TURKEY AND ARMENIA TO ESTABLISH DIPLOMATIC TIES

AlArabiya.net
August 30, 2009 Sunday
UAE

Armenia and Turkey have agreed to begin "internal political
consultations" on establishing diplomatic relations within six weeks,
the two countries’ foreign ministries said Monday, after almost a
century of hostility.

"The political consultations will be completed within six weeks,
following which the two Protocols will be signed and submitted to
the respective Parliaments for the ratification on each side," the
foreign ministries of Turkey and Armenia, and mediator Switzerland,
said in a joint statement. The landmark agreement would provide
for the normalization of ties "within a reasonable timeframe", said
the statement.

"The normalization of bilateral relations will contribute to regional
peace and stability," it added.

Armenia and Turkey said in April that they had agreed to a road map
for normalizing diplomatic ties after years of enmity.

Turkey has long refused to establish diplomatic links with Armenia
over Yerevan’s efforts to have World War I-era massacres of Armenians
by Ottoman Turks recognized as genocide — a label Turkey strongly
rejects.

Turkey also closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in solidarity with
ally Azerbaijan over Yerevan’s backing of ethnic Armenian separatists
in the breakaway Nagorny Karabakh region.