Turkish PM says U.S. vote on genocide to "greatly harm" ties

WASHINGTON - A U.S. resolution that branded as genocide the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World War One will seriously damage U.S.-Turkish relations, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said on March 6.
NATO member Turkey, an ally crucial to U.S. interests in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and the Middle East, has expressed its outrage at the March 4 non-binding vote in the Foreign Affairs committee of the U.S. House of Representatives, and recalled its envoy to the United States for consultations.
"The decision of the Foreign Affairs Committee will not hurt Turkey, but it will greatly harm bilateral relations, interests and vision. Turkey will not be the one who loses," said Erdogan, speaking at a summit of Turkish businessmen.
The Obama administration made a last-minute appeal against the resolution and has vowed to stop the vote, which was broadcast live on Turkish television, from going further in Congress.
Turkey, a vital location for oil and gas pipelines between East and West, including the U.S.-backed Nabucco Pipeline bypassing Russia, has said the resolution could jeopardize a fragile drive by Turkey and Armenia to end a century of hostilities and lead to further instability in the south Caucasus, a region crisscrossed by oil and gas pipelines to Europe.
Turkey's ambassador to the United States told journalists upon his return on Saturday it was unclear when he would head back to Washington following his talks with the president, prime minister and foreign minister.
"I will return when the time is right ... We will have to wait and see," Namik Tan said. Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu was quoted in a media report as saying that the consultations could last "a long time."
The resolution urges Obama to use the term "genocide" when he delivers his annual message on the Armenian massacres in April.
Turkey accepts that many Christian Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks but denies that up to 1.5 million died and that it amounted to genocide - a term employed by many Western historians and some foreign parliaments.

Nabucco deal to be signed in Ankara on June 25

ANKARA - The European Union and Turkey have struck a ground-breaking gas pipeline deal, according to senior EU officials.
The agreement, to be signed in Ankara on June25, represents a major boost to the EU's proposed Nabucco pipeline project, which is to transport natural gas to Europe from central Asia, the Caucasus and the Middle East.
"This is a complete breakthrough," said a senior EU official involved in the tough negotiations with Turkey. "The Turks have accepted our terms. There is no conditionality."
The €9 billion Nabucco project is at the center of a contest pitting Russia against the EU and involving Turkey, Germany, Austria, Azerbaijan and the authoritarian regimes of central Asia in the effort to secure Europe's gas needs while curbing the hold Moscow and the gas monopoly Gazprom have over the supply lines. Nabucco, to stretch more than 2,000 miles from Turkey's eastern border to Europe's main gas hub outside Vienna, would be the main route for pumping gas to Europe not controlled by Gazprom.
The plan to build Nabucco faltered over a deadlock between the EU and Turkey over the pipeline transit agreement. More than half the pipeline is to be located in Turkey, making it the gatekeeper of Europe's energy supplies.
Ankara has been driving a hard bargain, insisting on collecting a "tax" on the gas being pumped and demanding 15 percent of the transit gas at discounted prices. This, say EU officials and the six-company consortium that is to build and run the pipeline, would render Nabucco financially unviable.
The stalemate was broken at a summit in Prague on May 8 between the EU and the countries involved. "The 15 percent demand has gone," Andris Piebalgs, the EU commissioner for energy, told the Guardian. "We've agreed on cost-based transit. We're very close to a conclusion."