Post date: Dec 22, 2011 2:25:29 PM
The French parliament passes a draft law which would make it illegal to deny genocide, sparking outrage in Turkey as it would also cover the 1915 mass killing of Armenians in Ottomon Turkey.
PARIS, FRANCE (DECEMBER 22, 2011) (FRENCH NATIONAL ASSEMBLY) - France took the first step on Thursday (December 22) to criminalising the denial of genocide, including the 1915 mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks, a move that risks damaging Paris' diplomatic and commercial relations with Ankara.
Tension has risen in the last week over the draft law put forward by members of President Nicolas Sarkozy's party with Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan warning Sarkozy there would be grave consequences if the bill passes.
Lawmakers in the National Assembly - the lower house of parliament - voted overwhelmingly in favour of the bill, which will now be debated next year in the Senate.
France, the cradle of human rights, passed a law recognising the killing of Armenians as genocide in 2001, when Turkey was in the midst of an economic crisis, and reacted in a similar vein. The French lower house first passed a bill criminalising the denial of an Armenian genocide in 2006, but it was finally rejected by the Senate in May of this year.
The new bill was made more general to outlaw the denial of any genocide, partly in the hope of appeasing the Turks. It could still face a long passage into law, though its backers want to see it completed before parliament is suspended at the end of February ahead of elections in the second quarter.
Lower House President Bernard Accoyer said on Wednesday he doubted the bill would pass by the end of parliament as the government had not made the bill priority legislation.
Armenia, backed by many historians and parliaments, says about 1.5 million Christian Armenians were killed in what is now eastern Turkey during World War One in a deliberate policy of genocide ordered by the Ottoman government.
Successive Turkish governments and the vast majority of Turks feel the charge of genocide is a direct insult to their nation. Ankara argues that there was heavy loss of life on both sides during fighting in the area.
Ankara considers the bill, originally proposed by 40 deputies from Sarkozy's party, a blatant attempt at winning the votes of 500,000 ethnic Armenians in France in next year's elections, limits freedom of speech and is an unnecessary meddling by politicians in a business best left to historians.
The French government has stressed that the bill, which mandates a 45,000-euro fine and a year in jail for offenders, is not its own initiative and pointed out that Turkey cannot impose unilateral trade sanctions.