Yerevan Report, Armenia
Jan 7, 2010
A Brief Look at Armenian-Turkish Relations in 2009
BY AMALYA GABRIELYAN
The year 2009 was rich with political and economical events that had a
big importance not only for Armenia, but for the whole region as well.
One of them ` not an event but a process ` is, of course, the first
steps to the normalization of Armenia-Turkey relations.
Armenia and Turkey ‘ two neighboring countries that didn’t have any
diplomatic relations since 1993 when the border between these
countries was closed by the initiative of official Ankara. If we try
to follow the history of this issue, it will take us to the year 1915,
which is well-known because of the event that shocked the whole
civilized world: the genocide of the Armenian people in the Ottoman
Empire, where millions of Armenians were murdered, while a multitude
of cultural, historical and religious monuments were destroyed.
Many countries have already accepted the events of 1915 as genocide
and condemned it. Official Ankara continues denying it.
The other reason for such complicated relations between Armenia and
Turkey is the fact that Turkey supported Azerbaijan in the Karabakh
conflict.
The improvement of the relations between Armenia and Turkey started in
2008, but the real steps in this direction were made in 2009. On
February 21, 2008 the president of Turkey Abdullah Gul congratulated
the newly elected Armenian President Serge Sarkisian and said that it
was a good opportunity for improving Armenia-Turkey relations.
To improve relations you must first have relations to improve. But
official Yerevan began to like that idea, and soon, on July 5, 2008,
Serge Sarkisian invited Abdullah Gul to Yerevan, to watch the FIFA
World Cup qualifier football match between the Armenian and Turkish
teams. The invitation was accepted, and on September 6 the Turkish
president came to Armenia. After these events that were later called
`football diplomacy,’ the relations between Armenia and Turkey began
to develop, and rather quickly, but not without difficulties.
One of these difficulties was, of course, the Karabakh problem and the
relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan that were being connected
with the improvement of Armenia-Turkey relations. On April 3, 2009,
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said that `It is not possible
for us to make a sound decision regarding Armenia before a solution to
the Karabakh issue.’
On April 22, the foreign ministers of Armenia and Turkey came to an
agreement on a `roadmap’ that would improve the relations between two
countries.
On October 10 in Zurich, Switzerland, in the presence of Hillary
Clinton, EU’s High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security
Policy Javier Solana and the foreign ministers of Switzerland, France
and Russia, the foreign ministers of Armenia and Turkey, Eduard
Nalbandian and Ahmed Davutoglu, respectively, signed an accord to open
the borders between the two countries and to set diplomatic relations.
On October 14, `Football Diplomacy 2′ took place: President Serge
Sarkisian accepted the invitation of the Turkish president and went to
Turkey to watch the Armenia-Turkey football match.
It was supposed that the Armenia-Turkey border would be open by the
end of 2009, but the Turkish parliament hasn’t ratified the agreement
yet. Turkish officials in their speeches continue to connect
Armenia-Turkey relations with the solution of the Karabakh conflict,
despite the fact that the representatives of the negotiating countries
and official Yerevan claim that no preconditions must exist to improve
Armenia-Turkey relations.
Amalya Gabrielyan is a contributor to Yerevan Report.
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