Turkey, Armenia Prepare to Take Step Toward Reconciliation

Wall Street Journal
EUROPE NEWS OCTOBER 10, 2009

By MARC CHAMPION

Turkey and Armenia look set to sign an accord Saturday aimed at reopening
their shared border and establishing diplomatic relations, a move backed by
the U.S. and European Union with potentially sweeping consequences for the
region.

But Saturday’s agreement, though important, would be just a step toward
those goals. It would also do little to end a corrosive dispute between the
two nations over whether the World War I-era massacre of up to 1.5 million
Armenians in the Ottoman Empire was genocide.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is due to attend the signing ceremony in
Zurich Saturday, reflecting the Obama administration’s involvement in trying
to improve a broken relationship that has long complicated U.S. ties with
Turkey, an important U.S. ally in the Middle East and a North Atlantic
Treaty Organization member.

On Thursday and Friday, in an important piece of the accord’s choreography,
the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan met in Moldova for talks aimed at
resolving their conflict over Nagorno Karabakh, a largely ethnic-Armenian
enclave within Azerbaijan that broke away with Armenian military aid in the
early 1990s.

A statement by the Minsk Group — France, Russia and the U.S. — which
mediates the negotiations, described the talks as constructive. But Azeri
President Ilham Aliyev, who has pushed Turkey not to sign the accord until
Armenia agrees to a resolution of the Karabakh dispute, told Azeri
television that the talks had made no progress, Russian news agency Interfax
reported.

Diplomats familiar with preparations said the signing in Zurich would go
ahead on Saturday, although debate was continuing over how the ceremony,
very sensitive on both sides of the border, would be presented.

Turkey wants to stress linkage between the border opening and resolution of
the Karabakh conflict by having the Minsk Group present, Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in a recent interview with The Wall Street
Journal. Armenia doesn’t want the group there.

Mrs. Clinton’s planned attendance has some American Armenians up in arms. "I
don’t think Clinton should be there," said Ken Hachikian, chairman of the
Armenian National Committee of America. "The U.S. is twisting Armenia’s arm
very hard to accept this. … Why? Because they want Turkey to have a way
out of recognizing genocide, and to get into the EU."

Many Armenians object to clauses in the accord that recognize the current
border and set up a historical commission to examine disputes, likely to
include the 1915 massacres. Turkey, which demanded the commission, disputes
the killings amounted to genocide.

Some Armenians say they are willing to back the rapprochement with Turkey,
arguing that it will ease the country’s isolation. "This will test the
courage of Turkey and whether they are sincere about the process. … We
expect the border to open without any preconditions," said Anthony
Barsamian, an executive board member of the Armenian Assembly of America.
Mr. Barsamian said he hoped the deal would free President Barack Obama to
follow through with his campaign pledge to allow U.S. recognition of the
genocide.

It is the Karabakh issue, however, that is likely to hold up implementation
of the agreement, analysts and diplomats say. After the document is signed,
it will need to be ratified by both parliaments to take effect, a process
that could be drawn out by either side.

"It is a significant event, but there is a way to go," Thomas de Waal, who
wrote a book on the Karabakh conflict, said of the signing. Turkey closed
the border in 1993 to protest what it saw as Armenia’s occupation of 20% of
Azerbaijan’s territory. Mr. Erdogan, the Turkish leader, has said he won’t
open the border until the conflict is resolved.

Write to Marc Champion at marc.champion@wsj.com
Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A10