Q: Have you seen the sheer number of people that are outside I mean what does this say to you? How impressive is this?

AMB:  I think it is an immense outpouring by tens of thousands of Turkish citizens who are making a statement here about what they hope Turkey will be and what they want it to be. 

Q:  The fact that there are Turks, Armenians, there are Kurds there are people from every walk of life.  Is that significant?

AMB:  Of course it is.  There are people here, Turks, I think, from all over the country.  There are certainly many foreigners who have come, both from Ankara and from outside the country, to pay respects to this man, to what he represented, to the values of freedom of speech, the importance of reconciliation and mutual understanding.  Hrant Dink was a very influential figure in this country.

Q: And, obviously, some of his friends speaking of him say this is exactly what Hrant Dink wanted.  This is what he wanted, everybody to get together.  I mean, do you think that his death is not in vain?  That something good has come of this?

AMB:  He stood for and advocated not only for freedom of speech, but also for reconciliation and mutual understanding, in particular, among Turks and Armenians.  I think, and I certainly hope that this outpouring here, the very emotional outpouring we see on the street will lead to the kind of reconciliation that we all want to see here. And certainly he very much wanted to see. 

Q:  You yourself have been Ambassador here since December 2005, have you seen anything like this before in Istanbul?

AMB:  I have not seen anything like this in Istanbul.  I believe that there was another journalist who was murdered here a number of years ago.  A similar, very emotional outpouring.  This obviously is a little bit different because it is an Armenian Turk or a Turkish Armenian, who stood for some very particular things at a time when Turkey is undergoing some important transitions.  It is opening its society.  It is trying to draw itself to the West, the European Union especially. His loss is very emotionally felt by a lot of people.

Q:  And the fact that there are so many different nationalities here.  There are Ambassadors from I think about seven or eight different countries.  And the fact that the Turkish government invited the Armenian diaspora and the Armenian Foreign Minister.  What does that say, how much has Turkey changed?

AMB:  Well, I think and I certainly hope that people connected with the government here saw this as an opportunity to reach out to Armenians in Armenia, to Armenians in the United States, to Armenians in Europe in the very spirit of reconciliation that Hrant Dink had talked about and advocated for.  So it is a good step.  I think all of us hope that the government here will follow this up and that the public will follow it up to take steps to bring people together in a better way and build a better Turkey for the future.

Q:  And if I can follow on from that, what happens in the future?  Obviously, I know you don’t want to speak specifically about it, but congress is going to decide, France has already decided that it should be called a genocide.  How important is this at this point and what will happen in the future?

AMB:  I think the important point here today is that there are thousands of people, citizens of this country and elsewhere, who are mourning the loss of a man, who talked about reconciliation and talked about understanding, talked about dealing with the past.  All of those things are important.  I hope that that will be the focus today.

Q:  Very good, thank you very much.

AMB: Thank you.