Turkish parliamentarian to head PACE
Mevlut Cavusoglu, head of the Turkish delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) has been elected new President during today's PACE sitting.
Mevlut Cavusoglu of the ruling Justice & Development (AK) Party will replace Lluis Maria de Puig of Spain. He was nominated by the European Democrat and was the only candidate for the post.
The newly-elected PACE President is scheduled to have a press conference at 12:30 local time.
Recall that last autumn Mevlut Cavusoglu linked the Armenian-Turkish peace deal with Karabakh conflict settlement during an interview with A1+.
IN reply to A1+'s observation that the Armenian-Turkish Protocols carry no provision on the Karabakh issue, Mr. Cavusoglu said: "Why do you think we closed the border? We did it because of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. You say a security zone, while we see a few settlements which speak of "occupied territories," so we closed the border for this reason."
Then he continued: Suppose we open the border.
Everything is all right, but tomorrow something happens between Armenia and Azerbaijan and Turkey will have to close the border again. You know our relationship with Azerbaijan."
