DASHNAK LEADER SLAMS ARMENIAN DIPLOMACY OVER U.S. COURT VERDICT
Hasmik Smbatian
Armenialiberty.org
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Aug 27 2009
A senior figure of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation
(Dashnaktsutyun) has effectively linked a recent U.S. court decision
invalidating a law that allowed hairs of Armenian genocide survivors
to seek payments on dead relatives’ life insurance policies to what
the nationalist party has viewed as Armenian diplomatic failures in
the ongoing negotiations with Turkey.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco last week said
the California law that allowed heirs of Armenians killed in the
Turkish Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago to seek payment on the
life insurance policies of dead relatives amounted to "unconstitutional
meddling in U.S. foreign policy."
Dashnaktsutyun’s political affairs director Giro Manoyan implied at a
press conference in Yerevan on Thursday that the roadmap to normalizing
bilateral relations announced by Armenia and Turkey on the eve of the
Armenian genocide commemoration day enabled U.S. President Barack Obama
to avoid terming the 1915 massacres of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey
a genocide in an annual presidential message to the U.S. Armenian
community on April 24, which, in turn, allowed the U.S. judges to
interpret that step in reaching their decision.
"This is linked to the Armenian-Turkish negotiations as much as
the April 22-23 announcement [of the roadmap] became a pretext
for U.S. President Barack Obama to avoid using the G-word," stated
Manoyan. "But for that announcement, Obama would most likely have not
avoided the use of the G-word. And had Obama used the word genocide
in his April 24 address, the U.S. court would not have passed such
a verdict."
Manoyan said unless changed, the verdict will serve as an instrument
in the hands of the Turkish circles to get genocide affirmation laws
in other U.S. states invalidated.
"Even on the basis of this verdict it is possible to prohibit the
U.S. Congress from adopting any resolution affirming the genocide,"
said Manoyan.
The Dashnaktsutyun representative called for legal and political steps
to redress the situation, such as appealing the verdict and demanding
that this appeal be heard and decided by more than just three judges.
Also, Manoyan called for efforts to prevent the verdict from being used
as precedent in considering other lawsuits. He said that addressing
the matter at the Constitutional Court as the last resort is "though
theoretically possible but practically is ineffective."
Manoyan called simultaneous political steps equally important. He
said the Armenian National Committee of America had already sent
a letter to Barack Obama mentioning that his failure to affirm the
genocide has in fact been used as an occasion for a U.S. court "to go
beyond its powers and make interpretations" in making the decision,
which may "deliver a major blow to the affirmation of the Armenian
genocide in America in general."
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
