RA AMBASSADOR TO GREAT BRITAIN VAHE GABRIELIAN AND ANKARA UNIVERSITY
PROFESSOR TURKKAYA ATAOV GIVE JOINT INTERVIEW TO AL JAZEERA TV
YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. Within the
framework of Hrant Dink’s murder and public discussions on the
Genocide, the English editorial of the Al Jazeera TV company invited
Ambassador of Armenia to Great Britain Vahe Gabrielian to an
interview. As Noyan Tapan was informed by the RA Foreign Ministry’s
Press and Information Department, Turkish historian, Ankara University
Professor Turkkaya Ataov was also invited. Famous British journalist
David Frost held the interview.
According to the same source, responding Frost’s observation about the
Genocide issue’s again entering the field by Dink’s murder, Ambassador
Gabrielian mentioned that that issue has never been taken out of the
agenda and forgotten. Touching upon the question about the fact of the
genocide, the Ambassador said that he is not going to discuss the
reality of the fact which is not subject to question and is proved by
extensive documentary materials, including by Turk historians’
evidences, and memories about which are bright almost in every
Armenian family both in Armenia and Diaspora, and the issue of its
recognition and improvement of the Armenian-Turkish relations must be
discussed instead of it.
Vahe Gabrielian mentioned that the Ottaman government’s intention to
implement a genocide was proved and he drew one’s attention to the
fact that just the Turkish special courts sentenced in 1919-1920 a
part of the Genocide organizers to death or other punishments, but
this fact is today buried in oblivion.
Touching upon David Frost’s question if the issue of the Genocide
recognition must become a precondition for Turkey’s membership to the
EU, the Ambassador responded that Armenia is not a EU member and may
not officially present preconditions as such one, but the Copenhagen
standards demand from the member countries good-neighbourly relations
with all neighbors, solution of problems existing with them and
improvement of the situation of minorities living in their countries,
and all these supposes the Genocide recognition as welll. A number of
EU member states also make this issue difficult and Armenia expects a
principal position from the EU in this issue.
The Turkish historian only mentioned that he felt sorrow for "his
fellow-writer brother’s" murder though he shared not all viewpoints of
Dink. He refused the fact of the Genocide but presented no reasoning.