TURKISH VALUES DO NOT ALLOW OUR PEOPLE TO COMMIT GENOCIDE: TURKEY'S PRIME MINISTER

arminfo
2007-11-06 17:38:00

ArmInfo. "The Turkish values do not allow our people to commit
genocide", Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Erdogan said in the National
press-club in Washington.

As the FDCH e-MEDIA reports, Turkey's PM said: "The Turkish principles
do not allow such a phenomenon as genocide". Moreover, he said,
investigation of the archive materials indicates that there is no
genocide that has taken place. "If the Armenians have documents in
their archives, they should make them available. And so should third
countries. And we should let political -- the political experts, the
archaeologists, the historians, all of the experts, so that they can,
after looking at the documents, prepare a report.

If, indeed, this allegation of so-called genocide can be proven, we
are ready to settle with accounts with our history", R. Erdogan said.

Moreover, the PM said, Turkey "aims to reach a common understanding
of this painful period in our history". "But I, still, to date,
have not received a response to my letter of 2005, to RA President
Robert Kocharyan with suggestion to establish a joint historical
commission. So I told you what my suggestions -- proposals were in
this letter, but since we have not received a response, there is
nothing I can say further on the subject", the Turkish politician
said. He added that it is his sincere wish that U.S. Congress does
not keep this resolution as a Sword of Damocles and does away with
the discussion of this resolution all together.

To recall, RA President Robert Kocharyan sent a reciprocal letter
to the Turkish PM with a counter offer to create a joint commission
at a governmental level. It was expected that among other issues,
the commission will be able to consider also the issue of creating
a commission of scientist-historians. RA president considers it
unacceptable to create a commission of scientists of the two countries,
which have no diplomatic relations.

Aram