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French MPs pass 'genocide' bill French MPs pass 'genocide' bill
(10 minutes later)
The French parliament has adopted a bill making it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered "genocide" at the hands of the Turks, infuriating Turkey.The French parliament has adopted a bill making it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered "genocide" at the hands of the Turks, infuriating Turkey.
The bill, which would make genocide denial punishable by a year in jail and a 45,000-euro ($56,400) fine, will now be passed to the Senate and president.The bill, which would make genocide denial punishable by a year in jail and a 45,000-euro ($56,400) fine, will now be passed to the Senate and president.
Turkey has threatened to retaliate with economic sanctions against France.Turkey has threatened to retaliate with economic sanctions against France.
Armenia says Ottoman Turks killed 1.5 million people systematically in 1915 - a claim strongly denied by Turkey.Armenia says Ottoman Turks killed 1.5 million people systematically in 1915 - a claim strongly denied by Turkey.
Free vote
Turkey has been warning France for weeks not to pass the bill.
Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said on Wednesday: "If this bill is passed, Turkey will not lose anything but France will lose Turkey. [France] will turn into a country that jails people who express their views."
The opposition against Turkey in the EU has begun to present an ugly face Cengiz CandarTurkish commentator Turkish press divided
The vote, in the lower house of the French parliament on Thursday morning, was sponsored by the opposition Socialist party.
The ruling Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) did not back the law, but gave its deputies a free vote.
It passed by 106 votes to 19.
EU membership bid
The BBC's Sarah Rainsford in Istanbul says many Turks are angry at what they see as double standards in the EU, where opinions are sharply divided about whether Turkey should be allowed to join.
The official Turkish position states that many Christian Armenians and Muslim Turks died in fighting during World War I - but that there was no genocide.
France's President Chirac and Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy have both said Turkey will have to change that position and recognise the Armenian deaths as genocide before it joins the EU.
Turks argue that while the EU is pressuring Turkey to improve its legislation to ensure full freedom of speech France seems to be moving in the opposite direction.
EU enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn urged France not to adopt the bill, which he said was "counterproductive".
Arguments have raged for decades about the Armenian deaths
Turkish politicians on Wednesday considered a law that would make it a crime to deny that French killings in Algeria in 1945 were genocide.
But Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan objected, saying: "We are not like those who clean dirt with dirt."
France has about 500,000 people of Armenian descent - thought to be the largest Armenian immigrant community in western Europe.
There are accusations in Turkey that the Armenian diaspora and opponents of Turkey's EU membership bid are using this issue to prevent Turkey joining the 25-member bloc.
The Socialist MP and former minister Jack Lang helped to draft an existing French law which recognises that Armenians suffered genocide in Turkey.
But he told the BBC's World Today programme that the new bill was unnecessary.
"I cannot give my vote to a completely stupid law which will punish somebody who expressed free judgement concerning historical facts. It's not acceptable.
"We have to help Turkey to accept, progressively, what was history. I think that this provocation of the French parliament will not help the consciousness in Turkey," he said.