WASHINGTON, April 12 (UPI) -- Turkish officials are to meet in Washington with an Armenian delegation in an effort to repair bilateral relations.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is to meet his Armenian counterpart Serzh Sargsyan on the sidelines of a nuclear conference in Washington.
Erdogan, prior to his departure to Washington, dispatched Feridun Sinirlioglu, an undersecretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to Armenia to discuss bilateral ties, the official Anadolu news agency reports Monday.
Turkish relations with Armenia were complicated by claims of genocide during the Ottoman Empire. Recent ties were strained further over issues regarding the region of Nagorno-Karabakh, an area of dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia.
Turkey reacted angrily to a series of measures passed in Sweden and the United States that described the killing of Armenians in World War I as genocide. The Turkish envoy to Washington was recalled briefly when a measure narrowly passed March 4 in the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Leaders from Turkey and Armenia met in October, however, to sign protocols aimed at restoring bilateral ties following years of acrimony.
The protocols outline a series of provisions, ranging from a bilateral denunciation of terrorism to stating a "willingness to chart a new pattern and course for their relations on the basis of common interests, goodwill and in pursuit of peace, mutual understanding and harmony."
