Only one in four Turks supports opening border with Armenia

PanARMENIAN.Net - Only one in four Turks supports a quick and unconditional opening of Turkey’s border with Armenia, according to a new opinion poll released on January 5, 2011.

The nationwide poll conducted by the Ankara-based MetroPOLL Strategic and Social Research Center and published by Today’s Zaman daily gauged Turkish public opinion on a wide range of domestic and foreign policy issues, including Turkish-Armenian relations.

When asked whether the land border between the two neighboring countries, which Turkey closed in 1993, should be reopened, 50.3 percent of respondents said “no.” More than 27 percent said “yes,” while the remaining 22 percent had no answer.

These findings of the survey are in tune with the apparent public sentiment in Armenia. An opinion poll conducted there by the non-governmental Armenian Marketing Association (AMA) about a year ago found that only one-third of Armenians want to have an open border with Turkey, while those who are firmly or mostly against make up just over 30 percent of the country’s population.

According to the AMA Most of those polled did not share Western governments’ and lending institutions’ belief that border opening would have a quick and highly positive impact on the Armenian economy, Asbarez.com reported.