Turkey embarrassed by court ruling

Just over one week before it was due to start EU accession negotiations on October 3, Turkey found itself embarrassed on Friday after a court in Istanbul banned a conference to discuss the Armenian genocide 90 years ago that was due to be held at two universities, saying that it needed more information about the qualifications of the speakers and who was paying for the conference.

In the end, the conference went ahead, with heavy police protection, at a third university, but embarrassed a government that has been trying to prove its European credentials.

Suggesting that there was systematic genocide of Armenians by the Turkish military in the first world war, rather than deaths caused by partisan conflict, can still land people in deep trouble.

Novelist Orhan Pamuk faces a jail sentence if he is found guilty of “denigrating Turkish identity” by supporting genocide claims.

But under pressure from the EU, the government has given the go ahead for a debate among historians, rather than politicians.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said the court verdict had “nothing to do with democracy”, Reuters reported, while Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said “There is no one better than us when it comes to harming ourselves.”