Armenia's president has ruled out any preconditions for reestablishing ties with Turkey, the Armenian presidential press service said on Saturday. Armenia and Turkey reached an agreement early in September to start "political consultations" on reestablishing diplomatic relations and reopening borders. The negotiations were mediated by Switzerland. The two countries agreed to a "roadmap" to normalize their relations under Swiss mediation this April.
"Those protocols are just the first step towards the resumption of Armenian-Turkish ties... Their purpose is to pave the way for a complicated yet necessary process of reestablishing ties, doing so with dignity as civilized 21st century countries should," Serzh Sargsyan said at a meeting in Paris with representatives of the Armenian community in Europe late on Friday.
Some members of the Armenian community abroad have been opposing the signing of bilateral protocols. The Armenian community abroad, especially in the United States, Russia and France, is a very powerful force influencing the making of national decisions in Armenia.
Sargsyan assured his compatriots abroad that Armenia would not take a step that would run counter to all-Armenian interests.
"Our strategic and long-range goals are the same, and the resumption of Armenian-Turkish ties does not close the doors along that path, but opens up new opportunities," the Armenian president said.
Turkey closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in a show of support for Muslim ally Azerbaijan, following a bloody conflict over Nagorny Karabakh between the two ex-Soviet republics. Ankara has also demanded that Yerevan drop its campaign to have the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in 1915 internationally recognized as genocide.
Sargsyan said with confidence that the reestablishment of ties of Turkey did not mean doubting the act of genocide against Armenians.
"The genocide against Armenians does not need to be proved, and Turkish authorities will sooner or later be forced to take into account the committed crime and pain of the descendants of 1.5 million of victims," Sargsyan said.
The Armenian president is expected to travel to Turkey on October 14 to attend a return football match. Last September, Turkish President Abdullah Gul came to Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, to watch a football match between the two countries in their qualifying group for the 2010 World Cup.
