3 TURKS CONVICTED OF DENYING ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
Associated Press Worldstream
October 21, 2008 Tuesday 2:11 PM GMT
A Swiss court convicted three Turkish men of racism Tuesday for
denying that the deaths of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Armenians
under Ottoman rule during the early 20th century amounted to genocide.
State prosecutor Andrej Gnehm said the 58-, 53- and 42-year-old men
have been ordered to each pay up to 4,500 Swiss francs (euro2,940). The
defendants were not identified in the ruling because of privacy laws.
Gnehm said the men helped organize an event in Switzerland last year
during which Dogu Perincek, the leader of the Turkish Workers’ Party,
denied the killing of Armenians was genocide. A Swiss court convicted
him of racism and fined him.
None of the defendants received jail sentences.
The case has caused diplomatic tension between Switzerland and Turkey.
Historians estimate that up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed in
1915-18 in Ottoman Turkey in what is widely regarded as the first
genocide of the 20th century. About 20 parliaments have passed
resolutions to this effect.
Turkey denies any genocide, saying the death toll has been inflated
and the dead were victims of civil war and unrest.