Hay Dat: Turkey keeps demanding for apologies

August 1, 2011 - 18:05 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - The director of the ARF bureau's Hay Dat and political affairs office Kiro Manoyan characterized Armenia’s normalization policy with Turkey as incorrect.

As he told a news conference, Yerevan must withdraw its signature under Armenia-Turkey Protocols, as Ankara closely links the rapprochement with Karabakh settlement. “Turkey is clearly benefiting from a delay in signatures' withdrawal,” Mr. Manoyan added.

Commenting on the statement of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayipp Erdogan, demanding Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan to offer apologies, Mr. Manoyan characterized it as “unexpected”, noting that Turkey periodically demands apologies from other countries. He cited Erdogan's demand for Israel to apologize for Freedom Flotilla incident as an example.

As Manoyan noted, Armenian side gave positive assessment to presidential statement, while Diaspora is perplexed over the “demands” of Turkish side.

Turkish side was critical of Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan’s reply to the question of Armenian school student, who asked if the return Western Armenia, along with Ararat is possible in future.

As the President replied, “it depends on you and your generation. I believe, my generation has fulfilled the task in front of us; when it was necessary in the beginning of the 90-s to defend part of our fatherland – Karabakh – from the enemy, we did it. I am not telling this to embarrass anyone: my point is that each generation has its responsibilities and they have to be carried out, with honor. If you, boys and girls of your generation spare no effort, if those older and younger than you act the same way, we will have one of the best countries in the world. Trust me, in many cases the country’s standing is not conditioned by its territory: the country should be modern, it should be secure and prosperous, and these are conditions which allow any nation to sit next to the respectable, powerful and reputed nations of the world. We simply must fulfil our duty, must be active, industrious, must be able to create bounty. And we can do that, we very easily can do that, and we have done it more than once in our history. I am certain about it, and I want you to be certain too. We are a nation that always rises from the ashes like phoenix – again and again.”