French singer Aznavour criticized by Turkey, Armenian diaspora upon remarks

French-Armenian musician Charles Aznavour has been criticized by both Turkey and the Armenian diaspora in Switzerland following his remarks on the death of Armenian people in 1915 at the hands of the Ottomans and his proposals for normalization of Turkey-Armenia relations. Aznavour, who is Armenia's ambassador to Switzerland and permanent delegate to the United Nations office in Geneva, criticized Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan last week in a televised interview in Switzerland, without naming him. He claimed that the Turkish prime minister once said he hates Greeks and Armenians, saying that a prime minister cannot say such things. In a written statement released on Saturday, the Foreign Ministry said: "We cannot understand what his stated claims are based on. We strongly reject this groundless and meaningless accusation. The Turks have long coexisted peacefully with the Armenians and Greeks." The Turkish statement, however, welcomed Aznavour's offering proposals on the normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations as a world-famous "man of art and intellectual." Meanwhile, Aznavour's remarks have also drawn a reaction from the Armenian diaspora in Switzerland, though from a different viewpoint. Secretary-General of the Swiss parliament's Switzerland-Armenia parliamentary friendship group Sarkis Shahinian issued a press release criticizing Aznavour's remarks for their "banalization" on the so-called Armenian genocide. "Turks are using the word 'mass killing' -- let them use it," said Aznavour, maintaining that he would not ask for anything other than the opening of the border between the two countries and recognition of historical events between the two nations. He, however, also stated that he does not care about using the word "genocide" when defining the 1915 events, claiming that a simple recognition of the killings is necessary and sufficient. Aznavour mentioned that he found it "ridiculous" and "pitiful" that young Armenians are writing more books by the day and vast libraries could be filled with all of their efforts spent on the question. He said that the issue is also a burden on young Turks. But Aznavour's constructive remarks on the normalization of Turkey-Armenia ties, recalling that Turkey and Armenia share a border and there are economic -- even if informal -- and tourism relations between the two countries, have angered the Armenian diaspora. Shahinian's statement, released after Aznavour's interview, asked the Armenian government "what they aim for with having themselves represented in the international arena by a person [Aznavour] who fails to grasp the struggle in its totality for the recognition of a crime related to the destruction of his own people." The statement also accused Aznavour of "throwing to the wind a long struggle in Switzerland which provided for a unique judicial opinion making it illegal to deny [the so-called Armenian genocide]."