As the U.S. Congressional House Resolution 106 recognizing the Armenian Genocide continues to make headlines around the world, The Economist has published a piece on Armenian-Turkish, U.S.-Turkish, and Armenian-Diaspora relations. While covering the larger picture, it looks at the difference on approaches to Genocide recognition between Armenians in the Republic and in the Diaspora as well as the Turkish response to H.R. 106.

Genocide is a tricky subject in Washington. Six weeks after the Rwandan genocide began in 1994, when 500,000 people had already been murdered for belonging to the wrong tribe, the American government still hesitated to call it what it was. The trouble with calling genocide “genocide” while the blood is still spilling is that, under the terms of a UN convention, one is obliged to do something to stop it.

The Armenian killings incur no such awkwardness. Obviously, Congress cannot do much about a massacre that happened nearly a century ago. But that does not mean that its words carry no cost. […]

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A recent poll conducted by the International Republican Institute, a pro-democracy pressure group, suggests that the people of Armenia—unlike their brothers and sisters in the diaspora—may be ready for change. Only 3% of respondents said that recognition of the genocide was their first priority. A mere 4% listed it at all. For many, finding a job is their chief worry.

Meanwhile, Turkey has looked the other way as thousands of illegal Armenian migrants have sought work in Istanbul, the former Ottoman capital. Mutual suspicions are beginning to fade as these newcomers are recruited by Turks to care for babies and ageing parents. Armenian tourists, too, braving accusations of treachery back home, have been heading by the thousands to Turkey’s Mediterranean resorts. “Until I met a real Turk, I rather feared them,” confesses Tevan Poghossian, an Armenian pundit, who runs projects to promote Turkish-Armenian dialogue. “Now I go out drinking with them in Yerevan.”

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Despite this burgeoning spirit of reconciliation, however, Turkey has balked at establishing formal ties and insists that Armenia must make the first move. Armenia retorts that it is up to Turkey to prove that its overtures are not designed solely to kill the genocide resolution; to prove its good faith, Turkey should act first. Mr Erdogan’s lieutenants blame the impasse on Turkey’s meddlesome generals, who insist that Armenia must make peace with Azerbaijan before it can make peace with Turkey.

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[…] If Turkey wants to fulfil its dreams of being a regional power and an inspiring example of how Islam and democracy can co-exist, it must make peace with all its citizens, including its Kurds. And it should find a way to face up to its past. It could do worse than seek inspiration from Ataturk who, as Mr Akcam noted in a recent book, once called the Armenian tragedy “a shameful act”.

Meanwhile, AFP reports that divisions among Armenians regarding H.R. 106 extend to those living in Turkey. Following on from the murder of ethnic Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in Istanbul earlier this year, Turkey’s Armenian community fears that if the resolution is put before the U.S. Congress for a full vote in November, it will bear the brunt of repercussions from Turkish ultra-nationalists.

The spiritual leader of Turkey’s tiny Armenian community said Friday he was opposed to a U.S. Congressional bill branding the Ottoman massacres of Armenians as genocide.

“This bill will harm relations both between Turkey and Armenia and between Armenians and Turks in Turkey,” the Istanbul-based Patriarch Mesrob II told Anatolia news agency in Erzurum, eastern Turkey.

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“It is impossible to deny the painful history … (but) now it’s time to consider forward looking policies,” Mesrob II said.

The patriarch complained he was under pressure from the Armenian Diaspora in the United States for his opposition to the bill. “The Diaspora’s arrows of criticism are on us all the time,” he said.

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Turkish Armenians say the U.S. endorsement of the genocide label will also damage a fledgling public debate in Turkey over the massacres, which were a taboo until recently.

The Economist article is here.