POLITICAL SCIENTIST RECOMMENDS THE ARMENIAN PRESIDENT TO REFUSE TO GO TO TURKEY FOR SOCCER
By Georg Khachaturyan

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Published: 12 October, 2009

Richard Giragosian, director of the Armenian Center for National and
International Studies (ACNIS) advises the Armenian president not to
go to Turkey for the World Cup qualifier between Turkish and Armenian
soccer teams (on October 14), this way responding to the October 11
statement made by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Giragosyan says the "game has just started" and Armenia has "be strong"
in order to pass yet many "diplomatic tests".

It is noteworthy that a day after the protocols on the normalization
of the Armenian-Turkish relations were signed in Zurich, Erdogan
once again stated that Armenia "must withdraw its troops from
Nagorno-Karabakh" and that Turkey "cannot open the borders with
Armenia until Armenia withdraws its troops from the conflict zone."

According to the political scientist, October 10 made Turkey’s tactics
of "playing with Armenia and dragging time" obvious to everybody,
and, first of all, to the international community.

By threatening to leave and having made the Turkish side remove the
unacceptable for Armenia wording from the post-signing statement (to
be made by Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoghlu) Armenia passed
a unique diplomatic test set by Turkey, but the game has only started
and many such tests to be yet expected. Turkey respects and reckons
with the viewpoints of only those countries which demonstrate strength;
that is why Armenia must develop a strong diplomatic strategy. It is
clear that Turkey is playing "good cop" (Abdullah Gul), "bad cop"
(Recep Tayyip Erdogan) game and the logical response to it should
be either Serzh Sargsyan’s refusal to visit Bursa or a threat to do
so in case the Turkish side does not stop taking provocative steps,
concluded Giragosian.