Pelosi: Vote to label as genocide mass killing of Armenians in doubt

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday that prospects were uncertain whether members will vote on Armenian genocide after several members pulled their support of a proposed resolution because of fears it would cripple US relations with Turkey. "Whether it will come up or not, or what the action will be, remains to be seen," Democrat Pelosi, who controls the House's agenda, told reporters. The remark marks a weakening of Pelosi's previous position. Both she and the House majority leader, her second-in-command in the chamber, earlier pledged that if the resolution should clear the Foreign Affairs Committee, the full House would vote on it by year's end. The House proposal, which would label as genocide the killing of Armenians a century ago by Ottoman Turks, has inflamed US tensions with Turkey, which says the death toll has been inflated and the Armenians died during civil unrest, not organized genocide.