France makes denying Armenian genocide a crime

PARIS - France's parliament voted Monday to make it a crime to deny that the killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks nearly a century ago constituted a genocide, risking more sanctions from Turkey and complicating an already delicate relationship with the rising power.

Turkey, which sees the allegations of genocide as a threat to its national honor, suspended military, economic and political ties with France and briefly recalled its ambassador last month when the lower house of parliament approved the same bill.

Before Monday's Senate vote, Turkey threatened more measures if the bill passed. The measure now needs to be signed by President Nicolas Sarkozy, whose party proposed it, to become a law.

The debate surrounding the measure comes in the highly charged run-up to France's presidential elections this spring, and critics have called the move a ploy to the garner votes of the some 500,000 Armenians who live in France.

Valerie Boyer, the senator from Sarkozy's conservative UMP party who wrote the bill, did not deny that, saying that politicians are supposed to pass laws they think their constituents want.

"That's democracy," she said.

But this domestic gamble could have major international consequences. France's relations with Turkey are already strained, in large part because Sarkozy opposes Turkey's entry into the European Union. The law will no doubt further sour relations with a NATO member that is playing an increasingly important role in the international community's response to the violence in Syria, the standoff over Iran's nuclear program and peace negotiations in the Middle East.

"It is null and void for us," Turkey's Justice Minister Sadullah Ergin said on live TV immediately after the bill's passage Monday. "It is a great disgrace and injustice against Turkey. I want to tell to France that you have no value for us in the slightest degree, we don't care."

While most historians contend that the 1915 killings of Armenians as the Ottoman Empire broke up was the 20th century's first genocide, Turkey vigorously denies that.

[Nikos_Retsos]

The French bill that makes denying the Armenian Genocide of 1915 a crime is an extension of France's unyielding opposition to Turkey's joining the European Union (EU). The French always blasted the Turkish governments for widespread torture in Turkish prisons, for failure to reign in a military that disposed elected governments in a whim, and for still living in the culture of the Ottoman Empire that was utterly brutish. The current prime minister Tayyip Erdogan have reigned in the military, and Turkey is today a laudable democracy. But now France also wants Turkey to accept its brutal past, while the Turks want to sweep it under the rug! The French law denying the Armenian Genocide, therefore, is just another legal block that will force Turkey to accept it - if it pursues its application to join the EU.

Surely the present Turkish leaders cannot accept it. Firstly, they were not responsible for, and, secondly, they cannot officially admit that their ancestors were so brutish and so inhuman! It will be a political suicidal! But France wants Turkey to accept a cathartic admission of its brutish past, as the present day Germany has accepted the past crimes of the Third Reich and of Adolf Hitler! Nikos Retsos, retired professor

[antiglobal5]

Hey if it is true the Turks need to admit it. The truth is all that matters regardless of who it hurts.

[sensi2]

Indeed, while i don't support any of these "memorial" law, being in Istanbul last december and seeing the pitiful Turkish officials populist nationalistic tone over the issue, Erdogan pathetic historical fairy tales, smearing and feigned outrage, I do think that this law is more than deserved, and that it may helps Turkey to move on over that Ottoman late "legacy", in spite of their officials...

[Bob-Gren]

France, the only real "DEMOCRACY" where money isn't everything.

[Jim1900]

Yes, controlling your thoughts is more important.

[sensi2]

@ jim1900
Last time I checked nobody was trying to control your thoughts. What a nonsense.

[fwd23515]

So much for freedom of speech.

[sensi2]

I think most of the french people can bear not voicing revisionist fairy tales about the first 20th century genocide, you know. Don't you have any defamation/slander law in your own country? Kthxbye.

[mikedev75]

Good for France , that should **** off the muscums.

[Bob-Gren]

Deair Mr. Sadullah Ergin, If it is "Null and void for you, I suggest that after it passes, you go to France and deny it, then we will see if your statement you made today is genuine, Do you have the Balls to do it is the question!!!!!!

[AttyFAM]

While I agree that the Ottomans committed genocide against the Armenians in 1915, making any political opinion a crime is going too far. What then differentiates this law from the Nazi laws regulating free speech in 1930s-1040s Germany?

I note that, unfortunately, Turkey has a similar law, making it a crime to dishonor the country by stating that it committed genocide. That law too has to go. Islamic oriented countries have invested far too much into the concept of Honor, and far too little into the concept of Humility.