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The atmosphere of fear established in Turkey has an impact on voicing the truth about the Armenian Genocide within the country, Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of Armenia's National Academy of Sciences (NAS) Ruben Safrastyan told a press conference on Monday.

In Safrastyan words, in 2016 when the government successfully suppressed the coup attempt by the military, Erdogan strengthened his grip on power, exercising pressures on different layers of the society.

“The atmosphere of fear that was spread throughout the country had certain implications also on isolated cases of voicing the truth about the Armenian Genocide that had been observed over the past couple of years. Regretfully, the voice of few brave Turkish individuals that used to voice the truth is now silenced or weakened,” Safrastyan said, adding the tendency would continue amid Erdogan’s policy of silencing any dissent.

Speaking of the recognition of the Armenian Genocide and the recent activation in the process, the Turkologyst said: “The fact remains that the process of the recognition is activated whenever relations of certain countries worsen with Turkey. On the other hand we should not overlook the fact that the recognition of the Armenian Genocide is not a matter of bilateral relations but an issue of a genocide prevention.”