Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev will travel toFrancetoday, as a group mostly consisting of members of the French-Armenian Diaspora prepares to protest his visit.
Aliyev will attend the opening ceremony of the Islamic Arts Hall at theLouvreMuseum, and then meetFrance’s President Francois Hollande at the Elysee Presidential Palace.
Hollande will bring the issue of Safarov’s release to the agenda during his meeting with Aliyev, said Franck Mourad Papazian, a prominent figure in the French-Armenian Diaspora and a member of the ARF Dashnaksutyun, in a telephone interview with Hürriyet Daily News.
The protest of Aliyev’s visit is intended as call for a justice addressed to the entire world, Papzian said. “Aliyev’s government pardoned and promoted Safarov, who killed Gurgen Margaryan just because he was an Armenian. Forgiving a murderer means ignoring and violating international law,” Papazian said. More than 6,000 people all overFranceare expected to attend the protests.
With regard to the French draft law concerning denial of the Armenian genocide, Papazian said the Hollande government will revive the law, and that negotiations to schedule this were ongoing, the Hurriyet Daily News Reports.
