A US House of Representatives committee will on September 28 give the green light for full House consideration of a bill recognizing the 1915 killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire as genocide, a panel source said Monday.
The measure, which the source said would clear the House International Relations Committee in a Thursday vote, has inflamed Turkey and threatens to cast a pall over bilateral relations between allies Washington and Ankara.
It was not clear when the full House will take up the measure, but the US Congress is scheduled to end its legislative year October 6.
Ankara has said the bill is based on "false and distorted data," and Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit has called it the work of "irresponsible" US lawmakers.
Armenia maintains that up to 1.3 million of its people were massacred, while Turkey puts the figure at around 300,000.
Turkey rejects claims of genocide, saying that thousands of Turks also died in what was internal fighting during the dissolution years of the Ottoman Empire.
On Sunday, demonstrators took to the streets in front of the US consulate in Turkey's southern city of Adana Sunday, burned an Armenian flag and destroyed US-made goods to protest the bill -- WASHINGTON (AFP)
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