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Armenia, Turkey To Re-Open Border

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  • Armenia, Turkey To Re-Open Border

    ARMENIA, TURKEY TO RE-OPEN BORDER

    ABC Online
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/09/ 01/2672903.htm?section=justin
    Sept 1 2009
    Australia

    Armenia and Turkey have agreed on a plan to establish diplomatic
    ties and re-open their border, seeking to end decades of distrust
    and resentment on both sides.

    The two countries have no diplomatic relations, a closed frontier and
    a long history of hostility rooted in massacres of Armenians under
    the Ottoman Turks during World War I.

    The two countries said they would hold six weeks of domestic
    consultations before signing two protocols on establishing diplomatic
    ties and developing bilateral relations.

    "The political consultations will be completed within six weeks,
    following which the two protocols will be signed and submitted to
    the respective parliaments for ratification," the countries' foreign
    ministries said in a joint statement with mediator Switzerland.

    According to copies of the protocols released by the Armenian foreign
    ministry, the two countries have agreed to re-open their common border
    "within two months" of the deal taking effect.

    The agreement also calls for the creation of a joint commission
    to examine the "historical dimension" of their disagreements,
    "including an impartial scientific examination of the historical
    records and archives".

    The two countries said in April that they had agreed to a road map
    for normalising diplomatic ties after years of enmity.

    Turkey has long refused to establish diplomatic links with Armenia over
    Yerevan's efforts to have World War I-era massacres of Armenians by
    Ottoman Turks recognised as genocide - a label Turkey strongly rejects.

    Armenians say up to 1.5 million of their kin were systematically killed
    between 1915 and 1917 as the Ottoman Empire, Turkey's predecessor,
    was falling apart.

    Turkey categorically rejects the genocide label and says between
    300,000 and 500,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks died in civil
    strife when Armenians took up arms in eastern Anatolia and sided with
    invading Russian troops.
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