ARMENIAN GROUP BLASTS US FOR ‘GENOCIDE RECOGNITION FAILURE’
Hurriyet Daily News
Dec 21 2009
Turkey
The ANCA’s strong criticism of Washington came nearly a few days after
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, right, and U.S. President Barack
Obama met at the White House.
The largest and most radical Armenian-American group has criticized
the United States of failing to formally recognize the World War
I-era killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire as "genocide."
"It is truly astonishing that the United States has … pursued
a policy of complicity in Turkey’s state-sponsored denial of the
Armenian genocide and has even gone to the lengths of assisting Turkey
in covering up a crime," said Kate Nahapetian, government affairs
director of the Armenian National Committee of America, or ANCA.
Nahapetian’s remarks came in written testimony she submitted to the
U.S. Senate’s Judiciary Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Law for
a hearing titled "The Law of the Land: U.S. Implementation of Human
Rights Treaties" late last week.
"Turkey’s success in silencing one of the most powerful countries in
the world on one of the best documented cases of genocide emboldens
other states to commit genocide and undermines the ability of the U.S.
and the international community to prevent crimes against humanity,"
Nahapetian said, according to an ANCA statement.
She urged the U.S. administration and Congress to reverse this
situation.
The ANCA’s strong criticism of Washington came nearly a few days
after Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and U.S. President Barack
Obama met at the White House. Their agenda included Turkey’s relations
with Armenia.
Reconciliation process
The Turkish and Armenian foreign ministers met Oct. 10 and signed a
set of agreements under which Ankara and Yerevan would reestablish
diplomatic relations and reopen their land border.
Obama, who as a candidate pledged to recognize the Armenian killings
as "genocide," during last year’s election campaign, reversed his
position as president this year and fully backed the Ankara-Yerevan
normalization process, saying he would refrain from any move that
would jeopardize this process.
Presently, two identical "genocide recognition" resolutions introduced
by pro-Armenian lawmakers are pending in the Senate and the House
of Representatives, the upper and lower chambers of Congress,
respectively.
Analysts suggest that as long as the Turkey-Armenia normalization
process remains on track, chances for congressional adoption of these
resolutions remain slim.
However, there are signs that the reconciliation process is facing
obstacles on both sides. The Turkey-Armenia accord of Oct. 10 needs to
be ratified by the parliaments of both countries before implementation,
and there is no indication of when the two nations may bring the deal
to their respective parliaments.
The problem that lies at the root of the problem is the unresolved
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Turkey’s
close ally.
Turkey first wants to see progress toward the solution of the
Nagorno-Karabakh dispute before opening its border with Armenia. And
according to Turkey, Armenia is hinting no sign of this.
Nagorno-Karabakh, a mostly Armenian-populated enclave inside Azerbaijan
as well as other parts of Azerbaijan proper, have been under Armenian
occupation since a war in the early 1990s. As a result of this war,
Turkey has kept the land border with Armenia closed since 1993.