ISTANBUL: Turkey’s foreign ministry has summoned the US ambassador in Ankara to protest the US decision to mark the deportation and killing of Armenians during the Ottoman Empire as “genocide.”
Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Onal met with David Satterfield late Saturday to express Ankara’a strong condemnation. “The statement does not have legal ground in terms of international law and has hurt the Turkish people, opening a wound that’s hard to fix in our relations,” the ministry said.
On Saturday, US President Joe Biden followed through on a campaign promise to recognize the events that began in 1915 and killed an estimated 1.5 million Ottoman Armenians as genocide. The statement was carefully crafted to say the deportations, massacres and death marches took place in the Ottoman Empire. “We see that pain. We affirm the history. We do this not to cast blame but to ensure that what happened is never repeated,” it said.
The White House proclamation immediately prompted statements of condemnation from Turkish officials, although Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is yet to address the issue.
Turkey rejects the use of the word, saying both Turks and Armenians were killed in the World War I-era fighting, and has called for a joint history commission to investigate. For years, American presidents have avoided using “genocide” to describe what Armenians call Meds Yeghern, or the Great Crime.
The announcement comes as Turkish-American relations suffer from a host of issues. The US has sanctioned Turkish defense officials and kicked Turkey out of a fighter jet program after the NATO member bought Russian-made S400 defense system. Ankara is frustrated by Washington’s support of Syrian Kurdish fighters linked to an insurgency that Turkey has fought for decades. Turkey has also demanded the extradition of Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish cleric accused of orchestrating a bloody coup attempt against Erdogan’s government in 2016. Gulen lives in the US and denies involvement.
Erdogan and Biden spoke on the phone Friday for the first time since the US elections.
Ibrahim Kalin, the spokesman to the president, tweeted Sunday: “President Erdogan opened Turkey’s national archives & called for a joint historical committee to investigate the events of 1915, to which Armenia never responded. It is a pity @POTUS has ignored, among others, this simple fact and taken an irresponsible and unprincipled position.”
Turkey summons US ambassador over genocide announcement
https://arab.news/pusn3
Turkey summons US ambassador over genocide announcement
- Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Onal met with David Satterfield late Saturday to express Ankara’a strong condemnation
2 US service members and one American civilian killed in ambush in Syria, US Central Command says
- The attack is the first to inflict casualties since the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad a year ago
DAMASCUS, Syria: Two US service members and one American civilian have been killed and three other people wounded in an ambush on Saturday by the Daesh group in central Syria, the US Central Command said.
The attack is the first to inflict casualties since the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad a year ago.
Central Command said in a post on X that as a matter of respect for the families and in accordance with Department of War policy, the identities of the service members will be withheld until 24 hours after their next of kin have been notified.
Shots were fired at Syrian and US forces on Saturday during a visit by American troops to a historic central town, leaving several wounded, Syria’s state media and a war monitor said.
The shooting took place near Palmyra, according to the state-run SANA news agency, which said two members of Syria’s security force and several US service members were wounded. The injured were taken by helicopters to the Al-Tanf garrison near the border with Iraq and Jordan.
SANA said the attacker was killed, without providing further details.
A US defense official told The Associated Press that they are aware of the reports and did not have any information to provide immediately. The official spoke on condition of anonymity for not being authorized to speak to the media.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least three Syrian security members were wounded as well as several Americans. It added that the attacker was a member of the Syrian security force.
The US has hundreds of troops deployed in eastern Syria as part of a coalition fighting the Daesh group.
Last month, Syria joined the international coalition fighting against Daesh as Damascus improves its relations with Western countries following last year’s fall of President Bashar Assad when insurgents captured his seat of power in Damascus.
The US had no diplomatic relations with Syria under Assad, but ties have warmed since the fall of the five-decade Assad family rule. The interim president, Ahmad Al-Sharaa, made a historic visit to Washington last month where he held talks with President Donald Trump.
Daesh was defeated in Syria in 2019 but the group’s sleeper cells still carry out deadly attacks in the country. The United Nations says the group still has between 5,000 and 7,000 fighters in Syria and Iraq.
US troops, which have maintained a presence in different parts of Syria — including Al-Tanf garrison in the central province of Homs — to train other forces as part of a broad campaign against Daesh, have been targeted in the past. One of the deadliest attacks occurred in 2019 in the northern town of Manbij when a blast killed two US service members and two American civilians as well as others from Syria while conducting a patrol.
