The Turks Respond
The BBC confirms an earlier report: Turkey recalls ambassador to US
Ankara is recalling its ambassador to Washington for consultations amid anger at a vote in Congress labelling the mass killing of Armenians as genocide.
The passing of the resolution by a House committee on Wednesday despite appeals by the Bush administration was denounced by President Abdullah Gul.
Turkey accepts there were mass killings in 1915-17 but denies genocide.
Turkey’s foreign ministry said the ambassador would return to Turkey for a stay of “a week or 10 days”.
“We are not withdrawing our ambassador,” said ministry spokesman Levent Bilman.
“We have asked him to come to Turkey for some consultations.”
I hope Ms Pelosi is happy, but she must be aware that the Armenian community tends to vote Republican and I don’t think this attempt to curry favor is going to do much to alter that. This is the same kind of pandering that the Miami Cuban community gets through the Cuban policy.
2 comments
For 1/2 the time I lived down in the LA area (La Crescenta), the area was represented by Adam Schiff.
http://schiff.house.gov/HoR/CA29/
He represents his constituents very well, and in this case, apparently too well. In his District lay Glendale, where a good portion of the residents are Armenian. Adam has been working on this resolution for close to a decade. It came at a really lousy time.
A decade ago it wouldn’t have mattered, but things are just too nasty and the domestic political situation in Turkey is just too strained.