Armenia’s Prime Minister announces readiness to establish diplomatic relations with Turkey without preconditions

The Armenian leadership wanting to establish diplomatic relations with Turkey without any preconditions is a historic opportunity. The Armenian media quoted Mustafa Sarigul, the head of the opposition Republican People’s Party of Turkey, as saying:

“Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan said that they are ready to establish diplomatic relations with Turkey without preconditions. The outstretched hand of Armenia should be considered a historic opportunity.”

Turkey expert Astghik Igityan told JAMnews that Pashinyan’s statement, voiced in an interview with Al-Jazeera TV channel, continues to be the focus of the Turkish media’s attention even after it aired several days ago:

“Almost all well-known publications focused on Armenian-Turkish relations and reported on Pashinyan’s statement. There are news stories, but the headings carry certain sentiments, for example, ‘an important message from Armenia’ or ‘an unexpected statement from Armenia’. However, there is no official reaction. It will probably follow a little later, on the basis of publications in the media.”

The expert says that Mustafa Sarigul’s position is not popular on social networks in Turkey:

“Most [users] reacted very harshly. Those against establishing relations with Armenia say that the Karabakh issue must be resolved first.”

Pashinyan recognizes that relations between Yerevan and Ankara are impacted by its relations with Azerbaijan. And yet, judging by other statements from the same interview, he is ready to establish relations with Turkey:

“Turkey closed the border between Armenia and Turkey; from the Armenian side it can be considered open.”

Pashinyan spoke about another aspect that hinders the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries:

“For us, international recognition of the Armenian Genocide [the events of the beginning of the last century in Ottoman Turkey – JAMnews] is very important, and Armenia is one of the active fighters against genocides. The issue of genocide for our country is not so much an issue of Armenian-Turkish relations as a matter of the global struggle against genocide.”