What will Erdoğan do after Biden's Armenian genocide recognition?

Murat Yetkin writes: What will Erdoğan do? Will he call back the newly appointed Washington Ambassador Murat Mercan to Ankara for consultations in reaction to Biden? The pro-government media might call it a strong reaction but everyone knows that this does not mean much in today’s diplomacy.

Sunday April 25 2021 11:55 am

Members of the Armenian diaspora rally in front of the Turkish Embassy after U.S. President Joe Biden recognized that the 1915 massacres of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire constituted genocide in Washington, U.S., April 24, 2021.

Duvar English

Prominent journalist Murat Yetkin has penned a piece on U.S. President Joe Biden's recognition of the mass killings of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire as genocide, analyzing Ankara's possible reactions to the move.

"And what will Erdoğan do? Will he call back the newly appointed Washington Ambassador Murat Mercan to Ankara for consultations in reaction to Biden? The pro-government media might call it a strong reaction but everyone knows that this does not mean much in today’s diplomacy," Yetkin said in his piece on Yetkin Report.

"Will he level down diplomatic ties like he did with Egypt and Israel, or ask the U.S. Ambassador to leave the country? Will he cancel the NATO meeting with Biden in June? Will he free hash production like late prime minister Bülent Ecevit did in the past? Will he close the İncirlik military airbase like Süleyman Demirel, another late prime minister and president, did? Or will he order a second batch of S-400 missiles from Russia?" he asked.

Yetkin said that Russia's recognition of the Armenian genocide years ago didn't prevent political and military relations with Moscow from "reaching an unprecedented extent."

"Or with Germany, with France… The U.S. became the 30th country to declare the 1915 deportation as the Armenian genocide. The number may increase after this decision of the U.S.," he said.

Yetkin's piece in full can be read here.