Bundestag's Vote on Armenian Genocide Delayed Over Policy on Turkey

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The German parliament's vote recognizing the genocide of the Armenians by the Ottoman Empire had been postponed due to the ruling coalition's "fake diplomacy" toward Ankara, German lawmaker from Die Linke party Sevim Dagdelen told Sputnik on Thursday.

Earlier in the day, Germany joined the ranks of European countries recognizing the 1915-1916 mass killings of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire as genocide. Before the vote,  proposed by lawmakers from the ruling coalition of Conservatives and Socialists together with the Green party, Ankara said its relations with Germany would deteriorate in case the resolution was passed.

"This resolution was discussed last year, and its adoption had been delayed because of a false diplomacy of the CDU/CSU [the ruling coalition under Chancellor Angela Merkel] and the SPD [Social Democratic Party] towards the Turkish authorities because of Turkey's part in NATO," Dagdelen said.

The Armenian genocide was a series of mass killings ordered by the Ottoman government during and after World War I. Turkey refuses to recognize the massacre as genocide, claiming that Turkish nationals were also victimized. A number of states all around the world, including Russia and major Western powers, have recognized and condemned the crime of genocide against the Armenians.