French Justice Ministry to draw up new Genocide bill text

PanARMENIAN.Net - French Ministry of Justice has been instructed to come up with a new text of the bill criminalizing the Armenian Genocide denial, considering the censorship by the Constitutional Council, Ministry representative said.

Bruno Badré noted that by President Nicolas Sarkozy’s decree, the country’s Justice Ministry will analyze the Constitutional Council’s decision to draw up the new text in accordance with constitutional and European demands.

“The terms will be defined in light of the analysis,” he said.

The French Constitutional Council ruled that a bill recently adopted by the French Senate making it a crime to deny the Armenian Genocide was anti-constitutional.

In a statement the Council said the bill adopted by parliament on January 23 represented an “unconstitutional breach of the practice of freedom of expression and communication.”

Turkey reacted furiously when the Senate approved the law. Ankara halted political and military cooperation with France and was threatening to cut off economic and cultural ties if the law took effect.