ACCORDING TO KIRO MANOYAN, ARMENIAN-TURKISH PROTOCOLS CONTAIN AT LEAST THREE UNACCEPTABLE POINTS

Noyan Tapan
Sep 1, 2009

YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 1, NOYAN TAPAN. The draft Armenian-Turkish protocols
published on August 31 contain at least three unacceptable points,
which Turkey has so far put forward as preconditions for normalizing
the relations with Armenia. Kiro Manoyan, a representative of the
ARF Political and Hay Dat Office, stated this on September 1.

According to him, Turkey continues to indicate the Nagorno Karabakh
problem as a precondition for normalizing the relations, which in
particular is evident from Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu’s
statement to Hurriyet newspaper. "Our president’s statement about
this does not correspond to reality," Kiro Manoyan said, meaning the
speech that Serzh Sargsyan made at the meeting of the MFA staff and
heads of Armenian diplomatic missions and consulates on the same day.

The second unacceptable circumstance, in the words of K. Manoyan, is
that in the indicated document the existing Armenian-Turkish border
is recognized as a legal border, which may invalidate the Armenian
people’s right to their historical lands.

The third negative point, according to the ARF representative, is
that the protocols envisage establishing a sub-commission on the
historical dimension. K. Manoyan said this means that Armenia gives
up the international recognition of the 1915 Armenian Genocide.

"If Turkey is sincere and it wants to know the historical truth,
it should create the necessary atmosphere in Turkey and hold free
discussions on the Genocide. It may involve experts of other countries,
but not Armenian experts. We have no business to do there," K. Manoyan
noted.

He said that another flaw of the proposed documents is that they do
not establish the dates for the normalization of Armenian-Turkish
relations. In particular the Armenian legislation does not envisage
ratification (by parliament) of a document on the establishment of
diplomatic relations. In his words, "by envisaging this requirement
in the protocols, we provide the Turkish side with the opportunity
to endlessly delay the process".

Finally, according to K. Manoyan, the purpose of "internal discussion"
of the protocols is not clear. "We do not know if there will be any
change in these documents as a result of discussions," he said.