CAUCASUS FRIENDSHIP BID FROM ROTARY

Two Armenian, one Azerbaijani, one Georgian and several Turkish Rotary clubs will be meeting at Ankara’s Bilkent Hotel today within the scope of the program.

Members of the Armenian clubs were reportedly traveling by bus and after spending a night in Kars were expected to arrive in Ankara late on Friday.

The program, supported by the United Nations and the governments of Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia, reportedly started as the Public Private Alliance Project of the Rotary Club of New York, but it was only after Governor Erhan Çiftcioğlu Rotary District 2430 — one of the Rotary districts operating in Turkey — rolled up his sleeves with a “Peace is so important that it should not be left only to the politicians” motto and started touring the four countries to garner support for the project that the project became successful.

According to Çiftcioğlu, the Rotary clubs of the Caucasus countries, particularly Armenia were skeptical at the beginning, but on a visit to Yerevan last year he invited a group of young Armenians to visit Turkey.

“Thus, we had the first youth exchange program. Last year we hosted 22 Armenian students in Turkey. They visited Mersin, Cappadocia and Antioch. It was an excellent trip that provided an opportunity to our young Armenian guests to learn about Turkey and the Turkish people. They stayed here for two weeks,” he said. The Rotary governor, speaking with the TDN, said that during a full-day discussion today the Rotarians of the four countries will adopt a set of decisions that will take the project to a new dimension. He said he expected the participants to agree on a youth exchange program as well as programs for increased exchanges between business and academic circles of the four countries and establish some sort of a consultation mechanism to explore what can be done to boost economic and commercial relations between their countries.

19 MARCH/ANKARA – Turkish Daily News