Turkey, Armenia sign historic accord
ZURICH, 10 OCTOBER, NOYAN TAPAN-AP. Turkey and Armenia signed an accord
Saturday to establish diplomatic relations after a century of enmity,
as U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton helped the two sides
clear a last-minute snag.
"It was pulled back from the brink," said a senior U.S. official The
Turkish and Armenian foreign ministers signed the agreement in the
Swiss city of Zurich after a dispute over the final statements they
would make. In the end, the signing took place about three hours later
and there were no spoken statements. Accordind to AP, officials say
Clinton and mediators from Switzerland intervened to help broker a
solution.
The accord is expected to win ratification from both nations’
parliaments and could lead to a reopening of their border, which has
been closed for 16 years. But nationalists on both sides are still
seeking to derail implementation of the deal. American officials said
Clinton; the top U.S. diplomat for Europe, Philip Gordon; and Swiss
Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey were engaged in furious
high-stakes shuttle diplomacy with the Turkish and Armenian delegations
to resolve the differences. Diplomats said the Armenians were concerned
about wording in the Turkish statement that was to be made after the
signing ceremony at University of Zurich and had expressed those
concerns "at the last minute" before the scheduled signing ceremony.
Clinton had arrived at the ceremony venue after meeting separately with
the Turks and Armenians at a hotel, but abruptly departed without
leaving her car when the problem arose. She returned to the hotel where
she spoke by phone from the sedan in the parking lot, three times with
the Armenians and four times with the Turks. At one point in the
intervention, a Swiss police car, lights and siren blazing, brought a
Turkish diplomat to the hotel from the university with a new draft of
his country’s statement. After nearly two hours, Clinton and Armenian
Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian met in person at the hotel and drove
back to the university where negotiations continued. It was not clear
if there would be a resolution. In the end, the Turks and Armenians
signed an accord establishing diplomatic ties in hope of reopening
their border and ending a century of acrimony over their bloody past.
"We are trying to boost our relations with Armenia in a way that will
cause no hard feelings for Azerbaijan," Erdogan told reporters.
Armenian President Serge Sarkisian said his country was taking
"responsible decisions" in normalizing relations with Turkey, despite
what he called the unhealable wounds of genocide.
The agreement calls for a panel to discuss "the historical dimension"
of the killing of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians during World War
I. The discussion is to include "an impartial scientific examination of
the historical records and archives to define existing problems and
formulate recommendations." That clause is viewed as a concession to
Turkey, which denies genocide, contending the toll is inflated and that
those killed were victims of civil war. "There is no alternative to the
establishment of the relations with Turkey without any precondition,"
said Sarkisian. "It is the dictate of the time."
Clinton, Kouchner and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov were among
the leaders who were on hand to watch the signing as it took place.
Better ties between Turkey, a regional heavyweight, and poor,
landlocked Armenia are a priority for President Barack Obama. They
could help reduce tensions in the troubled Caucasus region and
facilitate its growing role as a corridor for energy supplies bound for
the West. Javier Solana, the EU’s foreign policy chief, thanked Turkey,
which is a candidate for European Union membership.
"This is an important cooperation, no doubt, of Turkey to solve one
issue that pertains to a region which is in our neighborhood," Solana
told AP Television News after arriving in Zurich. Switzerland, which
mediated six weeks of talks between Turkey and Armenia to reach the
accord, hosted the signing. Necati Cetinkaya, a deputy chairman of
Turkey’s governing Justice and Development Party, defended the deal,
saying "sincere steps that are being taken will benefit Turkey." He
said Turkey is aiming to form friendly ties with all its neighbors and
could benefit from trade with Armenia. But Yilmaz Ates of the main
opposition Republican People’s Party said Turkey should avoid any
concessions. "If Armenia wants to repair relations … then it should
end occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh. That’s it," Ates said Saturday.
About 10,000 protesters rallied Friday in Armenia’s capital to oppose
the signing, and a tour of Armenian communities by Sarkisian sparked
protests in Lebanon and France, with demonstrators in Paris shouting
"Traitor!" On the Nagorno-Karabakh issue, Turks have close cultural and
linguistic ties with Azerbaijan, which is pressing Turkey for help in
recovering its land. Turkey shut its border with Armenia to protest the
Armenian invasion of Nagorno-Karabakh in 1993. Turkey wants Armenia to
withdraw some troops from the enclave area to show goodwill and speed
the opening of their joint border, but Armenia has yet to agree, said
Omer Taspinar, Turkey project director at the Brookings Institution in
Washington. "We may end up in a kind of awkward situation where there
are diplomatic relations, but the border is still closed," Taspinar
said.