Head of the Armenian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Mr. Davit Harutyunyan addressed a letter to MR. Thorbjorn Jagland, Secretary General of the Council of Europe and Mr. Mevlut Cavusoglu, President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, by which he alludes the attention of the mentioned people to the statements of the Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan, which relate to deporting Armenians illegally living in Turkey. According to Harutyunyan over the past two weeks the Prime Minister of Turkey has twice explicitly stated his intention to deport Armenians who allegedly reside in Turkey illegally. Immediately after the US Congress Foreign Affairs Committee passed a resolution specifying “the systematic and deliberate annihilation of 1,500,000 Armenians as genocide” Recep Tayyip Erdogan told to BBC “We are turning a blind eye to the remaining 100,000 Armenians, who are not citizens of Turkey. Tomorrow, I may tell these 100,000 to go back to their country, if it becomes necessary”. According to Harutyunyan these statements show that since 1915 Turkey has continued its discriminating attitude to Armenians. He claims that this kind of behavior focused on one national minority is unacceptable for a Council of Europe member country. “These kind of irresponsible statements violate the international conventions on racism and discriminations,” thinks Harutyunyan. Besides that Harutyunyan has sent another letter to Cavusoglu. “This is merely a response to the assessments given by Cavusoglu regarding the Katin events. I only suggest him to practice the same approach to the issue of the Armenian Genocide,” says Harutyunyan.
