Turkish President Denounces Armenian Genocide Resolution

http://www.voanews.com/english/2007-10-11-voa4.cfm

By VOA News
11 October 2007

Turkish President Abdullah Gul is denouncing a resolution passed by a U.S. congressional panel declaring the early 20th century massacre of Armenians under the Turkish Ottoman Empire a genocide.

The House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee passed the measure Wednesday by a vote of 27 to 21. It now goes to the 435-member House for a full vote.

Mr. Gul says the bill is unacceptable, and has no validity among the Turkish people. He says House members who voted in favor of it ignored what he calls common sense in favor of petty politics.

But Armenian-American groups rejoiced over what they say is a long-overdue U.S. acknowledgment of the 20th century's first genocide.

Before the vote, President Bush warned that the bill's passage would greatly harm U.S. ties to Turkey, a NATO member and major transit point for supplies and U.S. troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The State Department says it recognizes what it calls the immense suffering of the Armenian people caused by mass murder and forced deportations at the end of the Ottoman Empire. But the spokesman said the bill does not lead to a full and fair accounting of the atrocities.

Armenia accuses the Ottoman Turks of killing 1.5 million Armenians from 1915 to 1923 to drive them out of eastern Turkey. The Armenians supported the invading Russians who were fighting the Ottoman Empire in World War I. Turkey strongly rejects the genocide charge. It calls the death toll exaggerated, and says a large number of people died in civil unrest during the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.