Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said thousands of Turks had made their voices heard in a protest march in Paris on Saturday against a French bill that makes it a crime to deny Armenian allegations on the Ottoman era incidents of 1915.
"Tens of thousands of Turks made this historic event visible to entire France by crowding a 4.5-kilometer long avenue. Turkish nation is proud of its history and it will continue to be proud," Davutoglu told reporters in the central city of Kayseri.
Despite rain and cold weather nearly 40 thousand Turks shunned the bill that penalizes denial of the Armenian allegations with a prison term of one year and a fine of 45 thousand euros.
The bill is set to come to the Senate floor this coming Monday but French Senate members could vote to uphold a parliamentary committee decision and drop the bill off the agenda without even debating it.
The protestors carried Turkish, Algerian, Azeri and French flags and urged senators to act against the legislation.
"Leave dealing with history to historians," a banner read as protestors chanted slogans against French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
"I have been living in France for fifty years and I haven't seen so many Turks got together. Turks in Europe for the first time had the chance to raise a strong voice against an injustice done to them," said Demir Onger, head of a Paris-based Turkish culture association.
Police took tight security measures at Place Denfert-Rochereau, the venue of the demonstration.
A similar bill -- proposed by the Socialist Party -- was approved in 2006 by the lower house but the Senate rejected to debate the bill last May when it upheld the committee's decision back then.
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