French Armenian genocide denial law ruled unconstitutional
The French Constitutional Council on Tuesday struck down a draft law that would have criminalized the denial of an Armenian genocide by the Ottoman Turks, legislation that has soured relations between France and Turkey. - The controversy over the bill is likely to persist, however. President Nicolas Sarkozy, who backed the legislation, vowed to submit a new bill with revised language. He has in the past indicated that he would push to see that denial of an Armenian genocide is made a crime even if the council ruled against the draft law. Mr. Sarkozy offered no indication on Tuesday as to how he thought a new bill might overcome the objections of the council, which ruled that “the legislature did unconstitutional harm to the exercise of freedom of expression and communication” in approving the legislation.