Outrage over Kobe Bryant Turkish Airlines deal

(12-16) 05:26 PST Los Angeles, CA (AP) --

Kobe Bryant's two-year Turkish Airlines endorsement deal has enraged some Armenian Americans who are threatening to boycott the Los Angeles Lakers basketball star if he doesn't back out of the contract.

Turkish Airlines says Bryant will appear next year as its "global brand ambassador" in advertisements promoting the March start of nonstop flights between Istanbul and Los Angeles.

There are up to 700,000 Armenian Americans in California, with most of them in the Los Angeles area, and Armenian National Committee of America executive director Aram Hamparian tells the Los Angeles Times that many of them are furious over Bryant's deal with Turkey's state carrier.

Armenian Youth Federation member Caspar Jivalagian says there is already a serious backlash with callers saying, "I hate Kobe" and "I won't watch the Lakers anymore."

Turkey has long denied that 1.5 million Armenian deaths between 1915 and 1919 constituted genocide and instead describes the deaths as resulting from civil unrest that accompanied the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.

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Information from: Los Angeles Times, www.latimes.com