BOLTON-BACKING SENATOR BLOCKS ANOTHER AMBASSADOR
Raw Story, MA
Aug 3, 2006
RAW STORY
Published: Thursday August 3, 2006
A Republican senator who has called on Democrats to give President
Bush’s controversial pick for UN Ambassador John Bolton an up or
down vote is now voting to block the nomination of another ambassador
picked by President Bush, RAW STORY has learned.
Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota announced his intention to vote
against recommending confirmation of Richard Hoagland to be President
Bush’s ambassador to Armenia. Coleman intends to block the nominee
because he refused to term Turkey’s early 20th century of Armenians
living in the country a ‘genocide.’ Coleman declared in an interview
with the Associated Press "My problem isn’t with Hoagland…I continue
to be troubled by our policy that refuses to recognize what was a
historical reality."
The article goes on to explain that the US will not call Turkey’s
killing of Armenians in the early 1900s an act of genocide, a position
Hoagland hewed to during his confirmation hearing in June.
Senator Coleman has been a loud voice in favor of Ambassador John
Bolton’s confirmation by a Senate vote. In one statement on Tuesday,
Coleman declared that "Blocking the nomination of Ambassador Bolton
is a case study in partisan excess….We must have an up or down vote
on Ambassador Bolton in the Senate."
During Bolton’s confirmation hearing last month, he also said "if
you really look at the opposition at times to this nomination…it’s
opposition to U.S. policy." He then added "But I think what we do
fundamentally agree with is the belief that the president has the
right to have his voice and his representation, somebody he trusts,
representing us at the United Nations."