Is agreement between Armenia and Turkey possible?

PanARMENIAN.Net - The treaties make provisions for the Armenian border, i.e. including Kars, Ardaghan, Surmalu and Trabzon. In fact Turkey violates those articles of the treaty, which set the Armenian-Turkish borders. Perhaps, this had its significant role in the fact that the most part of Western Armenia is inhabited by Kurds and Armenians. In the meantime Turkey raises the issue of recognition of the current borders by RA, which is nothing but a serious concern for national security of Armenia. It is natural that Yerevan cannot go for it. The second and perhaps the most painful precondition set by Turkey is the denial of the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Turkey in 1915-1923. Even if these two preconditions can still be somehow understood, though it's quite difficult, the third one is worthless any comments. Ankara insists on resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh problem to Azerbaijan's benefit, by the way, explaining the closing of the borders in 1993 by the Karabakh conflict. According to the RA Minister of Foreign Affairs Vartan Oskanyan, Turkey has nothing at all to do in the regulation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict; Turkey cannot have any influence on the resolution of this process. "The international practice doesn't allow interference of any interested party in the conflict resolution process," said Oskanyan.

In the international community the first condition for normalizing the relations is the opening of borders and this cannot be a precondition. This was announced in Yerevan too and the EU special representative to the South Caucasus Peter Semneby emphasized that closing the borders is nothing but anomaly. "Armenia and Turkey need to come to an agreement for the sake of the future. The EU is ready to assist them in this process, but we believe that both parties should come to a compromise. It shouldn't be forgotten that the two countries have a common future. Of course this is a long process, which should be carried out carefully, step by step. Armenia and Turkey have different viewpoints on the events of 1915 and the Karabakh problem. But Armenia speaks for healing the relations without any preconditions, while Turkey practices just the opposite viewpoint. This is where compromise should be sought," said Semneby. In his turn, the Head of the "Hay Dat" Office Giro Manoyan mentioned that Turkey's integration into the EU will definitely close all the ways for Armenia to Europe. "Turkey's integration into the EU at this moment will close all the ways for Armenia to Europe, since now Turkey creates all sorts of prohibitions for Armenia, trying to deprive our country of the membership in international organizations and the chance of joining the international negotiations," said Manoyan and added, that Turkey will only use the EU in its own interests. He also believes that the negotiations with Turkey on the EU membership have started without the approval of all the EU Member-States, which already points at political intentions of the USA and the Great Britain. "It is not excluded that Turkey will be integrated into the EU with the same political intentions, however, with its current views Ankara will not carry out any reforms," said Manoyan.

As for the issue of the Armenian Genocide, Turkey doesn't recognize it not only because of its political convictions, or the so-called "insult of Turkishness", but because of the huge financial compensation, which will immediately follow the recognition. "According to official documents the responsibility that Turkey carries for the damage it caused during 1914-1919, the years when the Genocide was committed, makes $415 milliard. In January 1919 the Paris Peace Conference completed its works, whose main aim was concluding a peace treaty and considering all aspects of war, including the compensations for the damage caused by the war. Subsequently a working group was formed, which estimated the damage done to the parties and nations, which were not the immediate participants of the war. According to the report of the working group, the sum of the damage to the Armenian nation in Western and Eastern Armenia during 1914-1919 made more than 19.130 milliard francs, or more than $41.5 milliard, since for such cases the exchange rate of franc to dollar is 1 to $2.17. Here the material damage caused in 1920-1923 is not mentioned. If this period is also taken into consideration, the above mentioned sum will definitely be enlarged with minimum 20%, believes the historian and diplomat Ara Papyan.