Tuesday, 01 July 2003

TURKEY HINTS AT SOFTENED STANCE ON ARMENIA

Published in News Digest

By empty (7/1/2003 issue of the CACI Analyst)

Speaking on 27 June in the east Anatolian city of Kars, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara will not open its border with Armenia until that country formally abandons its international campaign for recognition that the killings of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey in 1915 constituted genocide, RFE/RL\'s Yerevan bureau reported. But Erdogan did not insist, as Turkish politicians have hitherto done, that establishing diplomatic relations with Armenia is contingent on a solution to the Karabakh conflict that leaves the enclave a part of Azerbaijan. A senior Armenian official told RFE/RL that Turkey is under pressure from the United States to open its border with Armenia and might do so prior to establishing diplomatic relations.
Speaking on 27 June in the east Anatolian city of Kars, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara will not open its border with Armenia until that country formally abandons its international campaign for recognition that the killings of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey in 1915 constituted genocide, RFE/RL\'s Yerevan bureau reported. But Erdogan did not insist, as Turkish politicians have hitherto done, that establishing diplomatic relations with Armenia is contingent on a solution to the Karabakh conflict that leaves the enclave a part of Azerbaijan. A senior Armenian official told RFE/RL that Turkey is under pressure from the United States to open its border with Armenia and might do so prior to establishing diplomatic relations. The Armenian Foreign Ministry on 30 June reaffirmed Yerevan\'s readiness \"to continue the ongoing dialogue\" with Turkey in the hope that it will eventually lead to specific steps. The Armenian and Turkish foreign ministers met in early June on the sidelines of the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council meeting in Madrid. (RFE/RL)
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The Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst is a biweekly publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program, a Joint Transatlantic Research and Policy Center affiliated with the American Foreign Policy Council, Washington DC., and the Institute for Security and Development Policy, Stockholm. For 15 years, the Analyst has brought cutting edge analysis of the region geared toward a practitioner audience.

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