DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS between France and Turkey were on a knife-edge last night after Ankara warned of reprisals if the French parliament approves a law making it illegal to deny that the 1915 mass killing of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey was genocide.
The draft law put forward by a member of Nicolas Sarkozy’s right-wing party would make denying any genocide a criminal offence, punishable by a one-year jail sentence and a fine of €45,000.
All French parties back the Bill, which will be debated on parliament today and is likely to be approved.
The project has sparked a slanging match with Turkey threatening to withdraw its ambassador from Paris and expel the French ambassador to Ankara.
The Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, warned President Sarkozy of serious political, economic and cultural consequences. He said France should look at its own “dirty and bloody history” in Algeria and Rwanda.
Turkish business leaders and parliamentarians visited Paris to pile on the pressure over trade, particularly energy contracts and Turkish Airlines’ purchase of the Airbus. France is Turkey’s fifth biggest export market and the sixth biggest source of its imports.
French officials bristled at what they saw as Turkish intimidation, but a rift emerged between Mr Sarkozy, who refused to budge, and his foreign minister, Alain Juppé, who sought to smooth relations with Turkey – vital to France in dealing with Syria and Iran.
Mr Sarkozy is a longtime critic of Turkey’s bid to join the EU and has done little to defuse tensions.
On a visit to Armenia in October, he said Turkey should "revisit its history". Ankara has accused him of chasing the Armenian vote four months before the presidential election – there are thought to be 500,000 Armenians in France. – ( Guardian service)