COMMITTEE PASSES ARMENIAN GENOCIDE RESOLUTION
By Bartholomew Sullivan

Memphis Commercial Appeal
March 4 2010

WASHINGTON — The House Foreign Affairs Committee passed a resolution
condemning the Ottoman Empire’s Armenian genocide Thursday, with a
majority of members saying its truth outweighed the objections of
Turkey, a NATO ally.

The vote was 23 to 22.

Turkey, a key Muslim ally of the United States, angrily withdrew its
ambassador to the U.S. after the vote. Prospects for passage in the
full House are uncertain.

U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., a co-chairman of the Turkey Caucus, is
not on the committee and did not vote. But he did have a column in The
Hill newspaper today quoting a Turkish proverb: "A wise man remembers
his friends at all times; a fool, only when he has need of them." It
said the non-binding resolution, while "legally meaningless in the
U.S., would almost certainly be seen as a slap in the face to Turkey.

…"

U.S. Rep. John Tanner, D-Tenn., who is on the committee and is the
president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, voted against the
measure. He noted that all the living former secretaries of state
opposed the resolution.

Opponents of the resolution said it is unwise to antagonize Turkey,
the transit country for military cargo en route to the wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan. Proponents said it is both historically accurate and
likely to send a message to future tyrants that there are consequences
for ethnic cleansing.

Committee chairman Howard L. Berman, D-Calif., appeared eager to pass
the resolution, and was the first to vote "aye." A similar resolution
passed the committee in the previous Congress but never got a vote
in the full House.

Several committee members expressed reservations at the timing of
the vote as Turkey and Armenia are working out a set of protocols
to establish a normalization of relations. Many who opposed the
resolution acknowledged the historical truth of the genocide of
Armenians by the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1923.

As the vote was announced in the hearing room, a chorus of cheers
erupted.

"I declare such a decision that was taken with political concerns in
mind to be an injustice to history and to the science of history,"
Turkish President Abdullah Gul said in the capital, Ankara.

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