U.S. HOUSE PANEL APPROVES RESOLUTION ON ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

RIA Novosti
March 5, 2010
Washington

The Foreign Affairs Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives
has approved a resolution recognizing the genocide of Armenians by
the Ottoman Empire during World War I.

The panel voted 23-22 in support of the resolution following almost
six hours of heated debates on Thursday.

The resolution, which has already become a diplomatic flashpoint
between Washington and Ankara, has not been finally adopted and
will now go before the full House, although no date has been set for
the vote.

Turkey, which has always refused to recognize the killings of an
estimated 1.5 million Armenians at the end of the Ottoman period in
1915 as an act of genocide, warned Washington that this move could
jeopardize U.S-Turkish cooperation and set back the talks aimed at
opening the border between Turkey and Armenia.

On the eve of the vote, the Obama administration urged the committee
not to approve the resolution, fearing it could alienate Washington’s
NATO ally, whose help the White House considers invaluable in solving
confrontations in the Middle East and Afghanistan.

The Foreign Affairs Committee approved a similar genocide measure in
2007, and Turkey temporarily recalled its ambassador to the United
States.

However, after intensive pressure by the Bush administration, the
resolution was not brought to the House floor.

A number of states have recognized the killings in Armenia as the
first genocide of the 20th century, including Russia, France, Italy,
Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Greece, as well as 42 of the
50 U.S. states. The Vatican, the European Parliament and the World
Council of Churches have also denounced the killings as genocide.

Uruguay was the first to do so in 1965.