Controversial Conference On Armenian Massacre In Turkey
September 24, 2005
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24 September 2005 -- A conference on the massacre of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire started today in Turkey despite objections from Turkish nationalist groups.
The two-day conference had been planned to start yesteday, but an Istanbul court on 22 September demanded the panel be cancelled. Organizers say the court banned the conference venue but not the meeting itself, and have rescheduled it at a different location in Istanbul.
Some 30 members of the ultraright Nationalist Action Party demonstrated outside the site of the conference today,
booing participants as they entered the conference building and shouting "cad" at them.
Some 150 supporters of left-wing workers party carried a banner saying "The Armenian genocide is an international lie." Armenians claim up to 1.5 million of their people were massacred under the Ottoman Empire during World War I.
(AFP)
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