YEREVAN, March 31. /Mediamax/. The European Parliament debated the first draft of a new report on relations between the European Union and the Republics of the South Caucasus. The report was prepared by Swedish Green Party MEP Per Gahrton for the Foreign Affairs Committee.
The document that the EU should act more energetically to promote innovative approaches to diffuse conflicts and promote regional co-operation.
On the specific question of Turkey’s role in the region, the report argues that the EU has an opportunity, in view of Turkey’s application to join the EU, to “increase the Turkey’s flexibility towards the conflicts in the region, and particularly towards Armenia, on the questions of the closure of the borders and on its attitude towards the genocide of 1915.”
The recognition of the Armenian genocide by the European Parliament and by several Member States ought to provide a basis for the EU to present constructive proposals to Turkey on the handling of the matter, e.g. by setting up an multilateral international committee of historians on the 1915 Armenian genocide.
The report is expected to come to the vote in Committee in May, and to be submitted to the plenary in September 2001. –0–
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