TURKEY CRIES FOUL OVER U.S. GENOCIDE RESOLUTION; WARNS CONGRESS TO DROP BILL

Asbarez
Feb 8th, 2010

ANKARA (Combined Sources)-Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu
denounced a U.S. congressional committee over the weekend for
scheduling a vote on the Armenian Genocide resolution, saying that its
passage would seriously harm Turkey’s relations with both the United
States and Armenia, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported Monday.

Davutoglu reportedly suggested that Washington is using the prospect
of the resolution’s passage by the U.S. House of Representatives to
force Turkey to ratify its fence-mending agreements with Armenia. He
also accused Yerevan of hampering further progress in international
efforts to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

"Why is that draft included on the [committee] agenda now?" he said,
according to a "Hurriyet" report cited by the Azerbaijani APA news
agency on Monday. "Let them not expect from us the ratification of
protocols by using April 24 as a tool for pressure.

"The draft’s inclusion on the agenda is not in the interests of the
USA, Turkey and Armenia. This process can lead both our bilateral
relations with the USA and Turkey’s rapprochement with Armenia into
deadlock."

ANCA Executive Director Aram Hamparian Monday commented on the
Turkish diplomat’s most recent warning to Washington. "Davutoglu has
developed quite a nasty habit of lecturing America," said Hamparian,
urging Congress and President Obama to look past the foreign pressure
and stand firm behind US values and principles.

"It’s no more Turkey’s place to tell our Congress how it can speak
about the Armenian Genocide, than it is the Chinese government’s
place to tell our President whether he can meet with the Dalai Lama,"
Hamparian said. "Just as President Obama has properly taken a stand
against China’s threats, so too should the entire U.S. government
reject Ankara’s gag-rule on the proper commemoration of the Armenian
Genocide."

The Armenian Genocide resolution (H.Res.252) which was introduced by
U.S. lawmakers a year ago, urges President Barack Obama to "ensure
that the foreign policy of the United States reflects appropriate
understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to human
rights, ethnic cleansing, and genocide documented in the United States
record relating to the Armenian Genocide and the consequences of the
failure to realize a just resolution."

The resolution also "calls upon the President in the President’s
annual message commemorating the Armenian Genocide issued on or about
April 24, to accurately characterize the systematic and deliberate
annihilation of 1,500,000 Armenians as genocide and to recall the
proud history of United States intervention in opposition to the
Armenian Genocide."

Howard Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee,
said on Friday that the panel will vote on it early next month.

The vote will come less than two months before the 95th anniversary of
the start of Genocide. Turkey, which denies its crime and continues
to occupy Western Armenian lands, vehemently condemned similar bills
that were passed by the committee but never put to a full House vote
in the past. It refers to the crime not as genocide but as killings
and ethnic strife that occurred on a small scale and were not the
result of a premeditated government effort to exterminate Ottoman
Turkey’s Armenian population.

Davutoglu said he raised Ankara’s concerns with U.S. Deputy Secretary
of State James Steinberg at a meeting held on Saturday on the sidelines
of an international security conference in Munich. Speaking to
Turkish journalists on his way back from the conference, he claimed
that Armenia was also behind the scheduling of the congressional
committee vote.

"At first, Armenia’s Constitutional Court made comments about
the signed protocols that are unacceptable to us," Davutoglu said,
according to APA. "Then the Armenian side retreated from a constructive
position during the [last] meeting between Azerbaijani President
Ilham Aliyev and Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian. Now such a bill
is being included on the U.S. Congress agenda."

"The sequence of these three events is making us think that this is
not happening by chance," added Davutoglu.

Official Yerevan, meanwhile, signaled on Monday its satisfaction with
progress of the genocide bill. When asked by RFE/RL to comment on
the planned vote on the bill, an Armenian Foreign Ministry spokesman
cited statements on the issue made by President Serzh Sarkisian and
Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian in recent months.

Sarkisian said in an October address to the nation that the Armenian
genocide "must be recognized and condemned by the entire progressive
humanity." Nalbandian, for his part, told RFE/RL last month that
Armenia "will never cast doubt on the importance of international
recognition of the genocide."