ARMENIA PROTOCOL MAY FACE PARLIAMENT GRIDLOCK

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ANKARA 001487 SIPDIS DEPARTMENT ALSO FOR EUR/SE AND EUR/SE E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/15/2019 TAGS: AJ AM PGOV PREL TU SUBJECT: ARMENIA PROTOCOL MAY FACE PARLIAMENT GRIDLOCK REF: A. ANKARA 5555 ¶B. YEREVAN 722 Classified By: POL Counselor Daniel O'Grady, for reasons 1.4(b,d) ¶1. (C) Summary: Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman, Murat Mercan, told us October 15 that the government will submit the Armenia protocols to him next week for discussion by the Foreign Affairs Committee. He said an agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan on Nagorno-Karabakh is a prerequisite for parliamentary ratification of the Armenia protocols. He does not expect such an agreement in the near term. He claimed the government's skillful management of the issue and implied linkage of Turkish-Armenian rapprochement to an agreement on the Armenian-Azerbaijan dispute prevented any Turkish public outcry over the signing of the protocol. Mercan also advised against US public statements concerning the protocols or pressure on Turkey to ratify it. End Summary ¶2. (C) Murat Mercan, Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman, told us October 15 that the government would submit the recently signed Armenia protocols to him next week. The Turkish MFA confirmed that it already has forwarded the protocols to the Prime Ministry. The Parliament's central protocol office indicated it expects to receive them October ¶21. Mercan, as chairman of the committee, would decide when to submit the protocols to the Foreign Affairs Committee. The committee would then review the protocols and decide whether to send them back to the government for revision or to the floor of the parliament for debate. (Comment: While technically accurate, the former option is not realistic. End Comment.) He stressed that the parliamentary review process would likely take "a long time." ¶3. (C) Mercan said that he does not expect the government, which enjoys a majority in parliament, to impose party discipline on MPs were the protocols to come to a vote. He said that no MPs, including himself, would vote for the protocols right now until and unless they saw substantial progress on Nagorno-Karabakh. He told us that Turkey had learned a lesson from its dealings with the Cyprus Problem in 2004 and that its current view is "once bitten, twice shy." Mercan said that Turkey had lost its leverage once Cyprus was allowed into the EU and it would not let Azerbaijan lose its leverage over Armenia by opening the Turkish-Armenia border before Armenia and Azerbaijan reach an N-K agreement. ¶4. (C) We asked if Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed to a framework on N-K and were negotiating, if that would be enough for Turkish parliamentarians to ratify the protocol. Mercan emphatically replied that, in order to gain support for the protocols in the parliament, Armenia and Azerbaijan would have to reach an N-K agreement and that it would have to be signed and ratified by the two countries. When asked about the Turkish public's seemingly positive response to the signing of the Armenia protocols, Mercan said there had been no outcry because the Government managed to get the message out that without progress on Nagorno-Karabakh the protocol would not be ratified. He said that Prime Minister Erdogan had not changed his stance on the two issues being linked. ¶5. (C) Mercan advised the US against making public statements about the Armenian protocol. He said the USG should not pressure Turkey to ratify it because such a strategy would backfire. He stressed that the US and Turkish governments would not want a repeat of the March 1, 2003 vote which saw the Parliament deny permission to American land forces to invade Iraq from Turkey. Mercan maintained that the opposition parties would use any US public statements concerning the protocols against the government and would claim it was a US initiative. He advised that we should instead pressure the Armenians to reach an agreement with Azerbaijan. ¶6. (C) Comment. Mercan is an AKP hardliner who often assumes an accusatory stance toward the USG (although he is unfailingly courteous and approachable in person). His views on the N-K issue are therefore not a surprise, although he seems somewhat extreme in insisting on ratification of an N-K agreement prior to ratification of the Turkey-Armenia Protocols. Given his key position in Parliament, Mercan's stance confirms the Government will face tough sledding in the ratification process and that the process itself will move slowly. JEFFREY ANKARA 00001487 002 OF 002 "Visit Ankara's Classified Web Site at http://www.intelink.s gov.gov/wiki/Portal:Turkey"