Turkey seeks explanation from Iran over genocide remarks

Alarmed by reports that Iran’s Vice President Hamid Baghaei said the events of 1915 constituted a genocide, Turkey is seeking high-level explanation from Tehran, reports Hurriyet Dail News.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu spoke late Friday with his Iranian counterpart, Manouchehr Mottaki, who told him that Iran's position was in line with Turkey's stance on the issue.

“A hundred years ago the Ottoman Empire committed genocide against a certain number of Armenians,” he was Mr Baghaei had been reported by Iranian news agency IRNA as saying.

Mr Davutoglu said the Turkish Foreign Ministry immediately contacted both the Iranian Embassy in Ankara and the Turkish Embassy in Tehran. “I asked for an explanation from Mr. Mottaki,” Davutoglu told journalists in the central Anatolian province of Karaman on Friday.

Turkey’s envoy to Tehran went to the Iranian Foreign Ministry to follow up on the issue. Later in the day, Davutoglu contacted Mottaki. Soon the Iranian Embassy in Ankara released a statement saying that the Iranian vice president’s statements were not accurately reflected by some media outlets. The embassy stated that Baghaei commented on the subject only as a problem between Turkey and Armenia and that he did not express his opinions about the issue.

During their telephone conversation, Mottaki told Davutoglu that the conference attended by the Iranian vice president was about World War II, not about World War I, while repeating that there was no change in Tehran's position regarding the events of 1915.

But it appeared Friday that Davutoglu was not satisfied with Mottaki’s assurance. He said he told his Iranian counterpart that Turkey was awaiting an explanation from Baghaei himself. “Mottaki told me that Baghaei will make an explanation,” Davutoglu said.