Turkey may open Armenia border for NATO drill

A NATO disaster-relief exercise in Armenia may also provide an opportunity for a trial run at opening the long-closed border between Turkey and the former Soviet republic, daily Hürriyet reported Thursday.

“We will be taking part in the exercise” to be held in Armenia from Sept. 11 to 17, a Turkish diplomat told Agence France-Presse on Thursday on condition of anonymity. “We are looking into the possibility of whether the border may be opened if such a necessity arises. There has been no decision yet.”

If requested to do so, Turkey might allow the passage of NATO equipment through the Doğukapı crossing in the northeastern province of Kars for a six-day humanitarian exercise in Armenia’s Lori Mar region, daily Hürriyet wrote, quoting Turkish diplomatic sources as saying that any border opening would be temporary.

The governor’s office in Kars has prepared a report on the possible opening at the Foreign Ministry’s request, Hürriyet wrote, adding that the report concluded the highways and railroads on the Turkish side of the closed border were in good condition and the crossing could stay open for at least a month.

According to AFP, the Turkish diplomat said authorities are investigating whether the infrastructure of the border area is suitable for use during the Armenia 2010 Exercise, a drill based on a scenario of a post-earthquake civil emergency that is being organized by NATO’s Euro-Atlantic Disaster Response Coordination Center, or EADRCC.

The news of Turkey’s participation in the drill and the potential border opening was first revealed by daily Radikal columnist Murat Yetkin in an article that ran in that paper Wednesday, and was translated for publication Thursday in the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review.

The possible opening of the Doğukapı border crossing is seen as a potential thaw not only in tense Turkish-Armenian relations, but also in Armenian-Azerbaijani ties ahead of a key meeting between the foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Hürriyet wrote.

The top diplomats are set to meet in the Kazakh city of Almaty on the sidelines of an Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, or OSCE, ministerial summit to be held Friday and Saturday.

Crossing won’t stay open for Van ceremony

The EADRCC field exercise, including a command post element, training and a demonstration day, will be based on the fictitious scenario of a serious civil emergency arising in the Armenian city of Arzni.

Up to 1,000 participants from NATO and partner nations, as well as representatives and observers from other countries and international organizations, are expected to take part in the drill, which is held annually to practice disaster-response mechanisms and enhance cooperation in emergency situations. According to Hürriyet, Turkey is planning to send a group of three or four people to participate in the exercise.

The possibility of a temporary opening of the border for the NATO drill has prompted speculation that the crossing might be allowed to stay open to allow Armenians to travel overland to a September ceremony at the ancient Surp Haç Church on Akdamar Island, in the eastern Turkish city of Van. The Turkish diplomat told AFP, however, that “this is out of the question.”

Some 5,000 people are expected to be in Van for the first religious service in many decades at the centuries-old Armenian church, which the Turkish government has allowed to open once a year for such events.

A century of hostility

Turkey and Armenia have engaged in high-level negotiations to end nearly a century of hostility, talks that have included discussion of reopening the border, but the process stalled after Yerevan froze its ratification of the historic diplomatic protocols, accusing Ankara of dragging its feet by demanding the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute be settled first.

A flashpoint of the Caucasus, the Nagorno-Karabakh region is a constituent part of Azerbaijan, occupied since the end of 1994 by Armenia. While internationally recognized as Azerbaijani territory, the enclave has declared itself an independent republic and is administered as a de facto part of Armenia.

Turkey closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in solidarity with Azerbaijan, which was fighting Armenian-backed separatists over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

The border closure has exacerbated already-high tensions over Armenia’s claims that up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed during the final days of the Ottoman Empire in what Yerevan says amounted to genocide.

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Posted by ssm on Jul 15 2010 Filed under National Security. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.