SIX FACTORS FOR TURKEY’S PLIGHT GOING FORWARD TO APRIL 24: HURRIYET

News.am
Feb 16 2010
Armenia

April 24 is impending and Turkish Hurriyet Daily speaks of challenges
Turkey might face. In his "April 24 looms over protocols" article
expert Ihan Tanir mentions that every year "a guessing game starts
to spin over April 24." However, he refers to Turkish high ranking
diplomat who claims that "the situation this year is much different
than the past" due to Armenia-Turkey reconciliation.

Thereafter Ihan Tanir lists several factors "for Turkey’s plight going
forward to April 24" referring to the statements by Vigen Sargsyan —
Deputy Chief of staff to RA President at the CSIS meeting. NEWS.am
posts all six.

"1. Mr. Vigen Sargsyan, deputy chief of staff to Armenian President
Sargsyan, stated repeatedly during a speech last Friday at a meeting
organized by the Russia/Eurasian Program at the Center for Strategic
and International Studies, or CSIS, that Armenia does not recognize
the Karabakh conflict as a pre-condition for the protocols.

2. President Sargsyan will guarantee the ratification of protocols
in the Armenian parliament if the Turkish Parliament does so, as
Vigen Sargsyan pointed out. Therefore, while Turkey is unable to
push the Armenian side to show goodwill or to make progress to end
the occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh – although the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of Azerbaijan was reaffirmed by the United
Nations in several resolutions (#822, #853, #874 and #884) – Turkey,
itself feels compelled to display progress on the ratification process,
since the Armenian side is seemingly moving on in its parliament.

3. On the American front, Howard Berman, the Democratic chairman of
the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said a week ago he intended to
call a committee vote on March 4 on the non-binding resolution urging
President Barack Obama to describe the 1915 tragedy during the late
days of the Ottoman Empire as Genocide.

4. The head of European and Eurasian Affairs, Mr. Philip Gordon,
contrary to the U.S. State Department’s attitude in the past, did not
oppose outright the &’intention’ of Berman to bring the resolution to
the Foreign Relations Sub-Committee in early March. Mr. Gordon, as a
co-author of a book on Turkey, also stated a couple of weeks ago the
Armenian constitutional court’s decision was a step forward for the
reconciliation process, as opposed to the fierce outcry from Turkey.

5. According to one White House reporter in Washington, an official
from the White House stated recently that during the meeting between
Obama and Erdogan in the Oval Office in early December, Erdogan was
told that the normalization process has to go forward, otherwise
April 24 might be a difficult time for especially Turkey this year.

6. As if all these developments were not enough, Vigen Sargsyan, during
the same speech at the CSIS, stated although ‘the deadlines are not
good for diplomacy for it limits the flexibility of the countries,’
so far, about all the progress between the two countries relating to
the normalization process has been achieved due to different deadlines,
such as the dates of the football games or the last April 24, which
urged Turkey to finalize a road map just two days prior to Obama’s
commemoration statement."

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress