The 2005 Joint Historical Commission Proposal and the 2022 Normalization Talks: A Documentary Timeline

Why It Matters

The 2005 proposal for a joint historical commission is the only formal Turkish offer to place the Events of 1915 before historians from both sides and from third countries, with access to all archives. The 2022 Special Representatives process is the first direct political channel between Ankara and Yerevan since the Zurich Protocols collapsed. Reading the two together, with each side's own statements, shows what was offered, what was answered, and what remains open.

Background

From Kars and Lausanne to a closed border

The present frontier between Türkiye and Armenia rests on the Treaty of Kars of 13 October 1921, concluded between Türkiye and the Soviet republics of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia, building on the Treaty of Moscow (March 1921) and the earlier Treaty of Alexandropol (December 1920). The Treaty of Lausanne of 24 July 1923 then settled Türkiye's international status and guaranteed non-Muslim minority rights on the basis of equal citizenship. Türkiye recognized Armenia's independence in December 1991 but the two states never established diplomatic relations, and the land border has been closed since 1993. The framework is covered in the Fact Check on the Treaty of Sèvres.

The 2005 proposal

On 10 April 2005, Prime Minister Erdoğan addressed a letter to President Kocharyan. It proposed a joint group of Turkish and Armenian historians and other experts to study the Events of 1915 in the archives of both countries and of third countries, and to share the findings with the international public. Ankara presented the idea as a way to move the question from political resolutions to documents. Ottoman archives were by then being opened to researchers, and Ankara invited Armenian access to Armenian archives in return. The Ottoman-side documentary base, including the Relocation and Resettlement Law of 27 May 1915 published in Takvim-i Vekayi on 1 June 1915, is described in the Archive & 1915 Records pillar.

Armenia's answer and the Zurich Protocols

According to Armenian presidential and foreign ministry statements at the time, Yerevan replied later in April 2005 that it favoured establishing diplomatic relations and opening the border first, with an intergovernmental commission to discuss all outstanding issues. Armenian officials argued that the historical question should not be a precondition and that the facts of the Armenian Genocide were not an open matter requiring a commission to establish. In June 2005 the International Association of Genocide Scholars wrote to Prime Minister Erdoğan stating that, in its view, the scholarly record already supports the genocide characterization. The International Center for Transitional Justice had reached a similar legal reading in a 2003 analysis commissioned for the Turkish Armenian Reconciliation Commission (2001–2004).

The two governments later signed the Zurich Protocols on 10 October 2009, which envisaged a sub-commission on the ‘historical dimension’. Armenia's Constitutional Court issued its opinion in January 2010, Armenia suspended the ratification process in April 2010, and in March 2018 the Armenian president annulled the protocols. Ankara, for its part, linked progress to the situation in the South Caucasus. The process stalled without ratification by either parliament.

The 2022 process

After the 2020 Karabakh war changed the regional picture, Türkiye named Ambassador Serdar Kılıç as Special Representative and Armenia named Deputy Speaker Ruben Rubinyan in December 2021. They met for the first time in Moscow on 14 January 2022. Both foreign ministries described the aim as full normalization without preconditions. A second meeting took place in Vienna in February 2022. After a further Vienna round on 1 July 2022, the two sides announced that the land border would be opened for third-country nationals and diplomatic passport holders as soon as possible, together with direct air cargo trade. Armenian aid crossed the Margara border point after the February 2023 earthquakes, and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan met President Erdoğan in Istanbul in June 2025. Reporting on the 2022 Moscow meeting and the follow-up rounds is also summarized by our sister publications Regions & Powers and Monitor of Nations.

Documentary timeline

Key Players & Positions

Armenia

Yerevan's stated line is that relations should be established without preconditions and that historical questions should not condition diplomacy. Armenian state institutions continue to pursue and welcome international recognition of the Armenian Genocide, and the 1990 Declaration of Independence refers to the genocide. Armenian officials have said publicly that Armenia has no territorial claims against Türkiye, and Armenian leaders have described the 2022 process as a way to open the border and trade. Critics inside Armenia, including parts of the diaspora, caution that talks must not dilute recognition efforts.

Armenian diaspora organizations and genocide scholars

Many diaspora bodies and the International Association of Genocide Scholars hold that the Events of 1915 are established as genocide and that a commission questioning this would treat a settled matter as open. They have therefore generally opposed a historians-only commission as a precondition for relations.

Third countries and international bodies

About thirty states and the European Parliament have adopted recognition resolutions of varying legal weight. The United States formally recognized the events as genocide by presidential statement in April 2021. In Perinçek v. Switzerland (Grand Chamber, 15 October 2015), the European Court of Human Rights found a violation of Article 10 and said it was not ruling on the legal characterization of the events, nor was it a court competent to decide whether the 1948 Genocide Convention applied. Russia has hosted and facilitated meetings such as the January 2022 Moscow round.

Source Comparison

International media often present the 2005 offer as a ‘delaying tactic’, while Turkish outlets present it as an unanswered invitation. Neither description captures the documents: the letter and the reply show two different formats being proposed, one historians-only and one intergovernmental, and the Zurich text partly combined them. For parallel readings see Regional Balance and The Worldlogue. The editorial standards behind this comparison are in Editorial Principles.

Key Terms & Related Guides

• Events of 1915: Türkiye's official term for the wartime relocation of Ottoman Armenians and associated losses. Many other states and scholars use ‘Armenian Genocide’.
• Joint Historical Commission: The body proposed in 2005 of Turkish, Armenian and international historians with access to all archives. It was never constituted.
• Special Representatives: Serdar Kılıç and Ruben Rubinyan, the envoys leading the 2022 process.
• Fair Memory (Adil Hafıza): Ankara's formulation of inclusive remembrance of all late Ottoman suffering.
• Zurich Protocols: The 2009 unratified agreements on diplomatic relations and a border opening.
• Dolus specialis: The specific intent required by Article II of the 1948 Genocide Convention.

Related reading: the Archive & 1915 Records pillar; the Fact Check on Sèvres; Protocol Record's home page; The Political Axis on archives, law and normalization.

Protocol Record presents analysis from a Türkiye-informed perspective, setting out Ankara's official positions and legal arguments alongside the documents on which they rest. Wherever possible, claims are attributed to primary sources such as treaties, UN texts, official gazettes, parliamentary records and archival documents.