European Parliament Committee Urges Turkey to Acknowledge Armenian Genocide, Advocate for Genuine Reconciliation Without Preconditions

STRASBOURG — The 2022 report on Turkey, adopted by the European Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs, calls on Turkey to recognize the Armenian Genocide in order to “pave the way for genuine reconciliation between the Turkish and Armenian peoples and to fully respect its obligations to protect the Armenian cultural heritage.”

The report notes that the Committee supports the normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey in the interests of reconciliation, regional stability, security, socio-economic development, and welcomes the progress achieved.

The Committee calls for the speedy implementation of the agreements reached by the special representatives, such as the opening of the airspace and the border between the two countries, which will put an end to the economic blockade of Armenia.

The report also calls on both sides to participate in the process in good faith and without preconditions. The Committee expresses hope that this could give impetus to the normalization of relations in the South Caucasus region.

Although Turkey was one of the first countries to recognize Armenia’s independence from the former Soviet Union, the countries have no diplomatic ties, and Turkey shut down their common border in 1993, in a show of solidarity with Azerbaijan, which was locked in a conflict with Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

Turkey also refuses to recognize the Armenian genocide, committed during 1915-1923 when an estimated 1.5 million Armenians were massacred by the Ottoman government. The overwhelming majority of historians widely view the event as genocide.

In 2009, Ankara and Yerevan reached an agreement in Zurich to establish diplomatic relations and to open their joint border, but Turkey later said it could not ratify the deal until Armenia withdrew from Nagorno-Karabakh.

In 2020, Turkey strongly backed Azerbaijan in the six-week conflict with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, which ended with a Russia-brokered peace deal that saw Azerbaijan gain control of a significant part of Nagorno-Karabakh.

On February 9, 2023, Armenia sent 100 tons of aid to quake-stricken Turkey by five trucks through a border gate between the two countries that was opened for the first time in 35 years.

In December 2021, the two countries appointed special envoys to help normalize relations who have already had four meetings.