Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

ISTANBUL: Armenian group criticize US nominee for Turkey envoy

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • ISTANBUL: Armenian group criticize US nominee for Turkey envoy

    Today's Zaman, Turkey
    July 30 2014

    Armenian group criticize US nominee for Turkey envoy

    July 30, 2014, Wednesday/ 17:37:38/ TODAY'S ZAMAN / ISTANBUL


    The US-based Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) said on
    Monday that the US must be represented in Ankara by a clear and
    compelling voice for truth.

    `We oppose Turkey's gag-rule and all who accept Ankara's veto over
    America's right to speak with moral clarity about the Armenian
    Genocide. The US must be represented in Ankara on April 24th of 2015
    by a clear and compelling voice for truth," the director, Aram
    Hamparian, said in a written statement.

    John Bass was nominated to be the new ambassador to Turkey by US
    President Barack Obama and delivered his testimony along with four
    other ambassadorial nominees during a hearing at the Senate Committee
    on Foreign Relations on July 15.

    Ankara's policy is that the 1915 events do not amount to genocide, and
    Turkey argues that both Turks and Armenians were killed when Armenians
    revolted against the Ottoman Empire during World War I in
    collaboration with the Russian army, which was then invading Eastern
    Anatolia.

    `It is simply unacceptable -- six years after President Obama pledged
    to recognize the Armenian Genocide, five years after Ankara walked
    away from the Turkey-Armenia reconciliation protocols, and less than a
    year away from the 100th anniversary of the start of this still
    unpunished crime -- for a US ambassadorial nominee to respond to
    direct Senate questioning on the Armenian genocide with generic
    references to 'shared history',' the statement read.

    Hamparian claimed that the `euphemistic language' of Bass during the
    questioning aimed to downgrade a genocidal crime to a bilateral
    conflict.

    `The ANCA cannot support the nomination of John Bass to serve as US
    Ambassador to Turkey, on the basis of his Senate testimony that
    compounds President Obama's broken pledge to recognize the Armenian
    Genocide by retreating even further from the truth and tightening
    Turkey's gag-rule on the US government,' he added in the statement.

    In a historical first for the Turkish Republic, Prime Minister Recep
    Tayyip ErdoÄ?an extended condolences to the grandchildren of Armenians
    who lost their lives in 1915.

    His surprising statement came ahead of April 24, when Armenians
    commemorate the events of 1915-1923 that they call genocide.

    `It is our hope and belief that the peoples of an ancient and unique
    geography, who share similar customs and manners, will be able to talk
    to each other about the past with maturity and to remember together
    their losses in a decent manner. And it is with this hope and belief
    that we wish that the Armenians who lost their lives in the context of
    the early 20th century rest in peace, and we convey our condolences to
    their grandchildren,' said ErdoÄ?an's statement.

    However, not satisfied with ErdoÄ?an's condolences, Hamparian said, on
    April 23, `Increasingly isolated internationally, Ankara is repacking
    its genocide denials.'

    "Prime Minister ErdoÄ?an, in his statement today, attempts, in vain, to
    escape responsibility for the Armenian Genocide, by somehow
    downgrading this still unpunished international crime to the level of
    a simple, unresolved bilateral conflict. Neither the facts nor any of
    the world's commonly accepted codes of law or morality support this
    twisted view,' Hamparian added.

    http://www.todayszaman.com/diplomacy/news-354210-armenian-group-criticize-us-nominee-for-turkey-envoy.html


    From: Baghdasarian
Working...
X