PARIS (AFP)–France’s upper house of parliament–the Senate–Tuesday decided that it will not debate a bill recognizing Turkey’s genocide of the Armenian people in 1915.
The bill–already passed by the lower house the National Assembly–which has a left-wing majority–had become a basis of serious threats from Ankara in the event it became law. But the Senate’s agenda committee–dominated by the right–ruled that parliament was not authorized to debate a motion passing judgment on a period of history. "Neither the president of the republic nor the government can favor this bill which risks undermining the process of reconciliation in the states of the southern Caucasus," said a statement from the Senate.
More than 1.5 million Armenia’s were killed in the period between 1915 and 1923–and hundreds of thousands more uprooted from their historic homelands of 3000 years