TURKEY TO OPEN BORDER WITH ARMENIA FOR SOCCER MATCH REPORT
AssA-Irada
September 17, 2009 Thursday
Azerbaijan
Turkey will open its border with Armenia on the day it will host a
soccer match of the national teams, October 14, as a sign of goodwill,
and Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian will be able to head to the
neighboring country by road to attend the game, Turkish Milliyet
newspaper reported. Richard Giragosyan, the director of Armenias
National and International Research Center, claimed in an interview
with a visiting Turkish journalist that the Azerbaijani leadership
will give the most support to the Turkey-Armenia rapprochement and the
recently agreed protocols on normalizing the two countries strained
relations, Milliyet said.
Giragosyan maintained that the Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents
will meet to discuss the Upper (Nagorno) Garabagh conflict at
the mediating OSCE Minsk Groups initiative in early October and
issue a joint statement, which will allow Ankara to continue the
normalization process with Yerevan. Armenia and Turkey have been
at odds and the border between the two countries has been closed
since 1993 on Ankaras insistence due to Armenias policy of occupying
Azerbaijani territory and Armenian claims about the alleged World
War I-era genocide. Signs of a warming in Turkish-Armenian relations
discerned after Turkish President Abdullah Gul attended a 2010 World
Cup qualifying soccer match together with his counterpart in Yerevan in
September 2008. Further, Gul invited Sarkisian to Turkey for a return
game. On August 31, Ankara and Yerevan agreed to begin discussions on
forging diplomatic ties and developing bilateral relations, announcing
they would complete domestic consultations over two protocols within
six weeks, to be followed by their parliamentary approval. However,
Ankara has made clear that it could normalize ties with Yerevan only
after the Upper Garabagh conflict is fairly settled.