Opening Armenia-Turkey Border in International Press

TURKEY'S BABACAN TRAVELED TO ARMENIA BUT NOTHING WAS SIGNED
Tatul Hakobyan
The Wall Street Journal
Thursday April 16, 2009

Senior Azerbaijani diplomat in Yerevan for BSEC Council meeting

Yerevan - The Wall Street Journal and other influential newspapers
citing unnamed senior diplomats had reported that on April 16 Armenia
and Turkey "could" sign an agreement to establish diplomatic relations.

Turkey's Foreign Minister Ali Babacan was in fact in Yerevan today,
to participate in the meeting of the Council of Ministers of Foreign
Affairs of the Organization of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation
(BSEC), but no document was signed with Armenia.

"I can say that there is no intention to sign today any document
on Armenian-Turkish relations," said Edward Nalbandian, Armenia's
foreign minister, at a press conference following the BSEC meeting,
which he chaired. Armenian-Turkish "negotiations continue. We have
made progress and think that we can really resolve these issues in
the near future," he continued.

However, the foreign ministers of Turkey and Armenia did not even
hold a separate meeting during Mr. Babacan's visit. Instead, taking
the opportunity of being in Yerevan together, Mr. Babacan and the
foreign minister of Russia, Sergey Lavrov, held a meeting. Of the 12
BSEC member states, only Armenia, Russia, and Turkey participated in
the meeting at the foreign minister level.

Iran admitted as a partner

Among the delegations at the BSEC meeting was one from Azerbaijan,
led by Deputy Foreign Minister Mahmoud Mamedkuliyev - who is married
to President Ilham Aliyev's older sister. This was the first official
Azerbaijani delegation in Armenia in years. The six-month rotating
chairmanship of BSEC moves on May 1 from Armenia to Azerbaijan;
the ceremonial handoff took place today.

Ambassador Leonidas Chrysanthopoulos, who was confirmed as BSEC's
secretary general for a second term at this meeting, noted at the
press conference that two BSEC member states, Turkey and Azerbaijan,
have no diplomatic relations with another member state, Armenia. He
said one of the main decisions of the BSEC meeting was to grant
partner status to Iran.

"Iran is a country that was missing in the area," Mr. Chrysanthopoulos
said. "BSEC will establish cooperation with Iran in different
spheres. In particular, in agriculture, energy, and transport,"
he added.

Favoring linkage

Azerbaijan's deputy foreign minister was asked about his government's
position on Armenian-Turkish dialog. His government announces,
on the one hand, that it welcomes all steps that could lead to
the resolution of existing issues in the region. On the other hand,
Azerbaijan is opposed to the opening of the Armenian-Turkish border and
the establishment of diplomatic relations between Turkey and Armenia.

"We follow the process with interest, and our position is that the
restoration of relations between Armenia and Turkey can only be linked
to the resolution of the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan,"
Mr. Mamedkuliyev said in response, after making a ritual claim that
Azerbaijan does not interfere in the "domestic affairs" of other
countries and saying that Baku regards contacts between Armenia and
Turkey to be a matter for the two countries involved.

Mr. Mamedkuliyev said, "The development of relations between Armenia
and Turkey was in time interrupted and the main reason was the
occupation of Azerbaijani territory."

Turkey's role over Karabakh

Abdullah Gul, the Turkish president, recently announced that
Turkey is participating in negotiations with Azerbaijan and
Armenia. Mr. Nalbandian was asked about the mechanism for Turkey's
participation. He noted in response that the negotiations are being
mediated by the OSCE Minsk Group, and specifically by the U.S.,
Russian, and French co-chairs of the Minsk Group. "That is the format
of the negotiations, and no other format exists. Turkey does not
play a role as a mediator in the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict," he said.

The Azerbaijani deputy foreign minister said Baku welcomes the efforts
of any country toward the resolution of the conflict. "If there are
specific and realistic proposals, we are prepared to study them. The
continuation of the conflict gives no side an advantage; the conflict
must be resolved within the norms and principles of international
law as it exists. Turkey is a member of the Minsk Group and one of
the most important countries in the region," he said.

The president of Armenia, Serge Sargsian, received the participants
in the meeting of the BSEC Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs.

Armenian leadership

Armenia is one of the founding members of BSEC and is concluding its
six-month terms as chairman-in-office. With Armenia in the chair,
Mr. Nalbandian said, more than 50 documents and two declarations were
signed through the organization.

"Over the past six months Armenia exerted efforts to move BSEC
forward through the growing challenges of the contemporary world in
the condition of deepening financial crisis" said Mr. Nalbandian.

The head of the Azerbaijani delegation said, "regional cooperation
will be successful if there is the atmosphere of peace, stability and
security. Therefore our attempts will go to increase the activity of
our organization to care about existing conflicts in the Black Sea
area. Unfortunately, we are having some situation which is not very
supportive for full regional cooperation," he said.

BSEC was launched as a regionally owned initiative, with Turkey's
lead, in 25 June 1992 at the Istanbul Summit. The idea that stronger
economic cooperation among the Black Sea countries would enhance peace
and stability in the region was the underlying philosophy behind BSEC.

ARMENIA, TURKEY ANNOUNCE NO DEAL AFTER YEREVAN TALKS
Gaziantep Haber 27
April 17 2009
Turkey

Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan gave no indications of an
impending breakthrough in his country's relations with Armenia on
Thursday as he visited Yerevan to attend a meeting of the Black Sea
Economic Cooperation (BSEC) organization 17 Nisan 2009 Cuma 16:24

His Armenian counterpart, Eduard Nalbandian, insisted, nonetheless,
that Ankara and Yerevan may still normalize their historically strained
relations "soon."

Babacan refrained from making any public statements during the one-day
trip which ended with a meeting with President Serzh Sarkisian. A short
statement by Sarkisian's office gave no details of the talks. Babacan
also took part in a separate group meeting between Sarkisian and
participants of the BSEC session.

While in Yerevan, Babacan also met with Russia's Foreign Minister
Sergey Lavrov and Azerbaijan's Deputy Foreign Minister Mahmud
Mamedguliev.

Recent reports in Turkish and Western media said that the two
governments could use the BSEC meeting to announce agreement on a
gradual normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations. However, Turkey's
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has ruled out such possibility,
repeatedly stating this month that Ankara will not establish diplomatic
relations with Yerevan and reopen the Turkish-Armenian border before
a resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Babacan appeared to reaffirm that linkage as he spoke to CNN-Turk
television on his way to Yerevan. According to "Hurriyet Daily
News," he said the Turkish-Armenian dialogue must run parallel with
international efforts to settle the Karabakh conflict.

"Today we have no intention to sign any document regarding the
normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations," Nalbandian told
journalists after the BSEC meeting. "Negotiations continue. We have
made progress and believe that we can really be very close to solving
those issues soon."

Nalbandian also made clear that Yerevan remains opposed to direct
Turkish involvement in international efforts to settle the Karabakh
dispute. "Turkey will not play the role of a mediator in the Karabakh
peace process," he said.

The Armenian minister was speaking at a joint news conference with
Mamedguliev, whose country assumed the BSEC's rotating presidency
from Armenia at the Yerevan meeting. Mamedguliev, a rare Azerbaijani
official visiting Armenia, reaffirmed Baku's strong opposition to the
normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations before Karabakh peace. "Our
position is the following: the restoration of links between Turkey
and Armenia may only be conditional on the resolution of the conflict
between Armenia and Azerbaijan," he said.

By contrast, Lavrov welcomed the Turkish-Armenian rapprochement. "First
of all, this is the bilateral affair of Armenia and Turkey," he said
after the talks with Babacan. "We welcome all steps leading to the
normalization of relations between any countries of the region."

Ex-Ministers Downbeat On Turkish-Armenian Deal
Vartan Oskanian
17.04.2009
Emil Danielyan

Two former foreign ministers of Armenia remained pessimistic on 
Friday about the success of the ongoing Turkish-Armenian dialogue, 
urging the current authorities in Yerevan to reconsider their 
diplomatic overtures to Ankara.

A top U.S. official, meanwhile, visited Armenia in what may have been 
an attempt to salvage the faltering talks between the two neighboring 
nations. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza met with 
President Serzh Sarkisian and Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian. 
Official Armenian sources gave no details of the talks, and Bryza was 
not available for comment.

The diplomat, who is also the U.S. co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, 
arrived in Yerevan from Baku where he met Azerbaijani Foreign 
Minister Elmar Mammadyarov. Washington has been trying to neutralize 
Azerbaijan's strong resistance to the normalization of Turkish-
Armenian relations before a peaceful settlement of the Nagorno-
Karabakh conflict. U.S. President Barack Obama personally discussed 
the matter with his Azerbaijani counterpart, Ilham Aliev, in a phone 
call last week.

The vehement Azerbaijani protests led Turkish Prime Minister Recep 
Tayyip Erdogan to publicly state earlier this month that Turkey will 
not establish diplomatic relations and open its border with Armenia 
without a Karabakh settlement. Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan 
appeared to echo that linkage as he flew to Yerevan on Wednesday night.

"We don't say, 'Let's first solve one problem and solve the other 
later,'' Babacan was reported to tell Turkish journalists. `We want a 
similar process to start between Azerbaijan and Armenia. We are 
closely watching the talks between Azerbaijan and Armenia.'

Nalbandian insisted on Thursday, however, that Ankara and Yerevan 
could still hammer out a ground-breaking agreement `soon.' Two of his 
predecessors are far more pessimistic on that score, pointing to the 
statements made by Erdogan.

`I don't anticipate the signing of a Turkish-Armenian agreement in 
the near future,' one of them, Raffi Hovannisian, said. He was 
particularly worried about Erdogan's calls for the UN Security 
Council to denounce Armenia as an `occupier' and demand Karabakh's 
return under Azerbaijani rule.

Vartan Oskanian, who served as foreign minister from 1998-2008, 
likewise suggested that the Turks have no intention to cut an 
unconditional deal with Armenia and are instead trying to exploit the 
talks to keep the United States and other countries from recognizing 
the 1915 massacres of Armenians as genocide. He said they could also 
be pressing international mediators to seek more Armenian concessions 
on Karabakh in return for an open border with Turkey.

`When you make a Turkish-Armenian dialogue public, the Turks always 
take advantage of that because they face the genocide issue, the 
issue of European Union membership and the issue of friendship with 
Azerbaijan,' Oskanian told a news conference. `So publicity here, if 
we let it last for long, is not to our benefit. With every day 
passing without border opening or normalization of Turkish-Armenian 
relations, Turkey finds itself in a more beneficial position than 
Armenia.

`The moment that the border is opened, we too will start to draw 
dividends. The question is when that will happen.'

`The Armenian side should set a clear deadline for the Turks -- if we 
sign an agreement and the border is opened on a particular day, it 
will be fine; if not, let us interrupt the negotiations from that 
day. Something has to be done,' added Oskanian.

Oskanian also seemed puzzled by President Sarkisian's assurances that 
Armenia will `emerge stronger' from the U.S.-backed talks even if 
they end in failure. `I hope that there is something that the 
president knows but we don't know,' he said.

The former minister, who founded last year a private think-tank, the 
Civilitas Foundation, spoke to journalists before an official 
presentation of a newly published book containing speeches delivered 
by him throughout his decade-long tenure. Among those attending the 
event was Kaan Soyak, the Turkish co-chairman of the Turkish-Armenian 
Business Council (TABC) that has long been lobbying for improved 
relations and unfettered commerce between the two neighbors.

Soyak asserted that Erdogan's remarks were `a little misunderstood' 
in Armenia and did not wreck the Turkish-Armenian rapprochement. 
`What the prime minister wanted to say is that the normalization of 
relations between Armenia and Turkey is very important and within the 
context of this normalization Turkish diplomats and Turkish foreign 
policy advisers will be more active in the Caucasus for the 
settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan,' he told RFE/RL.

`He never set a precondition,' said Soyak. `He believes that all the 
solutions must be in one package, which includes Azerbaijan and 
Armenia, but not necessarily the Nagorno-Karabakh area.'

TURKISH-ARMENIAN DIALOGUE ON THE VERGE OF COLLAPSE
By: Emil Danielyan
Jamestown Foundation
April 14 2009

The nearly year-long negotiations between Armenia and Turkey look set
to prove fruitless after Ankara has revived its long-standing linkage
between the normalization of bilateral ties and a resolution of the
Karabakh conflict. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has
repeatedly made clear this month that his government will not establish
diplomatic relations with Yerevan and re-open the Turkish-Armenian
border without Azerbaijan's consent. In Armenia and especially
amongst its worldwide diaspora, meanwhile, there are growing calls
for President Serzh Sarkisian to abandon the Western-backed talks.

The success of those talks seemed a foregone conclusion in the weeks
leading up to President Barack Obama's visit on April 6-7. According
to reports in both the Turkish and Western media, Armenia and Turkey
have finalized an agreement on gradually normalizing their strained
relations and setting up inter-governmental commissions dealing with
various issues of mutual interest. Some of those reports quoted unnamed
Turkish officials as saying that the agreement could be signed during
or shortly after Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian's trip
to Istanbul on April 6. The resulting outcry in Azerbaijan (EDM,
April 10) suggested that Ankara and Yerevan were indeed very close
to cutting a far-reaching deal.

Erdogan called into question the possibility of such a deal when
he told a news conference in London on April 3 that Turkey cannot
reach a "healthy solution concerning Armenia" as long as the Karabakh
dispute remains unresolved (Today's Zaman, April 4). He reaffirmed
the linkage on April 8, two days after Obama stated in Ankara that
the Turkish-Armenian negotiations were "moving forward and could
bear fruit very quickly, very soon." The Turkish premier went as
far as demanding that the U.N. Security Council denounce Armenia
as an "occupier" and called for Karabakh's return under Azeri rule
(Hurriyet Daily News, April 9).

Any doubts about the practical implications of these statements
were dispelled by Erdogan during his holiday in southern Turkey on
April 10: "We will not sign a final deal with Armenia unless there
is agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia on Karabakh," he told
journalists (Anatolia news agency, April 10). In an interview with
the Azerbaijani newspaper Zerkalo published the following day, the
deputy chairman of Erdogan's Justice and Development Party, Haluk
Ipek, said the Turkish-Armenian border will remain closed for at
least ten more years. Ipek dismissed speculation over its impending
re-opening as "dishonest" Armenian propaganda aimed at driving a
wedge between the two Turkic nations. Turkey's more dovish President
Abdullah Gul likewise underscored the importance of Karabakh's peace
when he commented on Turkish-Armenian reconciliation in an interview
with The Financial Times on April 8.

That the Turkish-Armenian dialogue is reaching an impasse was
effectively acknowledged by Sarkisian at an April 10 news conference:
"Is it possible that we were mistaken in our calculations and
that the Turks will now adopt a different position and try to set
preconditions? Of course it is possible," he said (Armenian Public
Television, April 10). The Armenian leader insisted that Karabakh
has not been on the agenda of that dialogue. Indeed, Ankara was
clearly ready to stop linking Turkish-Armenian relations with a
Karabakh settlement acceptable to Baku when it embarked on a dramatic
rapprochement with Yerevan last summer. The two countries' foreign
ministers would have hardly held numerous face-to-face meetings since
if it was not.

For his part, Sarkisian signaled his acceptance, in principle,
of a Turkish proposal to form a joint commission of historians
tasked with examining the 1915-1918 mass killings of Armenians in
the Ottoman Empire. One of the Turkish-Armenian commissions which the
governments reportedly agreed to form would conduct such a study. The
idea was floated by Erdogan in 2005 and rejected by then Armenian
President Robert Kocharian as a Turkish ploy designed to scuttle
greater international recognition of what many historians consider
the first genocide of the twentieth century. Turkish leaders have made
no secret of using the fence-mending negotiations with the Sarkisian
administration to discourage Obama from making good on his election
campaign promise to describe the slaughter of more than one million
Ottoman Armenians as genocide.

The almost certain collapse of the talks has left Armenian politicians
and pundits questioning the wisdom of further Armenian overtures to the
Turks. "If Turkey suddenly succumbs to Azerbaijan's threats and these
negotiations yield no results soon, then I think the Armenian side
will not carry on with them," said Giro Manoyan, a senior member of the
Armenian Revolutionary Federation, a nationalist party represented in
Sarkisian's coalition government (Hayots Ashkhar, April 10). Former
Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian likewise advocated, in an April
7 interview with RFE/RL, Yerevan's pullout from the reconciliation
process if the sixteen year Turkish blockade of Armenia is not lifted.

Such views are indicative of the dominant mood in the Armenian
diaspora and, in particular, the influential Armenian community
within the United States. Harut Sassounian, a prominent community
activist and commentator, criticized Armenia's policy on Turkey,
effectively blaming it for Obama's failure to publicly use the word
"genocide" during his visit to Turkey. "In view of these developments,
it is imperative that the Armenian government terminates at once all
negotiations with the Turkish leaders in order to limit the damage
caused by the continued exploitation of the illusion of productive
negotiations," Sassounian wrote in an April 9 editorial by his Los
Angeles-based newspaper California Courier.

Sarkisian insisted on April 10 that the dialogue with Turkey can
be deemed beneficial for the Armenian side even if it produces no
tangible results. He said Armenia will "emerge from this process
stronger" in any case because the international community will have no
doubts that "we are really ready to establish relations [with Turkey]
without preconditions."

EU URGES TURKEY TO REOPEN ARMENIA BORDER
By Selcuk Gokoluk
Washington Post
April 15 2009

ANKARA (Reuters) - A top European Union official urged EU aspirant
Turkey to reopen its border with Armenia, piling pressure on Ankara
to normalize ties with Yerevan after U.S. President Barack Obama made
a similar call last week.

Turkey and Armenia last year launched high-level talks on establishing
diplomatic ties after a century of hostility.

The stand-off between Turkey and Armenia has destabilized the
energy-rich Caucasus region, isolated impoverished Armenia and
obstructed Turkey's efforts to join the EU.

Peter Semneby, the EU's special envoy for the South Caucasus, said
normalizing Turkish-Armenian ties would benefit the region and would
help Turkey's hopes of joining the bloc.

"Fundamentally this would be a development that I think could lead to
further positive developments that would in return benefit us, benefit
the region and would therefore benefit Turkey and the European Union,"
Semneby told a panel interview including Reuters late on Tuesday.

"It (opening the border) will certainly not hurt Turkey's EU
perspectives," he said.

Turkey closed its border with Armenia in 1993 to lend support to its
traditional Muslim ally Azerbaijan. Armenia and Turkey trace their own
dispute to 90-year-old claims that Ottoman Turks committed genocide
against Armenia in World War I.

Semneby said the EU is not putting pressure on Turkey to recognize
the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in 1915 as genocide,
a claim which Ankara strongly denies.

"I can only talk on the behalf of the European Union, and there is
absolutely no such pressure, absolutely not. This is not an issue of
ours. We are not involved on that issue."

Obama, in a visit to NATO ally Turkey earlier this month, also pressed
Ankara and Yerevan to complete talks soon.

But Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has said the deadlock over
the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, over which Armenia and Azerbaijan
fought a war in the late 1980s and early 1990s, must be resolved
before Turkey and Armenia strike a deal.

Azerbaijan, which sells gas and oil to Turkey, opposes its ally
opening the border because such a deal could take away the incentive
for Armenia to negotiate over Nagorno-Karabakh.

Armenia has controlled Nagorno-Karabakh, which lies wholly within
Azerbaijan, since a war that broke out in the last days of the Soviet
Union. A ceasefire in Nagorno-Karabakh, brokered by Russia, has held
since 1994.


OPENING BORDER BETWEEN TURKEY, ARMENIA MEANS

RECOGNIZING OCCUPATION: BAYKAL
Xinhua General News Service
April 13, 2009 Monday
China

Turkey's main opposition Republican People's Party Leader Deniz
Baykal warned the government against making a very serious mistake
on the issue of re-opening the border with Armenia, local Daily News
reported on Monday.

As tensions mount between Turkey and Azerbaijan, Baykal told reporters
before his party's meeting Saturday, "If the border is opened, the
occupation (of Upper Karabakh) will have been safeguarded."

The Upper Karabakh dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia has been
going on for a long time. Both Azerbaijani leaders and public opinion
have expressed serious concerns over the possibility of the border
between Turkey and Armenia being re-opened.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev refused to attend the Alliance of
Civilizations summit in Istanbul earlier this month, a move that was
seen as a protest against the pending border move.

"Turkey closed its border with Armenia in protest of the occupation
of Azerbaijan," said Baykal, adding, "this has nothing to do with
historical conflict. The issue on the opening of the border can only
be considered with the occupation of Azerbaijan."

Turkey closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in support of Azerbaijan
during its conflict with Armenia over the Upper Karabakh region.

On Tuesday, Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan confirmed in Istanbul
that his country has held talks with Armenia for months to normalize
ties.

"We are working on a comprehensive solution and our talks are going
well. We have made significant progress so far and both parties have
declared satisfaction over the process several times, " said Babacan.

U.S. President Barack Obama said during his visit in Ankara last
Monday that he was encouraged by the dialogues between Turkey and
Armenia aimed to improve ties.

He said that as Turkey and Armenia are having "serious negotiations"
that could bear fruit quickly, "I will be as encouraging as possible,"
adding the world should also encourage them.

Armenians claim that more than 1.5 million Armenians were killed in
a systematic genocide in the hands of the Ottomans during World War
I before modern Turkey was born in 1923.

But Turkey insists the Armenians were victims of widespread chaos
and governmental breakdown as the 600-year-old empire collapsed in
the years before 1923.
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