The Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs has summoned the US ambassador to the country over the recognition of the Armenian genocide by US President Joe Biden.
Turkish Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Önal has told US Ambassador David Satterfield “in the strongest terms” that the statement has no legal basis and that Ankara finds it unacceptable. He said the statement has caused a “hard-to-heal wound in relations.”
Biden is the first US president to officially recognize the genocide. In a statement distributed by the White House on Saturday, he commemorates the victims of the genocide that began on April 24, 1915. His recognition has left Turkey with bad blood.
The Ottoman authorities deported and murdered about 1.5 million Armenians from 1915 to 1917. The official recognition as genocide is still very sensitive in Turkey, the country denies that there was any targeted genocide.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavusoglu also completely rejected the recognition earlier Saturday. “Nobody needs to tell us about our own past. This whole statement is populist and undermines the ties between countries.” The State Department writes in a statement that Biden has no legal basis for this ruling. A spokesman for President Recep Erdogan says the US should look to its own past.
The Armenian Prime Minister calls the recognition a “powerful step towards justice and strong support for the victims’ descendants”. Nikol Pasjinian says he is happy with the recognition of the genocide, also given the recent unrest between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
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