Wizdom
12-03-10, 11:39
Gul slams Sweden over Armenian 'genocide' publicity
Fri, 12 Mar 2010 08:15:52 GMT
Turkish President Abdullah Gul
Turkish President Abdullah Gul has criticized Stockholm over a Swedish parliament resolution that branded the World War I killing of Armenians during the Ottoman Empire as 'genocide.'
"The resolution on Armenian allegations which was approved by the Swedish Parliament does not have any credibility. Those who made this decision and voted in favor of the resolution were not historians," Gul said on Thursday.
Sweden's parliament narrowly approved a resolution Thursday, claiming that the 1915 killing of Armenians in Turkey amounted to genocide. The resolution was passed by a very narrow margin, with 131 parliamentarians voting in favor and 130 against, with 88 abstaining in the 349-seat assembly.
Despite Armenian claims that the killing of over a million Armenians between 1915 and 1923 were the result of an orchestrated campaign by Ottoman Turks, Turkish officials strongly reject the idea and the genocide label. They insist far fewer Armenians died and that they were killed in a civil war in which Turks also died.
Ankara points to historical evidence, ignored by Armenian lobbyists and their Western supporters, that puts the figure of Armenian victims at 300,000 and also makes clear that nearly as many Ottoman Turks were killed in the civil unrest that led to the downfall of the Ottoman Empire.
US observers have also pointed to the close association of the influential Armenian lobby in the US with the powerful Israeli lobby in pushing through the symbolic resolution as a general publicity campaign against the Muslim state of Turkey, which has become one of the leading critics of violent Israeli policies against the Palestinians.
Ankara and Yerevan signed an agreement last October to normalize relations, but their parliaments have yet to ratify them to end a century of hostility.
Fri, 12 Mar 2010 08:15:52 GMT
Turkish President Abdullah Gul
Turkish President Abdullah Gul has criticized Stockholm over a Swedish parliament resolution that branded the World War I killing of Armenians during the Ottoman Empire as 'genocide.'
"The resolution on Armenian allegations which was approved by the Swedish Parliament does not have any credibility. Those who made this decision and voted in favor of the resolution were not historians," Gul said on Thursday.
Sweden's parliament narrowly approved a resolution Thursday, claiming that the 1915 killing of Armenians in Turkey amounted to genocide. The resolution was passed by a very narrow margin, with 131 parliamentarians voting in favor and 130 against, with 88 abstaining in the 349-seat assembly.
Despite Armenian claims that the killing of over a million Armenians between 1915 and 1923 were the result of an orchestrated campaign by Ottoman Turks, Turkish officials strongly reject the idea and the genocide label. They insist far fewer Armenians died and that they were killed in a civil war in which Turks also died.
Ankara points to historical evidence, ignored by Armenian lobbyists and their Western supporters, that puts the figure of Armenian victims at 300,000 and also makes clear that nearly as many Ottoman Turks were killed in the civil unrest that led to the downfall of the Ottoman Empire.
US observers have also pointed to the close association of the influential Armenian lobby in the US with the powerful Israeli lobby in pushing through the symbolic resolution as a general publicity campaign against the Muslim state of Turkey, which has become one of the leading critics of violent Israeli policies against the Palestinians.
Ankara and Yerevan signed an agreement last October to normalize relations, but their parliaments have yet to ratify them to end a century of hostility.