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ANKARA: Obama Urges Turkey, Armenia To Implement Normalization Deal

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  • ANKARA: Obama Urges Turkey, Armenia To Implement Normalization Deal

    OBAMA URGES TURKEY, ARMENIA TO IMPLEMENT NORMALIZATION DEAL

    Hurriyet
    April 13 2010
    Turkey

    U.S. President Barack Obama has urged Turkey and Armenia to put into
    effect a stalled deal to normalize their relations.

    Obama "urged that both Armenia and Turkey make every effort to advance
    the normalization process and achieve legislative ratification of
    the protocols of normalization," the White House said late on Monday
    after a meeting between the U.S. president and Armenian President Serge
    Sarkisian on the sidelines of a nuclear security summit in Washington.

    "The president commended President Sarkisian for his courageous efforts
    to achieve the normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey
    and encouraged him to fulfill the promise of normalization for the
    benefit of the Armenian people," it said in a statement.

    Separately, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who represented Turkey
    at the summit, also met with Sarkisian to discuss the normalization
    process.

    Turkish and Armenian foreign ministers signed last October a set
    of agreements under which Ankara and Yerevan would set up normal
    diplomatic relations and reopen their land border.

    But the normalization process is now faltering. The Turkey-Armenia
    accord needs to be ratified by the parliaments of the two neighbors
    before implementation, and there is still no indication of when both
    nations may bring the deal to their parliamentary agendas.

    Karabakh problem

    The problem that lies at the root of the issue is the unresolved
    Nagorno-Karabakh dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Turkey's
    close friend and ally. Turkey first wants to see progress toward a
    solution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict before opening its border
    with Armenia, and the Armenians are showing no sign of this.

    Nagorno-Karabakh, a mostly Armenian-populated enclave inside
    Azerbaijan, and parts of Azerbaijan proper have been under Armenian
    occupation since a war in the early 1990s. As a result of this war,
    Turkey has refused normal diplomatic relations with Yerevan and has
    kept the land border with Armenia closed since 1993.

    The U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee in early
    March also narrowly passed a resolution calling for official U.S.
    recognition of claims of World War I-era killings of Armenians in
    the Ottoman Empire as genocide.

    Turkey strongly reacted against the move by temporarily recalling its
    ambassador to Washington and warning that a full House endorsement
    of the resolution would hurt bilateral ties in a major and lasting way.

    It is not clear yet if or when the bill could come to a full House
    floor vote.

    During his speech at the nuclear security summit, Erdogan denounced the
    "genocide" resolution effort in the U.S. Congress. "We are against a
    one-sided interpretation of history," Erdogan said. "History cannot
    be written in a parliament or judged by a parliament."

    Group's call

    Meanwhile, ANCA, the largest U.S. Armenian group, urged Obama to
    qualify the last century's Armenian killings as "genocide" in his
    annual statement on April 24, the day commemorated in the United
    States to mark the Armenian deaths.

    "We would consider it highly inappropriate for the president of the
    United States to have invited the president of Armenia to Washington
    only days before April 24th if he had an intention of doing anything
    less than fully recognizing the Armenian genocide, fully honoring
    his commitment to recognize this crime against humanity," said Aram
    Hamparian, the ANCA's executive director.

    "We are looking forward to President Obama keeping faith with his own
    words and keeping faith with the relationship he seeks with Armenia
    by recognizing the Armenian genocide," Hamparian said.

    Turkish officials warn that, if Obama in his April 24 statement
    qualifies the Armenian deaths as genocide, then it would be a huge
    blow to the U.S.-Turkish relationship and will effectively kill the
    normalization process with Armenia.
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