The government has imposed tough restrictions on U.S. military bases in Turkey to protest a move by the U.S. Congress to honor Armenians killed by Turks in the last years of the Ottoman Empire, officials said Friday.
The officials said Turkey took the "drastic action" to show the United States how sensitive Turkey is to the Armenian genocide, which Turkey claims never took place.Last week the Senate approved a proposal sponsored by Republican Sen. Robert Dole of Kansas to set aside April 24, 1990, as a day of reflection on the massacre of Armenians in eastern Anatolia between 1915 and 1923.
Turkey fears the official memorial day will lead to acts of terrorism by Armenian radicals against Turkish diplomats.
Shortly after the Senate vote, Turkey halted visits by U.S. Navy ships to Turkish ports and supsended meetings on military cooperation between the two countries, a Turkish military source said.
"Turkey now knows that without some drastic action where it hurts most, it would not be able to make Americans understand how sensitive it is about the Armenian issue," the source said.
Government officials said Turkey was also blocking construction projects at U.S. military facilities in a reprisal move.
The United States has about a dozen military facilities on Turkish soil, including sensitive listening posts along the Black Sea coast to monitor Soviet troop movements and nuclear tests.
The bases in Turkey became more important to the United States after it lost its bases in Iran in 1979.
The Istanbul newspaper Gunes reported Turkey was restricting U.S. reconnaissance flights from an air base at Incirlik in southeastern Turkey.
Ankara also ordered a halt to training flights of U.S. F-16 aircraft from Konya, in central Turkey, and has asked the United States to reduce from 36 to 24 the number of military aircraft at Incirlik, Gunes said.
Turkey is one of the staunchest U.S. allies in the region and receives substantial U.S. economic assistance.