Germany should assess own role in Genocide: Bundestag vice speaker

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Bundestag should give a proper assessment to the German complicity in the Armenian Genocide as Germany was an ally of Turkey and did nothing to prevent the massacres, Bundestag Vice President Edelgard Bulmahn said Wednesday, May.

"Knowing history and honoring the memory of the Genocide victims is paramount," Bulmahn said at a meeting with Armenia's Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian in Yerevan, Armenia.

According to her, Germany's recognition of the Genocide will contribute to the establishment of security and peace in the region, as well as the reconciliation between the Armenian and Turkish nations.

Dwelling on the Nagorno Karabakh conflict, the parties stressed the importance of the agreements reached at a meeting of Armenian and Azerbaijani Presidents in Vienna on May 16.

Also in the limelight of the meeting were active bilateral cooperation between the parliaments of the two countries.

On June 2, the Bundestag intends to approve a resolution condemning the century-old Ottoman massacre of Armenians by describing it as genocide. The majority of foreign policy specialists from the relevant parties have given a clear signal that they will support the resolution.

The resolution is titled "Remembrance and Commemoration of the Genocide of Armenians and Other Christian Minorities 101 Years Ago." A CDU-CSU parliamentary spokeswoman said the text of the resolution is ready, having been prepared by no less than three parliamentary working groups. However, there will not be a roll-call vote on the declaration on June 2. This means that members of parliament will not be obliged to attend. The resolution will be voted on by a show of hands.

Bundestag President Norbert Lammert and German President Joachim Gauck have already used the term genocide, which provoked protests from Ankara.