Armenian Genocide resolution "unlikely"

It seems that Bush + Turkey & co 'succeded' again. A number of House members panicky withdrew their support as co-sponsors of the resolution. To get majority seems unlikely now, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may be forced to shelve or postpone it. I felt kind of disgust when read the news (below, via iararat). They used us or got used and then threw away... as usual. Pure 'moral dimension' in politics.

No other source of information confirmed this yet, but it seems likely to be true...

ABC News' George Stephanopoulos reports: "According to Congressional and Bush administration sources, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is now unlikely to bring a resolution which would label the deaths of Armenians in a conflict more than 90 years ago as "genocide".

Pelosi, as recently as Sunday on "This Week", has repeatedly said she would call the controversial but nonbinding resolution for a vote despite the opposition of the Bush administration and warnings that it could damage U.S. relations with Turkey.

President Bush called Speaker Pelosi on Monday night and asked her to pull the bill. But Congressional sources say that Pelosi is telling House members that she will not bring the bill to the floor without majority support.

At least seven House members have withdrawn as co-sponsors of the bill and several more are expected to follow. Key Pelosi ally Rep. John Murtha, D-Penn., is also lobbying against a vote.

Key House members continue to canvass members but don't expect a vote this year."
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Nancy Pelosi: earlier statements (AP)

"I've been in Congress for 20 years, and for 20 years people have been saying the same thing" about the timing being bad, she said. Turkey was seen as having a strategic location in the Cold War as well as the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the current Iraq war.

"Why do it now? Because there's never a good time and all of us in the Democratic leadership have supported" it, she said.

"It is a statement made by 23 other countries. We would be the 24th country to make this statement. Genocide still exists, and we saw it in Rwanda; we see it now in Darfur," she told ABC's "This Week" in an interview broadcast Sunday.

“Some of the things that are harmful to our troops relate to values -- Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, torture. All of those [are] issues about who we are as a country,” Pelosi said. “And I think that our troops are well-served when we declare who we are as a country and increase the respect that people have for us as a nation.”