President Mr. Abdullah Gül conducted an official visit to the US last week and during this visit, he held a meeting with representatives of selected Turkish Associations on January 9, 2008, in Washington, D.C. The meeting was hosted by Ambassador Nabi Sensoy at the Turkish Embassy and President Gül was accompanied by Turkey’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Mr. Ali Babacan. TACAM also received an invitation to this meeting and Didem Şeyhoğlu attended on behalf of our organization.
President Gül spent an hour with representatives of the Turkish Associations nationwide – he first gave a speech, discussing the Turkish-American relations and expressed his satisfaction from the meetings he held with President Bush and other US Government officials. He then emphasized the importance of Turks working together in the US to ensure our voice is heard and also pointed out that it’s our unity in connection with our relations with State and Government representatives is what will make us successful in presenting Turkey. Mr. Gül also asked us to work very hard on bringing the truth out in the matter of Armenian allegations of the genocide. Once the floor was open for remarks and questions, Didem Şeyhoğlu had a chance to tell our President about the “Armenian Genocide” essay competition in Michigan and how its announcements on WWJ Detroit radio were stopped through
TACAM members’ hard work together with the Turkish Consulate in Chicago. Then, she asked our President his recommendations to Turkish Associations in an effort to be proactive on this matter in line with Turkey’s foreign policy. His answer was focused on educating the community on the historic facts of this issue and working closely with our Consulate for strategic actions.
We were very excited to be a part of this meeting as TACAM and wanted to share the news with all friends of the Turkish-American community in Michigan. Attached are also couple pictures taken at the meeting last week.