British parliament takes center stage in 'Armenian genocide' recognition row

Monday, 15 March 2010 11:40

Following the Swedish parliament’s adoption Thursday of an Armenian “genocide” resolution, many people who support using this terminology for the Ottoman-era deaths in 1915 are looking to Britain next.

A second reading of a resolution in the British parliament will held April 30 before it is submitted to a House of Commons committee. If it is approved, an “Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day” will be established in the country.

The resolution approved by the Swedish parliament Thursday recognized as “genocide” the killings of Armenians and other Christian minorities during the final days of the Ottoman Empire. Turkey has long denied that the deaths constituted genocide, arguing that both Armenians and Turks were killed in civil strife.

The British committee is scheduled to hold its last evaluation in late March; the first reading of the draft was made Jan. 6. A similar draft will follow the same process in the British House of Lords.

If the resolution is approved, it will be submitted to the queen of England. If she does not reject the proposal, it will become legal and Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day will be officially recognized in the country.

Though Labour Party deputy Andrew Dismore and 11 other English parliamentarians support the proposal, one local politician says the resolution will fail, citing two reasons.

First, the make-up of the parliament will change after the May 6 elections, said Nilgün Canver, a member of the Haringey city council and the founder of the parliamentary group of friends from the Labour Party. She added that none of the political parties in Britain want to risk angering Turkey, daily Hürriyet reported.

“The resolution supporters are the members of a small group that opposes Turkey,” Canver told Hürriyet. “There is no chance for the approval of the resolution in the British House of Lords.”