EU should put pressure on Turkey to open the border with Armenia with no preconditions – Armenian MP
18.03.2015,
10:52
The European Union should, as part of its border control elimination policy, put pressure on Turkey to open its border with Armenia without preconditions, member of the Armenian delegation in Euronest Parliamentary Assembly Artsvik Minasyan said at the Euronest plenary session in Yerevan on Tuesday, Novosti-Armenia reported.
YEREVAN, March 18. /ARKA/. The European Union should, as part of its border control elimination policy, put pressure on Turkey to open its border with Armenia without preconditions, member of the Armenian delegation in Euronest Parliamentary Assembly Artsvik Minasyan said at the Euronest plenary session in Yerevan on Tuesday, Novosti-Armenia reported.
For about 25 years now Turkey and Azerbaijan have been pursuing a closed border policy toward Armenia, which leaves the country with only way to Europe – via Georgia, Minasyan said.
In this respect, it is important for Armenia that the EU makes efforts and puts pressure on Turkey to open the border without preconditions so that the country is able to increase its trade and integrate with Europe more closely, the member of the parliament said.
There are currently no diplomatic relations established between Turkey and Armenia: official Ankara closed the border in 1993. The uneasy relationship between the countries is caused particularly by Ankara’s support to Azerbaijan on Karabakh problem and Turkey’s overreaction to international recognition of the 1915 Armenian genocide in Ottoman Empire.
Some reconciliation in the relations started in autumn 2008 initiated by Armenia’s president Serzh Sargsyan. Foreign ministers of Armenia and Turkey signed protocols about establishing diplomatic relations in Zurich on October 10 2009 to be ratified by the parliaments.
On April 22 2010 Armenia’s president Sargsyan suspended the ratification process saying the political majority in the National Assembly considered statements from the Turkish side unacceptable, “specifically those by Prime Minister Erdogan, who has again made the ratification of the Armenia-Turkey protocols by the Turkish parliament directly dependent on a resolution over Nagorno-Karabakh.”
In a statement issued on February 16, president Sargsyan said he had asked parliament speaker Galust Sahakian to return the protocol to him since "the Turkish government has no political will, distorts the spirit and letter of the protocols, and continues its policy of setting preconditions." --0--
