WASHINGTON, Oct 11: The White House, fearing fallout on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, battled on Thursday to repair ties with Turkey after a US vote to label the World War I massacre of Armenians as “genocide.” “Turkey is playing a critical role in the war on terror and this action is problematic for everything we’re trying to do in the Middle East and would cause great harm to our efforts,” White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said.

After the resolution was adopted by the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday, President George Bush’s administration said it would lobby the full Democratic-led chamber against it.

“We are going to be continuing to work with Congress on this and try and see if we can keep it from passing on the floor,” State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey told reporters.

But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stressed: “It has come out of committee and it will go to the floor.” Reports said a debate by the chamber as a whole was likely in November.

Fueling tensions, Turkey’s government will formally ask parliament next week to approve an incursion into northern Iraq to crack down on Kurdish rebels taking refuge there, according to a ruling party official.

The Bush administration, worried about destabilising one of the few pockets of calm in Iraq, has urged Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government against a cross-border raid on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

According to the Armenians, 1.5 million of their kinsmen were killed from 1915 to 1923 under an Ottoman Empire campaign of deportation and murder.

Rejecting the genocide label, Turkey argues that 250,000 to 500,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks died in civil strife when Armenians took up arms for independence during World War I.

Asked whether she was concerned a heated House debate could damage the crucial alliance between the United States and its Nato partner Turkey, Pelosi said she had been hearing such talk for 20 years.

“This isn’t about the Erdogan government, this is about the Ottoman Empire,” the Democratic speaker added.

Speaking in London, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said that 70 per cent of air cargo, 30 per cent of fuel shipments and 95 per cent of new mine resistant armoured vehicles destined for US forces in Iraq go through Turkey.

“The Turks have been quite clear about some of the measures they would have to take if this resolution passes,” he said, citing the example of Turkish sanctions against France.

Since the French lower house called the Armenians’ suffering a genocide in 2006, Turkey has refused to grant overflight rights to the French air force, Egemen Bagis, vice chairman of Erdogan’s ruling party, said in Washington.

If Turkey withdraws US access to the vast Incirlik air base, “just imagine what this will do to the United States,” he said at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Incirlik is a major staging point for US military supplies bound for Iraq and Afghanistan.

“Those who claim Turkey is bluffing should not mock Turkey on live TV,” Bagis said after several House members suggested in Wednesday’s debate that any Turkish reaction would be short-lived.

The official added that Turkish frustration over the PKK was reaching a boiling point, and that the “only remedy” to the Armenia vote was US cooperation against the Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq.

Hailing the House panel’s vote, Armenian President Robert Kocharian said:

“The fact that Turkey has adopted a position of denial of genocide does not mean that it can bind other states to deny the historic truth as well.” But Ankara continued to simmer over what President Abdullah Gul denounced as “petty games of domestic politics” by US lawmakers, with many of the House panel members from districts with large ethnic-Armenian communities.

“We still hope that the House of Representatives will have enough good sense not to take this resolution further,” a Turkish government statement said.

—AFP