ANKARA STATES REFUSAL FROM OSCE PRESIDENCY NOT RELATED WITH ARMENIA DEMARCHE

Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul has made an official statement on the country officially refusing to assume the OSCE presidency in 2007. At that Gul denied the reports that official Yerevan statement on the intention to exercise veto when discussing the issue on coming OSCE forums was the underlying reason of the decision. In Gul’s words, election will be held in Turkey in 2007 and the country leaders cannot pay due attention to the OSCE presidency. Spokesman for the US State Department Richard Boucher has made a similar statement in Washington. “Turkish diplomats working for the OSCE told us that Ankara had withdrawn its candidacy, as the attention of the country leadership will focus on other questions in 2007. They intimated to us that they cannot pay due attention to the OSCE presidency and we respect their decision,” he said. It should be reminded that Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian lately stated that Yerevan might veto the decision on Turkey’s coming presidency in the OSCE. “We base ourselves on the principle that a country aspiring for the post OSCE Chairman-in-Office should have diplomatic relations with all organization participant states,” V. Oskanian noted. The head of the Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs also reported that he had discussed the question with representatives of the US administration in the course of his working visit to Washington in June this year.