PARIS, Dec 14 (AFP) - The French government on Tuesday used the word "genocide" for the first time in relation to the 1915-1917 massacre of Armenians during the end of the Ottoman Empire, risking further angering a Turkey already frustrated in its bid to join the European Union.
Foreign Minister Michel Barnier told parliament that France would ask many questions, "notably that of the Armenian genocide," in EU-Turkey negotiations on the membership issue.
Up to now, the French government had avoided the word "genocide", preferring the term "tragedy", although the parliament voted in 2001 to qualify the events as a genocide.
Turkey, which formed the nucleus of the former Ottoman Empire, has disputed the scale and nature of the killing of Armenians, and railed against the term "genocide" used by surviving Armenians and their descendants.
An estimated 1.5 million Armenians are believed to have died between 1915 and 1917 in the last years of the Ottoman empire.
Barnier, responding to an MP's question about Turkey and its ambitions of joining the EU, said Tuesday: "We will ask all the questions -- notably that of the Armenian genocide, notably that of Cyprus -- all through the negotiations."
He said the bloody events "are a wound that does not heal," and added: "This issue is at the very heart of the European project, which is based on reconciliation."
12/14/2004 15:41 GMT - AFP