PACE chief: Armenian pullout key to Turkey-Armenia fence-mending
BAKU – The president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) has said the most important condition for normalizing Turkey-Armenia relations is withdrawal of the Armenian forces from the occupied Azerbaijani territories, Turkish Hurriyet newspaper reported.
Mevlut Cavusoglu made the statement in an address at a conference on Turkey’s role in the European Union held in Gothenburg, Sweden last weekend.
"If this condition is met, the relations with Armenia will normalize," Cavusoglu said.
Turkey and Armenia have been at odds for decades and their shared border has been shut since 1993 due to Armenia’s occupation of Azerbaijani territory and Armenian claims on World War I-era "genocide". In October 2009, the two governments signed agreements to establish diplomatic relations and reopen their borders. However, the accords require approval by both countries’ parliaments, and Yerevan suspended ratification of the deals this April.
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