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October 10, 2007
Turkey Opposes U.S. Genocide Resolution
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 8:45 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Turkey is making a final direct appeal to U.S.
lawmakers to reject a resolution that would declare the World War
I-era killings of hundreds of thousands of Armenians a genocide.
The House Foreign Affairs Committee was to vote Wednesday on the
measure that is opposed by the Bush administration and which Turkey
has insisted could severely damage U.S. relations with a NATO ally
that has been a major portal for U.S. military operations in the
region.
Those threats were coming as Turkey's government was seeking
parliamentary approval for a cross-border military operation to chase
separatist Kurdish rebels who operate from bases in northern Iraq. The
move, opposed by the United States, could open a new war front in the
most stable part of Iraq.
''I have been trying to warn the (U.S.) lawmakers not to make a
historic mistake,'' said Egemen Bagis, a close foreign policy adviser
to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
A measure of the potential problem came in a warning the U.S. Embassy
in Ankara issued Tuesday to U.S. citizens in Turkey of
''demonstrations and other manifestations of anti-Americanism
throughout Turkey'' if the bill passes the committee and gets to the
House floor for a vote, the embassy statement said.
On Wednesday, hundreds of Turks marched to U.S. missions in Turkey to
protest the bill. In Ankara, members of the left-wing Workers' Party
chanted anti-American slogans in front of the embassy, the state-run
Anatolia news agency reported. A group of about 200 people staged a
similar protest in front of the U.S. Consulate in Istanbul, private
NTV television said.
Anatolia quoted a party official as saying that the ''genocide claim
was an international, imperialist and a historical lie.''
The basic dispute involves the killing of up to 1.5 million Armenians
by Ottoman Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely
viewed by genocide scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century.
Turkey denies that the deaths constituted genocide, says the toll has
been inflated, and insists that those killed were victims of civil war
and unrest.
Armenian-American interest groups also have been rallying supporters
in the large diaspora community to pressure lawmakers to make sure
that a successful committee vote leads to consideration by the full
House.
The bill seemed to have enough support on the committee for passage,
but the majority was slight and some backers said they feared that
Turkish pressure would narrow it. Most Republicans, who are a minority
on the committee, were expected to vote against the resolution.
On Tuesday, Bryan Ardouny, executive director of the Armenian Assembly
of America, sought to shore up support in letters to the committee's
chairman, Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., and its ranking Republican
member, Florida Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
''We have a unique opportunity in this Congress, while there are still
survivors of the Armenian genocide living among us, to irrevocably and
unequivocally reaffirm this fact of history,'' he said.
The head of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Catholicos Karekin II, was
to give the opening invocation to the House's session ahead of the
vote Wednesday.
Erdogan adviser Bagis said the resolution would make it hard for his
government to continue close cooperation with the United States and
resist calls from the public to go after the Kurdish rebels after
deadly attacks on soldiers in recent weeks. Turkey previously has said
it would prefer that the United States and its Iraqi Kurd allies in
northern Iraq crack down on the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK.
The United States reiterated on Tuesday its warnings against an incursion.
''If they have a problem, they need to work together to resolve it,
and I'm not sure that unilateral incursions are the way to go,'' State
Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
Many in the United States also fear that a public backlash in Turkey
could lead to restrictions on crucial supply routes through Turkey to
Iraq and Afghanistan, and the closure of Incirlik, a strategic air
base in Turkey used by the U.S. Air Force.
Bagis, a member of the Turkish Parliament, underscored that possibility.
''Let us not forget that 75 percent of all supplies to your troops in
Iraq go through Turkey,'' he said.
------
On the Net:
House Foreign Affairs Committee: http://foreignaffairs.house.gov
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-US-Armenia-G enocide.html
Turkey Opposes U.S. Genocide Resolution
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 8:45 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Turkey is making a final direct appeal to U.S.
lawmakers to reject a resolution that would declare the World War
I-era killings of hundreds of thousands of Armenians a genocide.
The House Foreign Affairs Committee was to vote Wednesday on the
measure that is opposed by the Bush administration and which Turkey
has insisted could severely damage U.S. relations with a NATO ally
that has been a major portal for U.S. military operations in the
region.
Those threats were coming as Turkey's government was seeking
parliamentary approval for a cross-border military operation to chase
separatist Kurdish rebels who operate from bases in northern Iraq. The
move, opposed by the United States, could open a new war front in the
most stable part of Iraq.
''I have been trying to warn the (U.S.) lawmakers not to make a
historic mistake,'' said Egemen Bagis, a close foreign policy adviser
to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
A measure of the potential problem came in a warning the U.S. Embassy
in Ankara issued Tuesday to U.S. citizens in Turkey of
''demonstrations and other manifestations of anti-Americanism
throughout Turkey'' if the bill passes the committee and gets to the
House floor for a vote, the embassy statement said.
On Wednesday, hundreds of Turks marched to U.S. missions in Turkey to
protest the bill. In Ankara, members of the left-wing Workers' Party
chanted anti-American slogans in front of the embassy, the state-run
Anatolia news agency reported. A group of about 200 people staged a
similar protest in front of the U.S. Consulate in Istanbul, private
NTV television said.
Anatolia quoted a party official as saying that the ''genocide claim
was an international, imperialist and a historical lie.''
The basic dispute involves the killing of up to 1.5 million Armenians
by Ottoman Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely
viewed by genocide scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century.
Turkey denies that the deaths constituted genocide, says the toll has
been inflated, and insists that those killed were victims of civil war
and unrest.
Armenian-American interest groups also have been rallying supporters
in the large diaspora community to pressure lawmakers to make sure
that a successful committee vote leads to consideration by the full
House.
The bill seemed to have enough support on the committee for passage,
but the majority was slight and some backers said they feared that
Turkish pressure would narrow it. Most Republicans, who are a minority
on the committee, were expected to vote against the resolution.
On Tuesday, Bryan Ardouny, executive director of the Armenian Assembly
of America, sought to shore up support in letters to the committee's
chairman, Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., and its ranking Republican
member, Florida Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
''We have a unique opportunity in this Congress, while there are still
survivors of the Armenian genocide living among us, to irrevocably and
unequivocally reaffirm this fact of history,'' he said.
The head of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Catholicos Karekin II, was
to give the opening invocation to the House's session ahead of the
vote Wednesday.
Erdogan adviser Bagis said the resolution would make it hard for his
government to continue close cooperation with the United States and
resist calls from the public to go after the Kurdish rebels after
deadly attacks on soldiers in recent weeks. Turkey previously has said
it would prefer that the United States and its Iraqi Kurd allies in
northern Iraq crack down on the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK.
The United States reiterated on Tuesday its warnings against an incursion.
''If they have a problem, they need to work together to resolve it,
and I'm not sure that unilateral incursions are the way to go,'' State
Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
Many in the United States also fear that a public backlash in Turkey
could lead to restrictions on crucial supply routes through Turkey to
Iraq and Afghanistan, and the closure of Incirlik, a strategic air
base in Turkey used by the U.S. Air Force.
Bagis, a member of the Turkish Parliament, underscored that possibility.
''Let us not forget that 75 percent of all supplies to your troops in
Iraq go through Turkey,'' he said.
------
On the Net:
House Foreign Affairs Committee: http://foreignaffairs.house.gov
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-US-Armenia-G enocide.html