Tuna Bekleviç was a Turkish Government Project: Turkologist

By not displaying political will and not ratifying the Armenia-Turkey Protocols, the Turkish government put the process in a deadlock, said Yerevan State University Faculty of Oriental Studies Deputy Dean,Turkologist Ruben Melkonyan, while speaking to journalists in Yerevan today.

“And now the Turkish authorities [display] a volume of imitation [i.e. artificial] activities: they are speaking of the so-called ‘silent diplomacy’ of Zurich 2, and recently public diplomacy has become active,” said the Turkologist, pointing to Powerful Turkey Party members’ recent visit to Armenia. 

According to him, the initiative of Powerful Turkey Party (Güçlü Türkiye Partisi, GTP) leader Tuna Bekleviç and his GTP colleagues was comprised of two plans:

“‘Plan Maximum’: to meet with representatives of Armenia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs; and ‘Plan Minimum’: to invite [the media] to a press conference in Armenia, which took place thanks to certain individuals [referring to local press club “Hayatsk”],” he said, laughing during the second half of his statement.

According to Melkonyan, it was a cheap move on the part of Turkey’s authorities. 

“The statements by Powerful Turkey Party leaders of having crossed the Armenia-Turkey border prove two things: either they’re liars, they didn’t cross the border, or they’re criminals, they broke the state law,” he said.

If, in any case, they did cross the border, added Melkonyan, they did so from Turkey and crossed a neutral zone, which, according to the Turkologist, is possible only with the permission of the Turkish government.

“This once again proves their [the Turkish government’s] participation in this issue,” he added.