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Erdogan alone is guilty for failure of Armenian-Turkish protocols – historian Baskin Oran

Armenpress 12:29, 20 February, 2018

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 20, ARMENPRESS. Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan’s speech at the Munich Security Conference on the absence of political will within the Turkish leadership to normalize the relations with Armenia is still under the spotlight of Turkish intellectuals.

In an interview to ARMENPRESS, famous Turkish historian, professor Baskin Oran said the only guilty one for the failure of the Armenian-Turkish protocols is current Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“In the current situation Armenia has no fault. Erdogan is the only guilty. Gul signed the protocols [Turkish President at that time], after which Erdogan visited Azerbaijan and made everything to zero”, Baskin Oran said, adding that by this Erdogan didn’t want to anger Azerbaijan, but the research done within that public showed that he was losing votes.

“After this the situation further worsened since after the crisis of December 17-25, 2013 [Erdogan’s involvement in major corruption processes was disclosed], Erdogan’s only goal was to hide that scandal. As a measure to do that he chose creating tension inside and outside the country”, the Turkish professor said. He brought as an example the current military operations of the Turkish forces in Syria, as well as the tension with Greece concerning the Aegean islands.  

“I once again repeat – all this aims at creating tension, provoking nationalistic sentiments. In this sense Armenia has no role. The only problem is that Erdogan wants to remain in power by creating tension”, Baskin Oran said.

He stated that the same they witnessed during the Kurdish reconciliation process, but after a short period of time the process was frozen, and the option to solve the issue by military means was used, the same as happened in 1937-1938.

During his speech at the Munich Security Conference on February 17, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said Armenia does not resort to the language of preconditions, but equally, Armenia will never accept preconditions put forward by anyone. The President noted that at the times of the Cold War, Armenia was on the border of one of the two rival blocks. Thirty years have passed since the fall of the Berlin wall, but Turkey still continues to keep the border with Armenia closed. He stated that it seems that the clock stopped ticking there.

“Is Azerbaijan preventing Turkey from establishing relations with Armenia, as many are trying to convince us? No, it is not the case. The chief impediment is the lack of political will on the part of the Turkish leadership”, the President said in Munich.

Araks Kasyan

 



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