Turkey ally Azerbaijan condemned on Friday a U.S. House panel resolution on the 1915 killing of Armenians as a blow to regional stability and to efforts to resolve a conflict over Armenian-backed Nagorno-Karabakh.

The Azeri parliament unanimously adopted a strongly worded statement saying the resolution, which labelled the mass killings by Ottoman Turks as genocide, "damages efforts to restore peace and stability in the region."
 

Azerbaijan traditionally sees any affirmation of historical Armenian grievances against Turkey as, by extension, an expression of support for Armenia in the festering conflict over the rebel Azeri region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
 

Azerbaijan believes Western support for Armenia will only harden Yerevan's resolve against compromising on Nagorno-Karabakh.
 

"The adoption of the resolution [...] could reduce to zero all previous efforts to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh problem," the statement said.
 

The Armenian-populated mountain territory, backed by Christian Armenia, broke away from Muslim oil producer Azerbaijan in fighting that erupted as the Soviet Union headed towards its 1991 collapse. Some 30,000 people died.

No full peace deal
A ceasefire was agreed in 1994, but without a full peace deal the spectre of conflict continues to hang over the South Caucasus, where pipelines carry Azeri oil and gas from the Caspian Sea to the West.
 

Tensions over Nagorno-Karabakh have been rising since Turkey and Armenia last year moved to overcome the legacy of the World War One mass killings and deportations, signing accords to establish diplomatic ties and open their border.
 

Turkey closed the border in 1993 in solidarity with Azerbaijan during the war. Azerbaijan reacted angrily to the rapprochement, and Turkey has since backed away from ratifying the deal without Armenian concessions on Nagorno-Karabakh.
 

The US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee voted 23-22 on Thursday to approve a nonbinding resolution calling on President Barack Obama to ensure U.S. policy formally refers to the 1915 killings as genocide.
 

The vote opened the way for the measure possibly to be considered by the full House, although it was unclear whether it would come to a vote there, and if so whether it could pass, given the closer-than-expected count on Thursday.
 

Source: Reuters