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 YEREVAN
(RFE/RL)–A key committee of the National Assembly effectively
rejected on Friday a proposal by the opposition Armenian
Revolutionary Federation to criminalize public statements
denying that the Armenian Genocide.
Armenia’s Criminal Code already carries heavy
fines and up to four years’ imprisonment for public denial of
genocides and “other crimes against humanity.” An amendment
tabled by the ARF last month would extend the maximum punishment
to five years and apply it to anyone “denying, playing down,
approving or justifying the genocide of Armenians in Ottoman
Turkey and Western Armenia.”
The bill is directly connected with the
recent agreements to normalize Armenia’s relations with Turkey
that have been strongly condemned by the party. They ARF says it
is specifically directed against a Turkish-Armenian
“subcommission” of historians envisaged by one of the
agreements.
The commission would be tasked with studying
the extermination of the Ottoman Empire’s indigenous Armenian
population. The ARF and other critics of the deal say the very
existence of such a body would call into question the fact of
the genocide, a claim denied by Armenia’s authorities.
In a written opinion submitted to the
Armenian parliament committee on legal affairs this week, the
Ministry of Justice objected to the ARF bill and essentially
upheld the existing Criminal Code clause relating to genocide
denial. The committee on Friday postponed the bill’s
consideration by at least two months, meaning that the proposed
amendment will not reach the parliament floor before February.
The committee chairman, David Harutiunian,
made no secret of his strong opposition to the measure, saying
that it would create “extremely serious problems” in the ongoing
Turkish-Armenian negotiations. He said its passage would lead
the Turkish authorities to resume heavy enforcement of a
controversial law that makes it a crime to “insult the Turkish
nation.” The law, superficially amended last year, has been used
in the prosecution of prominent Turks who have questioned the
official Turkish version of the events of 1915.
Harutiunian also argued that amendment
drafted by the ARF was unnecessary because “Armenia’s position
on this issue is so strong that we don’t need any additional
tools of defense in the shape of criminal liability,” the former
justice minister said at a committee meeting. “The stronger
party doesn’t need such tools.”
“I don’t see that confidence about our
strength,” Vahan Hovannisian, the leader of the ARF faction in
the parliament, countered, referring to President Serzh
Sarkisian’s conciliatory policy towards Turkey. He said the
October 10 signing of the Turkish-Armenian protocols in Zurich
was “a sign of weakness” on the part of Yerevan.
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