October 9, 2007
Turkey’s President Warns Bush Over Armenian Vote
By REUTERS
Filed at 8:52 a.m. ET
ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey’s president has written to U.S. President
George W. Bush warning of the damage to bilateral ties if Congress
backs a bill recognizing the 1915 massacres of Armenians as genocide,
his office said on Tuesday.
Congress’s Foreign Affairs Committee is expected to back a bill on the
genocide issue on Wednesday and speaker Nancy Pelosi, a known
supporter of the Armenian cause, could then decide to bring it to the
House floor for a vote.
The Bush administration is opposed to the bill, but Congress is now
dominated by its Democratic opponents.
"In his letter our president thanked President Bush for his efforts
(to stop the bill) and drew attention to the problems it would create
in bilateral relations if it is accepted," President Abdullah Gul’s
office said in a statement. It did not provide further information.
A senior lawmaker of Turkey’s ruling AK Party, Egemen Bagis, was
quoted this week as saying Ankara might cut logistic support to U.S.
troops in Iraq if Congress backs the bill. The bulk of supplies for
troops in Iraq pass via Turkey’s Incirlik airbase.
Turkish media have said U.S. firms could also be blocked from winning
defense and other contracts if the bill passes.
Turkey, a NATO ally of Washington, strongly rejects the Armenian
position, backed by many Western historians and a growing number of
foreign parliaments, that up to 1.5 million Armenians suffered
genocide at the hands of Ottoman Turks during World War One.
Ankara says many Muslim Turks as well as Christian Armenians died in
inter-ethnic conflict as the Ottoman Empire collapsed.
The bill comes at a delicate time for Turkey-U.S. relations. Turkish
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was on Tuesday considering whether to
allow a cross-border incursion into northern Iraq to strike Kurdish
rebels there after 15 Turkish soldiers were killed in attacks in
recent days.
Washington has urged Turkey not to send troops into mainly Kurdish
northern Iraq for fear of destabilizing the country’s most peaceful
region.
Source: -turkey-usa-armenians.html?pagewanted=print