French in Armenia 'genocide' row with Turkey

[Marx]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6043730.stm

The French parliament has adopted a bill making it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered "genocide" at the hands of the Turks, infuriating Turkey.
The bill, which provides for a year in jail and a heavy fine, still needs approval from the Senate and president.

Turkey called the decision a "serious blow" to relations with France. It has already threatened economic sanctions.

Armenia says Ottoman Turks killed 1.5 million people systematically in 1915 - a claim strongly denied by Turkey.

Turkey has been warning France for weeks not to pass the bill.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6043730.stm

The French parliament has adopted a bill making it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered "genocide" at the hands of the Turks, infuriating Turkey.
The bill, which provides for a year in jail and a heavy fine, still needs approval from the Senate and president.

Turkey called the decision a "serious blow" to relations with France. It has already threatened economic sanctions.

Armenia says Ottoman Turks killed 1.5 million people systematically in 1915 - a claim strongly denied by Turkey.

Turkey has been warning France for weeks not to pass the bill.

I'm with the Turks on this one, though perhaps for different reasons. Continental Europe has too many restrictions on free speach.

[NeilW]

I'm with the Turks too - it's just provocative and an unacceptable restriction on free speech. Of course I would have much more sympathy with the Turks if they didn't have their own laws under which you can be prosecuted for saying the opposite - that genocide WAS committed against the Armenians...

[Simon.D]

Bad and backward move by France..

[cain1798]

Keeping the surprising degree of unanimity here, I also think this is to be deplored. I believe that what took place was genocide by any standard. But this does not mean it should be illegal for someone to present another point of view.

While we're all having great craic fighting the enternal election on this site and on the streets, maybe we should focus more on the increasing numbers of restrictions on free speech in Europe, the US, Britain and Ireland.

[Jozer]

The Turks prosecute their own people for saying it did happen. They are a joke nation.

The Turks prosecute their own people for saying it did happen. They are a joke nation.

At least the Turks are still on their first Republic...how many have the frogs notched up at this stage? :wink:

[Marx]

Keeping the surprising degree of unanimity here, I also think this is to be deplored. I believe that what took place was genocide by any standard. But this does not mean it should be illegal for someone to present another point of view.

While we're all having great craic fighting the enternal election on this site and on the streets, maybe we should focus more on the increasing numbers of restrictions on free speech in Europe, the US, Britain and Ireland.

i would have to agree there certainly has been a slide backwards in recent years

[St Disibod]

From the BBC News piece:

There are accusations in Turkey that the Armenian diaspora and opponents of Turkey's EU membership bid are using this issue to prevent Turkey joining the 25-member bloc.

I think there is a high accuracy in this point. It would seem that European politicians hostile to Turkish entry into the EU are willing to raise all sorts of additional barriers to entry that are applied to no one else.

The focus of EU membership criteria should be on political and economic standards and regulations, not codified history.

Turkey's chief negotiator in EU membership talks, Ali Babacan, might be worth listening to: "Leave history to historians." I don't think history should be shielded from the public, but it is most unfortunate to see it being played so cheaply by politicians.

State regulation on historical debate seems somwhat pointless. Who actually gains from seeing David Irving sent to jail? There is hardly any sense of heightened justice or rehabilitation achieved as a result. States can steer history through funding- you can in effect buy history by funding one line of approach over another (and the EU appears to be playing this game as well as any national government). Historians should be slow to criticise this very cynical reality- alas, who else would fund us?- but would rather do well to just keep it in mind and caution others about it. But how can a state benefit from closing off an avenue of history, even (or especially) to historians?

I don't know whether there has been social studies on this, surely Gunter Grass is not the only one who tried to peel back Germany's reaction to the Nazi era, but I fail to see the benefits of laws like this.

[FutureTaoiseach]

I welcome this. From a freedom of speech POV I have reservations but I am determinedly opposed to a hugely-populated, poor Muslim country joining the EU. The Commission has been asked by the Council of Ministers to prepared a paper on the EU's absorption-capacity in terms of how large it can become and this is welcome (maybe they already have I don't know) but this seems to mark a recognition of enlargement-fatigue among the EU public - and increasingly among the Irish.