BRUSSELS (ArmRadio)–The Europe-Armenia Advisory Council has issued an open letter, published in the European press, calling on key European officials and institutions to be more involved in the rapprochement process between Armenia and Turkey.
The letter “calls upon all EU Institutions to intervene” to intervene in the process to ensure a speedy normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey is agreed on without preconditions.
It is directed at the President of the European Parliament Jerzy Buzek, The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs, Baroness Ashton, The Chair of the EP’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Gabriele Albertini, The EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus, Peter Semneby, and the Chair of the EP’s South Caucasus Delegation, Milan Cabrnoch, the Europe-Armenia Advisory Council:
Below is the open letter:
The Europe-Armenia Advisory Council:
1. Calls upon all EU Institutions to intervene with all possible instruments, including a high-level visit to the region, in order to urge both sides to ratify the protocols without preconditions and within a reasonable timeframe, which should not exceed two months;
2. Encourages all regional actors to contribute constructively to the ongoing process and especially invites Azerbaijan to join these efforts;
3. Notes the statement of the US State Department welcoming the Armenian Constitutional Court’s ruling on the Armenia-Turkey protocols and calls upon all relevant European institutions to issue a similar statement, underlining that this court ruling freed the way for the protocols’ ratification in Armenia and must not be misused by any party as a pretext to derail the ratification process;
4. Calls upon the Armenian government and the Armenian Diaspora around the world to resist the Turkish government’s new attempt to link the ratification of the protocols to the international recognition of the Armenian genocide;
5. Reminds all parties involved not to turn to populism during the historic process of re-establishing ties between Turkey and Armenia.”
I liked “regional actors”.
Ship of Fools: Turkey and the European Union
If history is any guide, the Turkish-Armenian Protocols’ fate is already determined. Excerpt from David Boyajian’s article: Ship of Fools: Turkey and the European Union
“Serious reforms were first attempted during Ottoman Turkey’s Tanzimat (Reorganization) period of 1839 to 1876. Pushed by Europe, Turkey declared measures, quickly proven ineffective, to safeguard the rights of its Armenian subjects.
A Turkish constitution was then declared in 1876 but suspended, along with parliament, just two years later. Article 61 of the Treaty of Berlin, signed in 1878 by the European powers, Turkey, and Russia, guaranteed the safety of Ottoman Armenians but was dead before the ink dried. Turkish “reforms” reached new levels in the 1890s with massacres of hundreds of thousands of Armenians.
In 1908 came the “reformist” Young Turk party. Inspired by European ideals, it pledged liberty, equality, and fraternity. The outcome was the massacres of Cilician Armenians in 1909, and “Reform” culminated in the cataclysm of 1915.
Turkey’s next European-inspired “reformer” was Kemal Ataturk, who all but finished off the country’s remaining Armenian, Greek, and Assyrian Christians, not to mention thousands of Muslim Kurds. He seized historical western Armenia, which Europe had promised to Armenians, and attacked the just-reborn Armenian Republic while Europe looked on.
Ataturk’s “reformist” legacy endures to this day: Genocide denial, the blockade of Armenia, and 80 years of military coups, human rights abuses galore, and even massacres, all tolerated by Europe. Today comes yet another collection of Turks pledging European-approved “reform.” This too will end in disaster if history is any guide. Given Europe’s wretched record regarding Armenians, there is little evidence that the EU will ever restrain Turkey against Armenia.”