month that he will not travel to
Turkey and watch the October 14 match with Gul unless Ankara takes
"real steps" to reopen the Turkish-Armenian border. He said the two
governments agreed on border opening during their year-long dialogue
that gained momentum with Gul’s historic September 2008 trip to
Yerevan.
"It was a boyish statement," said Bagratian. "Himself started the
process. Why is he antagonizing [the Turks] now?"
The HAK’s top leader, Levon Ter-Petrosian, and his close associates
have repeatedly denounced Sarkisian’s policy on Turkey as a gross
failure. Ter-Petrosian has accused Sarkisian of willingly sacrificing
U.S. recognition of the Armenian genocide while failing to secure
the lifting of the Turkish economic blockade of Armenia.
Levon Zurabian, the HAK’s central office coordinator, reaffirmed
the criticism on Tuesday. "Turkey has achieved its goal at Armenia’s
expense," he said.
Bagratian appeared more sympathetic to the Turkish-Armenian
rapprochement, even if he described as a "serious blunder" Sarkisian’s
apparent acceptance of a Turkish proposal to form a joint commission
that would look into the 1915 mass killings of Armenians in the Ottoman
Empire. "I think Turkey committed a mistake in April-May by violating
agreements [reached with Armenia,]" he said.
Sarkisian said last week that those agreements envisaged the
normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations regardless of a resolution
of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Turkish leaders, however, have
repeatedly stated in recent months that their country will not
establish diplomatic relations and reopen its border with Armenia
before a Karabakh settlement.