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Taner Akçam: On Turkey and the Armenian Genocide, the Obama Administration Needs to Sing a New Song

Food for Thought
Washington Post
A congressional committee voted Thursday to label as "genocide" the Ottoman-era slaughter of Armenians, shrugging off a last-minute warning from Obama administration officials worried about alienating Turkey, a key ally in the Middle East.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, on the eve of the hearing to express concern, administration officials said. In addition to straining U.S. relations with Turkey, the resolution could also endanger a recent rapprochement between Turkey and Armenia, State Department officials said.
But the committee voted 23 to 22 to adopt the measure. It calls on President Obama to use the annual presidential statement on the tragedy next month to "characterize the systemic and deliberate annihilation of 1,500,000 Armenians as genocide." The non-binding measure could now be taken up by the full House.
The issue is awkward for the Obama administration, which had said little publicly before the vote. As senators, Obama, Vice President Biden and Clinton had all called on the White House to condemn the killings as genocide. As president, however, Obama has not done so.
Turkey strongly denies the genocide charge. It has been a key U.S. ally, allowing use of one of its bases to move supplies to Iraq....
Reuters
A U.S. congressional panel voted on Thursday to label as "genocide" the World War One-era massacre of Armenians by Turkish forces, prompting Turkey to recall its ambassador from Washington.
The House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee voted 23-22 to approve the non-binding resolution, which calls on President Barack Obama to ensure U.S. policy formally refers to the killings as genocide.
The action cleared the way for the measure to be considered by the full House but it was unclear whether it would actually come to a vote there. The Obama administration and Turkey had pressed lawmakers to drop the matter.
The vote triggered an immediate condemnation from Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who recalled Turkey's ambassador to Washington for consultations. Erdogan said he worried the measure would harm Turkish-U.S. ties and efforts by Muslim Turkey and Christian Armenia to end a century of hostility.
The vote put Obama in a tight spot between his desire to maintain good relations with Turkey, a Muslim but secular democracy that plays a vital role for U.S. interests from Iran to Afghanistan to the Middle East.
On the one side is NATO ally Turkey, which rejects calling the events genocide. On the other side is an important U.S. Armenian-American constituency and their backers in Congress ahead of congressional elections in November....

Posted on Friday, March 5, 2010 at 12:19 PM | Comments (12) | Return