BURSA: The presidents of Turkey and Armenia attended a World Cup soccer match together on Wednesday in a show of unity meant to help defuse opposition to a deal reopening their border and restoring relations.
“We are not writing history. We are making history,” Turkish President Abdullah Gul said, according to CNN Turk.
Gul greeted Armenian leader Serzh Sarksyan with a warm handshake at a hotel before the match — a gesture unthinkable only a few years ago for two peoples divided over a century by rancor rooted in the World War I killings of Armenians.
Gul visited Yerevan last year for the first leg of what has been called “soccer diplomacy” and the two countries signed a landmark peace accord on Saturday.
The agreement could help stabilize the south Caucasus with its vulnerable energy corridor and ease Armenia’s geographical isolation. But it is resisted by nationalists in both countries as well as by Turkish ally and oil and gas producer Azerbaijan. Both parliaments must approve it.
“Today is a really historic day and I really wanted to be here,” Sayat Tekir, an Armenian-born student living in Turkey, said on a tour bus on its way to the match in Bursa. “There has definitely been a new openness in Turkish-Armenian relations over the last decade. We can also discuss history and 1915, which we couldn’t do before,” Tekir, 25, said.
A group of several dozen nationalists held a demonstration in Bursa to protest the peace accord, gathering behind a banner which said: “The protocol of betrayal is unacceptable”. Waving Turkish and Azerbaijan flags, the protesters chanted: “We did not commit genocide, we defended the homeland” and “the people of Azerbaijan are not alone”.
Neither team in the qualifier has a chance of making it to the World Cup finals.
Unprecedented security for the match underlined how much is at stake. Neither side wants to give ammunition to opponents of Armenian-Turkish normalization.
The match at the 18,600-capacity stadium is by invitation only, with a large chunk of guests police academy students. The Armenian Football Federation was given 100 tickets.
The game in Bursa, a former Ottoman imperial city, will give the presidents a chance to discuss some of the thornier issues and potential pitfalls surrounding the protocols.
While Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has said the protocols would be submitted to Parliament next week, many observers are skeptical of any approval before development on disputed territories, including Nagorno-Karabakh, to satisfy Azerbaijan.
