Armenian, Assyrian and Hellenic Genocide News

Ambassador to Turkey Cautions U.S.
by Shannon McCaffrey
Posted: Sunday, October 01, 2000 09:18 pm CST

WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. ambassador to Turkey cautioned members of Congress
Thursday that a resolution labeling the killing of Armenians in Turkey as genocide could cause significant harm to relations with a key military ally.

Turkey is a NATO member and the United States uses the Incirlik air base in southern Turkey to patrol the no-fly zone in northern Iraq. There is concern that adoption of the resolution could endanger American use of the base.

``There will be a strong Turkish reaction,'' Ambassador Robert Pearson told the House International Relations Committee. ``This is designed to make Turkish-American relations and the issues we are trying to deal with more difficult.''

The committee delayed a vote until next week.

The nonbinding resolution would place the U.S. government on record as confirming that 1.5 million Armenians were killed or displaced between 1915 and 1923 at the hands of the Ottoman Empire government.

Armenians maintain their people were slaughtered as part of an Ottoman campaign to force Armenians out of eastern Turkey. The Turks deny they ever engaged in genocide. They acknowledge some 300,000 Armenians were killed, but
say the deaths occurred as the Ottoman Empire tried to quell civil unrest. The Ottoman Empire became Turkey in 1923.

``Silence in the face of genocide, as we have learned, can only embolden those who would again seek the systematic destruction of an entire people,'' said Rep. George Radanovich, R-Calif., the resolution's prime sponsor.

In Turkey, Foreign Minister Ismail Cem described the committee hearing as a ``tasteless development.'' ``Turkey is a strong country, a strong society and
we will do anything we can do to make sure that a wrong decision will not be taken in a foreign parliament,'' he said.

U.S. defense contractors, which either have deals or are negotiating deals with Turkey, have been lobbying heavily against the resolution.

The Turkish government has hired a stable of high-powered lobbyists. Former Reps. Bob Livingston, R-La., Gerald Solomon, R-N.Y., and Steven Solarz, D-N.Y., are being paid $1.8 million to make the Turkish case on Capitol Hill.

Armenian groups have hired former Rep. Susan Molinari, R-N.Y., to lobby for them.

Some members of the committee expressed reservations about angering the Turkish government for actions that occurred long ago by a government no longer in power. Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., the only Holocaust survivor in Congress, said consequences of deliberately insulting a NATO ally could be devastating.

He proposed a more sweeping resolution that would recognize human rights crimes of the 20th century. It would include the killings of Armenians but would not single out Turkey as the perpetrator.

That was rejected by the committee chairman, Rep. Benjamin Gilman, R-N.Y.,

Other lawmakers said Congress has a moral obligation to do something.

``There is genocide denial in Turkey. That is what this is all about,'' said Rep. Edward Royce, R-Calif.

The resolution is H.Res. 596.

On the Net:

https://www.armenian-genocide.org

https://www.turkey.org/intro.html

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