TURKEY’S PRIME MINISTER SAYS NO GENOCIDE IN DARFUR
Tert
Nov 9 2009
Armenia
While the eyes of the international community are the message Turkey
will deliver to Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, wanted by the
International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against
humanity in Darfur and scheduled to arrive today in Ä°stanbul for a
meeting of Muslim countries, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has
reiterated his view on the Darfur issue, saying there was no genocide
there, reports Turkish news agency Today’s Zaman.
Bashir, who in March became the first sitting head of state to
be indicted by the ICC at The Hague, is among heads of state and
government that Ä°stanbul will host for an economic summit during the
25th session of the Standing Committee for Economic and Commercial
Cooperation (COMCEC) of the Organization of the Islamic Conference
(OIC).
Erdogan, speaking on Sunday in an interview broadcast by the Turkish
Radio and Television Corporation (TRT), noted that Bashir was an
invitee of COMCEC, thus no bilateral invitation was extended by Turkey,
reiterating earlier statements by Turkish leaders and officials.
"Gaza and Darfur should not be confused with each other.
Fifteen-hundred people were killed in Gaza. If there was something like
this in Darfur, we would follow that to the end as well," Erdogan said,
in response to those criticizing him for not showing Darfur the same
kind of sensitivity he has shown vis-a-vis Israel’s Gaza offensive.