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Donald Trump's administrationhas rejected a US Senate resolution recognising the Armenian genocide, just a day after Turkish president RecepTayyip Erdoganthreatened to recognise the killing of Native Americans in retaliation.

The Senate measure was rejected by the State Department on Tuesday, with a spokesperson for the department indicating that US position on the matter did not change.

"The position of the Administration has not changed," said spokesperson Morgan Ortagus, in a statement to the Hill. "Our views are reflected in the President's definitive statement on the issue from last April."

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The US Senate had passed a resolution unanimously last week to recognise the Armenian genocide as a matter of foreign policy, in a rare showing of bipartisanship on a deeply divisive issue and in spite of the Trump administration's objections. It marked the first time that the US Congress had formally designated the 1915 killings of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians at the hands of the Ottoman Empire as a genocide.

"To overlook human suffering is not who we are as a people," said senator Robert Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey who co-sponsored the legislation alongside Texas Republican senator Ted Cruz, during an emotional speech moments before the legislation was passed. "It is not what we stand for as a nation. We are better than that, and our foreign policy should always reflect this."

Armenian people carry torches during a march to commemorate the mass killings of Armenians

Getty

Armenian people take part in a march in commemoration of the 101th anniversary of the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman forces in 1915

Getty

People hold a flag during the laying of the flowers at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

President Serzh Sargsyan and actor George Clooney attend the laying of the flowers at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

Armenian clergymen, US actor George Clooney, center, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan, second right front, and guests attend a ceremony at a memorial to Armenians killed by the Ottoman Turks, in Yerevan

AP

Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian (C,R) and US actor George Clooney (C) attend a ceremony at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

A general view of attendees and mount Ararat during the laying of the flowers at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

Lebanese of Armenian descent burn an effigy of Turkish president Erdogan during a protest in front the house of Turkish Ambassador to mark the 101st anniversary of the mass killing of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915, near Beirut, Lebanon

EPA

Activists hold portraits of victims during a silent demonstration to commemorate the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in Istanbul

Reuters

Activists hold portraits of victims during a silent demonstration to commemorate the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in Istanbul

Reuters

Armenian people carry torches during a march to commemorate the mass killings of Armenians

Getty

Armenian people take part in a march in commemoration of the 101th anniversary of the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman forces in 1915

Getty

People hold a flag during the laying of the flowers at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

President Serzh Sargsyan and actor George Clooney attend the laying of the flowers at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

Armenian clergymen, US actor George Clooney, center, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan, second right front, and guests attend a ceremony at a memorial to Armenians killed by the Ottoman Turks, in Yerevan

AP

Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian (C,R) and US actor George Clooney (C) attend a ceremony at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

A general view of attendees and mount Ararat during the laying of the flowers at the Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Getty

Lebanese of Armenian descent burn an effigy of Turkish president Erdogan during a protest in front the house of Turkish Ambassador to mark the 101st anniversary of the mass killing of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915, near Beirut, Lebanon

EPA

Activists hold portraits of victims during a silent demonstration to commemorate the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in Istanbul

Reuters

Activists hold portraits of victims during a silent demonstration to commemorate the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in Istanbul

Reuters

The Senate vote came after the House approved the measure last month, with a vote that came while Mr Trump and Mr Erdogan were meeting in the Oval Office.

Following the Senate vote last week, Mr Erdogan threatened to recognise the killing of Native Americans by European settlers in America, as they moved across the country and displaced and killed entire populations.

"We should oppose [the US] by reciprocating such decisions in parliament. And that is what we will do," Mr Erdogan said during an interview on the pro-government A Haber news channel.

"Can we speak about America without mentioning [Native Americans]? It is a shameful moment in US history," he continued.

In its statement, the State Department pointed to Mr Trump's 24 April comments, which fell on the Global Armenian Remembrance Day. During his statement, Mr Trump recognised that over a million and a half Armenians were "deported, massacred or marched to their deaths" under the rule of the Ottoman Empire.

He did not describe the events as genocide. While former president Barack Obama described the events as a genocide as a candidate in 2008, his administration later assured the Turkish government that it did not support a resolution recognising the killings as a genocide.

Here is the original post:
Trump refuses to back recognition of Armenian genocide after Erdogan threat - The Independent

By Prateek Chakraborty | Updated: Dec 20, 2019 18:43 IST

New Delhi [India], Dec 20 (ANI): Describing the military offensive launched by Turkey as an attempt to divert public attention after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling party suffered a setback in this year's municipal elections, M Behzad Fatmi, a Turkish political writer and commentator, has said that the operation helped the government to silence rising voices of the opposition parties in the country.In an e-mail interview to ANI on Friday, Fatmi said that prominent Justice and Development (AKP) leaders like Ali Babacan and Ahmet Davutoglu, who were once Erdogan allies, decided to break away from the party and form their own parties to challenge the Erdogan regime.Fatmi explained how prior to the military offensive, Erdogan's hold over Turkey's politics had dwindled significantly, as was evident from the ruling party's loss in major cities including in Istanbul -- a city where Erdogan had served as a Mayor in the 1990s prior to occupying the top post of the country and had described the seat as the key to winning Turkish elections."Launching an offensive in Syria helped the Erdogan regime to silence rising opposition voices in the country. The ruling AKP party had just lost major cities like Istanbul and Ankara in the municipal elections, giving the opposition parties a reason to be assertive for the first time since the AKP had come to power more than fifteen years ago. With his immense popularity among both the conservative and liberal voters, the new Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu was presenting an unprecedented challenge to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan," he said."Moreover, prominent faces from within the AKP party like Abdullah Gul, Ali Babacan and Ahmet Davutoglu were preparing to form parties of their own to challenge the ruling party. This offensive effectively diverted public attention from all these debates and development," he added."The AKP's hold over Turkey's politics has certainly reduced significantly. In a poll conducted before the municipal elections, it was found that the AKP's vote share had come down to 36 per cent. In the words of Erdogan himself -- 'those who win Istanbul, win Turkey', which also means that who lose Istanbul, lose Turkey," Fatmi said.On October 9, Turkey had launched its unilateral military operation in north-east Syria to remove Kurdish-led forces from the border area. The move came days after the US announced it was withdrawing its troops from the region, leaving the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), without American military support.Several countries, including India, had condemned Turkey's operation in Syria, a war-ravaged country. New Delhi said that Ankara's actions can undermine "stability in the region" and has the potential for causing humanitarian and civilian distress. (ANI)

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Erdogan's offensive in Syria was designed to divert attention from domestic issues: Expert - ANI News

2019-12-15T22:12:11+00:00 2019-12-15T22:12:11+00:00 2019-12-16T16:48:10+00:00.

Antigoni Zachari

Recep Tayyip Erdogan mentioned that he is open to the idea of Larkin playing for the Turkish National Team.

By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan mentioned during a TV interview that he is open to giving Shane Larkin a Turkish passport so the player can join the national team.

We will do what we need to do about it. We would like to see such a successful basketball player in our national team. Larkin can take our national team to very good results, commented Erdogan.

Larkin himself had expressed his interest to join the Turkish national team in the future, with Efes coach Ergin Ataman also supporting the idea of Larkin playing for the national team.

National team coach Ufuk Sarica also addressed the matter and the possible difficulties of the player getting a Turkish passport, however, it seems that after Erdogans comment the paperwork can be a formality.

It will remain to be seen if he finally gets to follow the path of fellow American-born and naturalized Turkish guards, like Scottie Wilbekin and Bobby Dixon. Larkin reacted with the following tweet.

It has to be noted, of course, that under FIBA rules only one naturalized player can be used in the final roster of any national team.

Photo: EuroLeague

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The rest is here:
Erdogan on Larkin receiving a Turkish passport: We will do what we need to - Eurohoops

OpEds President Erdogan reasserts authority in Turkey

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The controversy over awarding the Nobel Prize for Literature to the Austrian writer Peter Handke has not subsided. The spokesman for the Turkish presidency, Ibrahim Kalin, has approached the Nobel Prize committee and asked that that the writer, guilty of siding with the Serbs during the Balkan war, be deniedthe prize:

The Nobel Prize to Handke is a shameful decision that must be annulled.

Turkey has taken the lead ofa number of Muslim countries that have protested aboutHandke. The Turkish ambassador to Sweden, Hakki Emre Yunt, told the Turkish broadcaster Hurriyet that he will not attend the ceremony, while President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that the Swedish Academy had already given the Nobel Prize to a Turkish terrorist, areference to the writer Orhan Pamuk (the only other Turkish Nobel Prize winner, the biochemist Aziz Sancar, is not known to be a government critic).

Turkey, at the same time, prevented one of its most famous writers, Ahmet Altan, from flying to Munich to receive the Geschwister-Scholl prize, which bears the names of the heads of the White Rose who were executed by the Nazis. In September 2016, Altan, founder of the now banned Taraf newspaper, was arrested on charges of taking part in the attempted coup against Erdogan. On February 16, 2018, the writer was sentenced to life imprisonment for spreading a subliminal message during a television program the day before the coup.

You can imprison me but you can't keep me here. Because, like all writers, I can easily cross your walls, Altan wrote in I Will Never See the World Again, the book written in his cell in Silivri's maximum security prison. Last November 4, Altan was released on the condition that he reported regularly to the police. A few days ago, he suffered a new arrest.

Turkish writer and Nobel Prize winner Pamuk, who in 2005 was tried in Istanbul and publicly attacked yesterday by Erdogan, told the Sddeutsche Zeitung: As long as systematic injustices against Altan continue and we remain silent, it will be shameful for us and our humanity.

Altan is not the only Turkish writer to have ended up in jail.

The poet Nedim Trfent has been in jail for 1,250 days, guilty of writing about human rights violations in Kurdistan.

Another famous novelist, Asli Erdogan, was in prison when in Germany she was awarded the Peace Prize named after Erich Maria Remarque in the German city of Osnabrck.

Someone should explain to Erdogan that the border, first of all moral and cultural, between Europe and Turkey is still drawn on the Bosphorus.The writer Sevan Nisanyan was sentenced to thirteen months for irony on the Prophet Mohammed.

And at Erdogan's request, Interpol arrested another Turkish writer on holiday in Spain, Dogan Akhanli, guilty of having set his novel Kiyamet Gunu Yargiclari (The Judges of the Last Judgment) during the Armenian genocide.

Now Turkey would like to see Handke to be deprived of the Nobel Prize for Literature. Someone should explain to Erdogan that the border, first of all moral and cultural, between Europe and Turkey is still drawn on the Bosphorus. And it should remain there.

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Erdogan's threat to Western culture - Arutz Sheva

Despite being a member of NATO, Mr Erdogan has agitated fellow member states with his foreign policy, but his feelings towards the group of nations were previously positive. Dr Simon Waldman told Express.co.uk: Before, Turkeys position was that it should harness its relations wherever it has them, so in the Middle East it should have strong ties, strong ties with Europe and strong ties with NATO.

That is what gives Turkey its strengths, having as little issues with its neighbours as possible as well as cultural engagement.

However, the attempted coup in 2016 aimed at ousting Mr Erdogan from power, has left the Turkish President with bitterness towards some Western countries as he believes they assisted the Gulen movement in its efforts to remove him from the Presidential Palace.

Expert in Turkish politics, Dr Waldman continued: But then there is the attempted coup in Turkey in 2016, from the perspective of Erdogan this is a personal attempt against him, and he thinks where are the Gulen movement, the architects of the coup, from? oh it has bases in the US.

What did NATO give Turkey, where was NATO in the post-Saddam Hussein gulf war when Turkey came under threat? Where did NATO help after the Iraq invasion when the fallout reached Turkey? Where was the help when there was a Kurdish insurgency?

And who were the officers directing the coup, many of them earned their stripes in NATO- so this distrust of NATO starts to kick in.

During the coup, NATOs F-16 fighter jets were used by Turkish anti-government pilots to bombard the Parliament in the capital of Ankara.

READ MORE:Erdogan risks fallout as Syria rant to spark Trump and Putin fury

The rest is here:
Why Erdogan will never trust NATO amid Putin missile deal - Express.co.uk