A Zurich prosecutor on Monday launched an investigation into remarks by Egemen Bağış, Turkey's EU affairs minister and chief EU negotiator, after he said in Zurich that there was no Armenian genocide and that Swiss authorities could arrest him if they wanted to, Today's Zaman reports.

The story was reported in the Swiss daily Neue Zürcher Zeitung. The investigation into Bağış's remarks- which he made last month in Zurich on his way back from the World Economic Forum at Davos - based on a complaint filed by members of Switzerland's Armenian community.

"There is no Armenian genocide. Let them arrest me," Bağış said last week following a question from a French reporter on the 1915 killings.

Zürich State Prosecutor Christine Braunschweig was quoted by the paper as having said: “Last week we received a petition about this issue, informing us that Mr. Bağış violated the anti-racism Article 261 of the Swiss Penal Code. Our prosecutor's office has taken this allegation seriously and launched an investigation. We will investigate whether Egemen Bağış uttered words denying the Armenian genocide as asserted in the petition. We will also see if he has diplomatic immunity. At the end of this, we will press charges against him if there indeed is a violation and if he cannot benefit from diplomatic immunity.”

Last week, in response to a question from a French journalist on what he thought of a bill criminalizing denial of the Armenian genocide adopted by the French Senate in January, Bağış said: “Here I am in Switzerland today, and I'm saying the 1915 incidents did not amount to genocide. Let them come arrest me.”