Senate of France adopted the draft law on criminalizing genocide denial

YEREVAN, January 24. /ARKA/. Senate of France adopted the draft law on criminal punishment of genocides, including Armenian Genocide in Ottoman Empire.

The document envisaging punishment in prison and a fine of 45 thousand euros for the denial of genocide was adopted by the lower house of French Parliament – National Assembly on December 22.

The adopted draft law should be signed by the President of France.

Ankara painfully reacts to the accusations of the Armenian genocide – a fact which is recognized by many states. After the adoption of the draft law of lower house of French Parliament, Turkey recalled its ambassador in Paris for consultations, announced the freezing of bilateral visits at the political, military and economic levels, military cooperation with France, canceled joint military exercises and undertook a number of other military countermeasures. 

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced about the possibilities of new sanctions against France, depending on the development of the situation with the adoption of the draft law.

Moreover, the Turkish Prime Minister tried to put pressure on Paris, using the “Algerian card”. In particular, Erdogan called “genocide” the action of the French army in Algeria.

However, these attempts have been rejected by the announcements made at the highest level in Algeria and France.

First, Prime Minister of Algeria Ahmed Uyahya called Turkey to stop the attempts of political capital on putting together the topic of murders of Algerians during the colonial period, stating that “no one has the right to use the blood of Algerians in their business”.

Then, President of France Nicolas Sarkozy reminded Erdogan in his letter that Paris had recognized its mistakes made in the past. He also warned that excessive steps related to this law, would harm relations between the two countries and initiators of this process will be responsible for it.

On Monday, official representative of French Foreign Ministry Bernard Valero urged Turkey to remain calm, saying that Ankara is one of the most important partners of Paris.

According to the experts, the process initiated by French parliament members can cause a domino effect and spread to other European countries.

In particular, members of Bundestag spoke about the possibility of adopting the law related to Armenian genocide in Ottoman Empire.

Armenian Genocide of 1915 was the first genocide of 20th century. Turkey traditionally refuses the genocide of Armenians during the First World War and painfully reacts on the critic from the West. Armenian Genocide was recognized by Uruguay, Russia, France, Lithuania, Parliament of Italy and majority of United States. 

On March 4 the Committee on international issues of US Congress adopted resolution №252 about recognition of Armenian genocide which calls the President of United States to make efforts for the adoption of worthy decision about the issues related to human rights and Armenian genocide. On March 11 the fact of Armenian Genocide was recognized also by the Parliament of Sweden. —0--