29/01/2015 21:19
President: Perinçek case not case of legal recognition or denial of Genocide
They are trying to turn the case of Doğu Perinçek, who is a nationalist criminal, sentenced several times by Turkish courts under different charges, but also representative of a nationalist party and organizations, into an issue related to the legal position of the court on the Armenian Genocide, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said at the 5th session of the State Commission in charge of Coordinating the Events Dedicated to the 100thAnniversary of the Armenian Genocide.
“The Republic of Armenia has been engaged in the case examination as a third party since the Grand Chamber of the ECHR will be reaching a verdict on the compatibility between the Swiss law having criminalized denial of the genocide and the European Convention on Human Rights. For us Armenians, it will be an important decision since we are certain that denial is the most likely signal for repetition of that type of crime. Nevertheless, we don’t view it as a case related to legal recognition or denial of genocide,” the president was quoted as saying by Armenpress news agency.
“We, being a state that represents a nation that survived genocide, have not appealed to the court with such a request. We also don’t believe the clear response to be given to that question is an issue in the area of jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights,” Serzh Sargsyan said.
He said that Turkish propaganda is ready to present any verdict on that case as a big victory with wrong interpretations and stressed the fact that Turkey didn’t even abstain from releasing Perinçek from prison or allowing him to leave the country to participate in the court session.