Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday warned Germany against the adoption of a parliamentary resolution recognising the massacre of Armenians by Ottoman forces as “genocide”, saying it would harm the countries’ relationship.
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Put forward by the ruling left-right coalition and the opposition Greens, the resolution entitled “Remembrance and commemoration of the genocide of Armenians and other Christian minorities in 1915 and 1916” also carries the contested word throughout the text.
Yildirim called on the German government and parliament to show common sense over the resolution, said the sources, who were not named according to protocol. If such a game is going to be played, this will harm ties aimed at our future: “diplomatic, economic, trade, political, military – and we’re also two member nations of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation”.
He said the German parliament should “not turn a deaf ear to the voice” of around 3 million ethnic Turks living in Germany.
“This vote is a ridiculous vote”, Yıldırım told reporters on June 1, when asked about a planned vote on a resolution on the issue in Germany’s parliament scheduled for June 2.
Turkey – the successor of the Ottoman Empire – agrees that many Armenians were mistreated at the time, but maintains that the number of victims has been grossly exaggerated and that there was no “genocide”.
“We haven’t killed anybody”, one demonstrator said.
Ankara has repeatedly proposed the creation of a joint commission of historians from Turkey and Armenia that includes global experts in order to tackle the issue in a scientific manner. The timing of the vote – part of “a prolonged poker game” between Europe and Turkey – is awkward and “it’s not going to make things easier”, he said.
“It’s not fair that you can not call the genocide of the Armenians genocide just because the head of state of another country is angry about it”, Sarkisian concluded.
The prime minister added that there has never been genocide in the history of Turkey.
Germany was then allied with the Ottomans, and deployed soldiers who participated in the deportations of Armenians, Gauck had said.
On April 24, before the Bundestag hearings, Germany’s Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier announced that he supports those MPs, who are in favor of calling the mass killings of Armenians “Genocide”.
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The German resolution comes at a time when Merkel is relying on Turkey to implement a migrant deal with the European Union.
