 |
Azerbaijan slams France over genocide bill approval
Legislators in France's lower house of parliament on Thursday voted overwhelmingly in favor of a draft law outlawing denial of the 1915 events in Turkey as genocide, which the Senate will debate next year.
If passed, the bill will make it illegal to deny that the 1915 mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks was tantamount to genocide. The issue has caused outrage in Turkey, which argues killings took place on all sides during a fierce partisan conflict.
Azerbaijan also joined Turkish reaction against the bill on Friday. Azerbaijani Parliament Speaker Ogtay Asadov called the French National Assembly's decision unreasonable, ill-conceived and a weak policy.
“This step is taken not against Turkey, but firstly against France. The Armenians are poor people who cannot control themselves. They are controlled by others. I would like to believe that the French president will not approve the decision of the National Assembly,” Azerbaijan's parliament's speaker was quoted as saying by an Azerbaijani news portal.
Azerbaijani Minister of Foreign Affairs Elmar Mammadyarov also slammed the bill recalling that it was passed with the support of only 10 percent of French lawmakers as only 55 out of 577 deputies voted in favor of the bill, Mammadyarov said at a press conference on Friday.
“If French parliamentarians find it necessary to discuss the issues of a century ago, they should also discuss the problem of the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, and the tragedy in the Azerbaijani city of Khojaly,” he said.
The Azerbaijani government, parliament and people will always be close to Turkey, he added.
The deputy chairman of the Azerbaijani ruling party, New Azerbaijan Party (YAP), also criticized the bill during a parliamentary address on Friday. Ali Ahmedov described the French decision as “undue and unfair pressure on Turkey.”
“I hope the citizens of Azerbaijan will also express their anger in this regard,” he said. Recalling that France is a co-chair of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe's (OSCE) Minsk Group, which is mediating the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, he said, “Seeing as Paris is this biased and prejudiced, each Azerbaijani citizen, including me, must draw a relevant conclusion as to the objectivity and impartiality of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chair.”
“Each step against fraternal Turkey will be seen as directed against Azerbaijanis and Azerbaijan,” he added.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| BÜLENT KENEŞ |  |
||
| What befell Niyazi-i Misri in the past is happening to Fethullah Gülen now | |||
| EKREM DUMANLI |  |
||
| When a call for fairness and reason finds acceptance | |||
| ŞAHİN ALPAY |  |
||
| Uludere, test case for democracy in Turkey | |||
| EMRE USLU |  |
||
| Are the Kurds mentally divorced from Turkey? | |||
| GÖKHAN BACIK |  |
||
| Erdoğan, Gül and Davutoğlu: the inner bargain on Turkish foreign policy | |||
| MARKAR ESAYAN |  |
||
| Taking lessons from previous experiences with the military | |||
| YAVUZ BAYDAR |  |
||
| Qualm | |||
| ÖMER TAŞPINAR |  |
||
| A new phase in Syria? | |||
| İHSAN DAĞI |  |
||
| Turkish foreign policy: Time for a re-evaluation | |||
| SEYFETTİN GÜRSEL |  |
||
| Poor-friendly economic growth and the AK Party | |||
| CHARLOTTE MCPHERSON |  |
||
| Missing women, missing opportunities | |||
| BERK ÇEKTİR |  |
||
| Changes to incentives for investment in Turkey | |||
| MERVE BÜŞRA ÖZTÜRK |  |
||
| The 1960 coup: a final test for democracy | |||
| AMANDA PAUL |  |
||
| Ukraine: a lost country | |||
| MÜMTAZER TÜRKÖNE |  |
||
| The 52nd anniversary of May 27 | |||
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
