Epress.am News from Armenia
A Zurich prosecutor on Monday launched an investigation into remarks by Egemen Bağış, Turkey’s EU affairs minister and chief EU negotiator, after he said in Zurich that there was no Armenian Genocide and that Swiss authorities could arrest him if they wanted to, Today’s Zaman reports.
Turkey swiftly responded to the news of investigation, with the Swiss ambassador in Ankara being summoned to the Foreign Ministry on Monday afternoon. Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Feridun Sinirlioğlu, who met Swiss Ambassador Raimund Kunz, demanded an official explanation and informed Kunz that the investigation was “unacceptable,” sources said.
News about the prosecution’s move was published in the Swiss daily Neue Zürcher Zeitung. The Zurich Chief Prosecutor’s Office launched the investigation into Bağış’s remarks — which he made last month in Zurich on his way back from the World Economic Forum at Davos — based on a complaint filed by members of Switzerland’s Armenian community.
Zürich State Prosecutor Christine Braunschweig was quoted by the daily as having said: “Last week we received a petition about this issue, informing us that Mr. Bağış violated the anti-racism Article 261 of the Swiss Penal Code. Our prosecutor’s office has taken this allegation seriously and launched an investigation. We will investigate whether Egemen Bağış uttered words denying the Armenian Genocide as asserted in the petition. We will also see if he has diplomatic immunity. At the end of this, we will press charges against him if there indeed is a violation and if he cannot benefit from diplomatic immunity.”
Cihangir Şahin, Bağış’s press secretary, said the minister will not comment on the issue until the prosecutor’s preliminary investigation is completed.