Don't forget that Turkey's interests are strongly tied to becoming '
acceptable' to the EU for membership - their
'head in the sand' approach and abject denial of their past actions in the Armenian trajedy continues to have a negative impact on that appearance of acceptability and remains just one of several issues which has kept Turkey
'seated in the EU's membership waiting room' longer than any other applicant.
Russia, France, and Switzerland, among others, have already labeled the actions of Turkey against the Armenians 1915-1923 as genocidal.
And then there are other issues in the matter which are associated with the waning days of the Ottoman Empire:
...some interpretations, such as that of the Prior of the Franciscan monks living in the region of where the events happened, claims this was not an act of genocide and that it was a two sided battle: "when they advanced victoriously under the protection of the Russian Army, the same spectacle occurred as in the year of 1915, but that time it was the Turks who got it in the neck. Wherever the Armenians found a Turk he was mercilessly hacked down, wherever they saw a Turkish Mosque it was plundered and set on fire. Turkish quarters went up in smoke and flames just like the Armenian quarters. You are presently about to travel round the country and you will still be able to follow in the footsteps of war: Bayburt, Erzincan, Erzurum, and Kars. You will still see smoldering heaps of rubble; you will still smell blood and corpses, but it so happens that these were Turkish corpses." [The Van Der Galiën Gazette, translation of article on Algemeen Handelsblad Armenian Atrocities Against Muslim Turks Part II November 17, 2007]
Personally, I find it sad that this is yet another issue in which there seems to be nobody on any side with the deft political astuteness to resolve it to the satisfaction of all parties involved...unless it remains in the best interests of many to not resolve it at all.
Richard's $.02
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