Resolution causing "concern over future of Turkish-US ties":
Turkish President Abdullah Gul has urged his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama to prevent a vote on a resolution branding the Ottoman massacres of Armenians as genocide, Anatolia news agency reported Thursday.
In his message, conveyed through diplomatic channels, Gul said "initiatives to bring the resolution to the agenda" of the House of Representatives were causing "concern over the future of Turkish-U.S. ties," the report said.
Gul told Obama he "should not allow the issue to hijack Turkish-U.S. relations," it added.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan sent a similar message to Obama earlier this week following reports that the Armenian lobby in the United States was pressing for a House vote on the resolution.
The issue already sparked a diplomatic crisis between the two NATO allies in March when the House’s Foreign Affairs Committee narrowly adopted the text.
Ankara recalled its ambassador from Washington and sent him back a month later after the resolution failed to proceed to a full vote in the House at the time.
The non-binding resolution calls on Obama to ensure that U.S. foreign policy reflects an understanding of the "genocide" and to label the killings of Armenians as such in his annual statement on the issue.
Historians estimate that up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely viewed by scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century. Turkey denies that the deaths constituted genocide, saying the toll has been inflated and those killed were victims of civil war and unrest.
The issue is awkward for Obama, who pledged as a presidential candidate to recognize the Armenian deaths as genocide. The administration reversed course, as Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton acknowledged Thursday.
Turkey, a NATO ally with a pivotal role for U.S. interests in the Middle East and Afghanistan, has warned that the resolution’s approval could jeopardize U.S-Turkish cooperation and set back negotiations aimed at opening the border between Turkey and Armenia.
Turkey also currently holds one of the rotating seats on the United Nations Security Council, which will have to approve sanctions against Iran.