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April 25, 2014, Friday/ 17:59:25/ LAMİYA ADİLGIZI/ BAKU
Azerbaijanis are highly concerned and disappointed with condolences Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan delivered to Armenians on behalf of Turks for the 1915 mass killing of Armenians during World War I, and they consider Erdoğan's statement a second challenge to the Turkish-Azerbaijani kinship under his 11-year-rule, after the Zurich protocols.
Turkey for the first time set an unexpected precedent on Wednesday when Erdoğan's government offered condolences to the grandchildren of Armenians who were killed in 1915, an act that most Armenians believe was perpetrated by Ottoman soldiers in World War I.
The contents of the prime minister's statement, released in nine languages -- including Armenian -- a day before the 99th anniversary of the 1915 killings, which the Armenians refer to as genocide, was something Turkey had never before seen. The highly debated killings of 1915 were, for the first time, named by Erdoğan as events that produced “inhumane consequences" -- the most conciliatory wording both Turks and the Western community have ever heard used by the Turkish leadership in reference to the killings.
Erdoğan's statement had repercussions all over the world, drawing a positive reaction from Washington -- although Azerbaijanis and the nation of Armenia were not satisfied, for different reasons.
US State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki said at a press briefing on Wednesday that the US welcomes Erdoğan's historic public acknowledgment of the suffering that Armenians experienced in 1915. The website of Armenian President Serzh Sarksyan posted remarks that same day calling Erdoğan's statement an “utter denial” of what Armenians believe was a genocide committed by the Ottomans 99 years ago.
"The Armenian genocide … is alive as far as the successor of the Ottoman Turkey continues its policy of utter denial," Sarksyan said, according to an English translation on the site.
The Armenian diaspora in the US also did not show much approval for Erdoğan's remarks, with US-based Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) Executive Director Aram Hamparian calling them “cold-hearted and cynical” and an act of avoiding “responsibility for the Armenian genocide.”
Marking the 99th anniversary of the 1915 killings, Armenians in Yerevan burned the Turkish flag in the capital's Liberty Square late Wednesday.
But with Azerbaijani territories still under occupation and the painful past of the Nagorno-Karabakh war, which Azerbaijanis associate with the Armenians, still a part of public consciousness, the head of the Caucasian Center for International Relations and Strategic Studies, Araz Aslanlı, said in an interview with Today's Zaman that a majority of Azerbaijanis emotionally and unilaterally do not accept Erdoğan's remarks on the 1915 killings.
“Any step taken by Turkey in favor of Armenia reminds Azerbaijanis of the Zurich protocols and, if the situation continues, the sensitivity of Azerbaijanis might extensively rise,” Aslanlı said. “Any tiny step in Turkish-Armenian ties might cause serious problems in Turkish-Azerbaijani relations.”
When asked if Turkey would open its border with Armenia in order to establish diplomatic relations, Erdoğan stressed that without a solution on some issues, such as Nagorno-Karabakh, Turkey would not approve moves to open the border.
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu echoed Erdoğan and said the prime minister's statement is a message to Armenians that Turks are attempting to acknowledge their pain.
A young Azerbaijani called out to Erdoğan from central Baku, urging the prime minister to stop driving a wedge between Turks and Azerbaijanis with what he called “nonsense."
“It does not make any sense. Erdoğan's condolences are unconditional recognition of the Armenian genocide. It does not suit the Turks, when we have a wound such as Nagorno-Karabakh,” 28-year-old Veli, who declined to provide his last name, said to Today's Zaman.
Another young Azerbaijani man, Elçin Hesenli, said he does not believe the Turkish prime minister is concerned with Azerbaijanis and the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict at all. He is “only interested in Azerbaijan's natural resources [oil and gas],” Hesenli said.
Turkey is an energy dependent country that meets 92 percent of its oil and 98 percent of its natural gas demand through imports. In collaborating with Azerbaijan, an energy rich country in the region, Turkey has been working to diversify its energy supply routes and source countries.
Semed Hüseynov, 29, says Erdoğan's condolences to Armenians were calculated to gain him votes in the August presidential election.
A middle-aged Azerbaijani who did not want to be named sees things from a different perspective; he labels Erdoğan's condolences as a serious message to Azerbaijan, saying they are a result of a disagreement that emerged with the Azerbaijani leadership after the Turkish prime minister paid a visit to Baku to mark his Justice and Development Party's (AK Party) decisive victory in the municipal elections on March 30.
As of yet, no reaction has come from the Azerbaijani government.
The 1915 killings are one of the most debated issues that strain political ties between Turkey and Armenia. Armenia considers the death of more than 1 million Armenians during World War I to be genocide, while Turkey dismisses this claim, saying that there was an ongoing war at the time and that many Muslims and members of other ethnicities, along with the Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire, also died in battles and clashes. This controversy has been one of the main hindrances in preventing diplomatic ties between Turks and Armenians from being normalized.
Turkey and Armenia were supposed to open their borders and establish a commission to study the 1915 event academically based on the Zurich protocols, signed in October 2009 to normalize ties between the two nations.
The move was not successful as the Turks said that before it would open its borders Armenia must stop its conflict with Azerbaijan, Turkey's staunch ally in the region, over Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijani territory occupied by Armenia in the early 1990s.
Turkey sealed off its border with Armenia in 1993 in solidarity with Azerbaijan after Armenian troops occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijani territories, including Nagorno-Karabakh, which is a predominantly Armenian populated enclave in Azerbaijan, and seven other adjacent territories.
Today's Zaman, your gateway to Turkish daily news
