Karabakh, Armenia-Turkey relations at focus of President’s UN GA speech

PanARMENIAN.Net - Speaking at the UN General Assembly Wednesday, Sept 24 President Serzh Sargsyan hinted that official Yerevan is considering the recall of the Turkey-Armenia Protocols since Turkey continues to insist on the resolution of the Karabakh conflict in favor of Azerbaijan as a precondition for ratifying the documents, Asbarez reported.

“The year 2015 bears particular significance for Armenians all over the world. On April 24 Armenians around the globe will commemorate the most tragic page of the nation’s history – the centennial of the Armenian Genocide. I thank Uruguay, France, Russia, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, Germany, Poland, Lithuania, Greece, Slovakia, Cyprus, Lebanon, Argentina, Venezuela, Chile, Canada, and Vatican for the recognition and condemnation of the Armenian Genocide regardless of the format and language adopted. I thank the U.S.A., European Union, and all those personalities, state bodies, territorial units and organizations in numerous countries, who publicly called things by their proper names. That is indeed extremely important since denial is a phase of the crime of genocide.

For a whole century now Armenians around the globe as well as the entire progressive international community expects Turkey to demonstrate the courage and face its own history by recognizing the Armenian Genocide, thus relieving next generations of this heavy burden of the past. Alas instead, we continue to hear ambiguous and ulterior messages, in which the victim and the slaughterer are equalized, and the history is falsified,” President Sargsyan stressed.

“Armenia has never conditioned the normalization of the bilateral relations with Turkey by recognition of the Armenian Genocide. In fact, Armenia was the party that initiated such a process which culminated in the signing of the Zurich Protocols in 2009. However, those Protocols have been shelved for years now awaiting ratification in the Turkish Parliament. Ankara declares publicly that it will ratify those Protocols only if Armenians cede Nagorno Karabakh, the free Artsakh, to Azerbaijan. In Armenia and Artsakh ordinary people often just retort to such preconditions: “To hell with your ratification.” This vernacular phrase concentrates the age-old struggle of the entire nation, and it unequivocally explains to those who attempt to bargain the others’ homeland that the motherland is sacrosanct, and they had better stay away from us with their bargain. It is in these circumstances that currently the official Yerevan is seriously considering the issue of recalling the Armenian-Turkish Protocols from the parliament,” the President said.

“While discussing the Nagorno Karabakh conflict settlement I cannot but address the four UN Security Council resolutions, which were adopted during the war, that every so often are exploited by Azerbaijani authorities in order to justify their obstructive policy.

It is about those four Resolutions that demanded unconditionally as a matter of priority cessation of all military hostilities. Azerbaijan failed to comply. Azerbaijan’s own non-compliance with the fundamental demands of these Resolutions made their full implementation impossible.

The Resolutions contained calls upon the parties to cease bombardments and air strikes targeting peaceful civilian populations, to refrain from violating the principles of international humanitarian law but instead Azerbaijan continued its indiscriminate bombardments of civilian populations. Azerbaijan did not spare children, women and old men thus gravely violating all legal and moral norms of international humanitarian law.

Now Azerbaijan cynically refers to these Resolutions – refers selectively, pulling them out of context as a prerequisite for the settlement of the problem. The adequate interpretation of the UN Security Council Resolutions is not possible without correctly understanding the hierarchy of the demands set therein,” the President said.