Syria Humbles and Horrifies

PHOTO from Evrensel
Leftist demonstrators in Taksim protest imperialist intervention in the Middle East and Syria.

Speaking in Tunis today, President Gul unequivocally proclaimed Turkey's opposition to intervention in Syria emanating from outside the region. The statement comes days after the president and Prime Minister Erdogan called for a humanitarian corridor to be opened in order to mollify the suffering of the Syrian people. Gul's statement should serve as a warning for American policymakers that despite what some in Washington have taken to be Turkey's refreshingly aggressive position against the Syrian regime.

Turkey is essentially between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, the Turkish public is increasingly angered by UN reports putting the death toll of Syrians at 35,000, horror stories broadcast on Turkish television from Hatay where over 10,000 refugees have sought haven on the Turkish border, and particular disgust among many who are more than angered at a Shi'a regime killing mostly Sunnis. Yet, at the same time, Turks are nervous. The border shared with Turkey is over 900 km across, and most are more than nervous (and rightfully so) that conflict in Syria could spill over the border and result in an influx of refugees and, worst of all, Turkish military involvement in what could be a very protracted civil war.

Further, concern that the United States could be goading Turkey into a war is also growing, and the more bellicose the statements coming from American policymakers (for instance, John McCain), the greater the concern. There is also, of course, concern about antagonizing Iran, upon which Turkey heavily relies for natural gas. The installment of a missile defense shield in Malatya, while pleasing to the United States, has jeopardized relations with Iran. It is doubtful that Prime Minister Erdogan's planned March 28 trip to Tehran will result in a re-setting of relations, and recent tensions are likely one reason why Turkey is seeking to host P5+1 talks on the Iranian nuclear issue.

Add into the mix the issue of destabilizing the Kurds in Syria, which Assad kept quiscent and among which Turkish media are already rumoring are now in cahoots with the PKK, as well as fears of al-Qa'ida and the possibility of a more complicated situation in Iraq as sectarians in that tension increase, Turks are understandably nervous.

As the situation intensifies, so does Turkish ambivalence, and so where does this leave Turkish support for a humanitarian corridor? Some Turkish officials have already stated that they are in support of a corridor that would be open to the Mediterranean rather than the Turkish border. This alone implies support for a multilateral effort, and one that would likely include players other than just the Arab League. And while Gul and Erdogan have called for a corridor, they have declined to comment further on how it would be executed.

Essentially, Syria is a wake up call for Turkey. It is simply impossible to have zero problems with neighbors, and especially in such a difficult neighborhood. Further, the idea that Turkey might go-it-alone is also likely to lose weight. As Barcin Yinanc elucidates:

Every time I see Turkey make an effort to mobilize international support to end the bloodshed in Syria, I cannot help but recall the results of the Transatlantic Trends survey conducted by the German Marshall Fund. When asked in the 2009 survey with which Turkey should cooperate most closely, the EU or the US, some 43 percent said Turkey should act alone – nearly twice the percentage of those favoring cooperation with the EU and ten times that favoring cooperation with the US. In 2010 this rate dropped to 34 percent, while in 2011 it has gone down further to 27 percent.

I am assuming that this rate might drop even further in the 2012 poll, if the Turkish public continues to hear complaints such as that voiced by Cemil Çicek, the Parliament speaker, which put the situation with Syria in unequivocal terms. “Don’t wind us up on that issue (Syria). No one should be so cunning, watching [the conflict in Syria] like a football game and leaving it to Turkey to handle,” Çiçek said last week in an interview with a media outlet from Saudi Arabia.

Çiçek described as “cunning” those who are taking the easy way out of the Syrian crisis by saying, “let’s leave the dirty work to Turkey.” Indeed, most probably they recall Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu’s famous statement from last year, when he addressed Turkey’s ambassadors. Davutoğlu said that Turkish diplomats would not only be like firefighters, rushing to stop crises in any corner of the world, but also like city planners, meaning that they would pursue a policy of preventing crises from happening.

It happens that Turkey’s firefighters have proven unable to extinguish the fire right next door. And naturally not a day goes by without an article appearing in the international press emphasizing the contrast between Turkey’s rhetoric and its real capacity to deliver.

And as this is one fire that is unlikely to easily be put out, Turks are waking up to the call that multilateralism is a must in Syria. Ironically, the current imbroglio across the Middle East--from Turkey's troubled relationship with Israel, Iran, and more recently, Iraq--might renew support for multilateralism and a more humble vision of Turkish foreign policy. This is refreshing for liberals who fear that the AKP's expansionist foreign policy have caused the government to take its eyes off of the European accession process (for those liberals who ever did think, much more still think, this is still a serious ambition of the government).

At the end of the day, and despite all the rhetoric otherwise and the rather proud and ambitious overreaching of Turkey's foreign policy, Turkey has been and will likely remain realist in its foreign policy orientation. Syria is humbling, and in the most horrible of ways since the reality is brought home by the enormous difficulties inherent in rendering aid and defense against mass human rights abuses -- brutality that Turks watch every night on television before going to bed, and know is occurring just to their south.

Yinanc says this is not a good time for Turkey to learn lessons, implying it is not a good time for Turkey to continue its Middle East adventuring. Yet, it seems there are other lessons to be learned.

Eksi Sozluk: A Model for the Middle East?

Eksi Sozluk (or, "Sour Dictionary") is an Internet compendium of information comprised by numerous authors similar to Wikipedia. From The Next Web.com:

The site has 36,000 authors, and an equal number of users who hope to become authors. It contains more than 10 million entries, gathered into more than 2.5 million topics, and it attracts 7.5 million unique visitors a month, out of a total Turkish Internet population of a little over 30 million. It’s an enormous success that few outside Turkey have heard of.

This is even more surprising, when you consider that the site just celebrated its thirteenth anniversary February 15th. It’s the grandfather of blogs, older than Wikipedia, Facebook and Twitter; it was launched before Urban Dictionary, which has 6 million entries.

Screen shot 2012 02 18 at 12.16.06 PM Can Turkeys contribution to the Web be reproduced elsewhere?“The idea was to create a user-made dictionary,” says Sedat Kapanoğlu, the site’s founder. There’s no editing: anyone can create any definition. Like a real dictionary, the entries are ordered numerically, but there’s no limit to how many definitions there can be; they can surpass 10 thousand entries, as is the case with “Love”, or for the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The most-read definitions are ranked first. All of this is processed in real time.

Some people see this as a sort of forum, but, Kapanoğlu insists, “We wanted to avoid that, and we created rules to prevent it from happening. We wanted a dialogue between ideas, not people. When a contributor leaves, the ideas and conversations remain.”

The site’s only revenue stream is advertising; in order to avoid “disrupting the user experience,” it is limited to one ad per page.

“We have more entries than the English version of Wikipedia,” Kapanoğlu responds when asked, “but the quality isn’t the same.” Jokes and false info abound. “We believe that no one has the authority to decide what stays on a site,” he says. “We’re neutral in terms of administrating it, and we’ve become one of the largest Turkish sites to defend the freedom of expression in a country where it is threatened.”

So there is no control of any sort. “I decided to let everybody express themselves, independently of social, religious or political stance It was very radical back then… and now makes us one of the most popular sites in Turkey.”

. . . .

The requests to copy the idea in English, French, Romanian and Arabic haven’t had much success. Kapanğlu is convinced that it can’t work anywhere else. “The way the site has grown is linked to specific aspects of Turkish society. We wanted to express ourselves, but had no space for that. The laws of physics don’t apply to social media; every culture needs its own platform.”

It’s a fascinating response, but one that Uçkan, the professor, doesn’t agree with. He recalls that Google’s social site Orkut, which is immensely popular in Brazil (and which plays an important role in India), was invented by Turkey’s Orkut Büyükkökten. Turkish-style socialization could perhaps spread elsewhere. “It can be copied. The format can be entertaining anywhere.”

It should be noted that Eksi Sozluk is one of many websites to face censorship and other attempts by the government to limit freedom of expression. Just this past June government officials detained 50 Eksi Sozluk users for insulting religion, and this was not the only time the website has been subject to state action. For more on Internet freedom in Turkey, click here.


UPDATE I (2/23) --  See also this article in today's Wall Street Journal on Turkey's emerging Internet market. According to the article, Turkey constitutes the fifth-largest Internet market in Europe, and Turkish users, in contrast to their other European counterparts, tend to spend more time online and be quite younger. Even more significantly is Turks use of social media. Turks constitute one of the top five audiences on Facebook and are within the top ten on Twitter.

The Path of the Pharaohs

PHOTO from Radikal

Before paying a trip to Washington, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu outlined on Turkish television a new Turkish approach to Syria he is expected to share and discuss while in town. The new approach includes plans for a "Friends of Syria" contact group akin to the Libya Contract Group that met in Istanbul in the weeks before rebels seized power in Tripoli.

According to Davutoglu, Turkey has exhausted diplomacy with Syria. It first attempted to deal directly with Assad, and when those efforts failed, it turned to the Arab League. After the Arab League failed to stop the violence despite what Davutoglu characterized as its best efforts, Turkey joined the United States and other countries to work through the United Nations. After the Chinese and Russian veto on Feb. 4, however, new steps are needed to resolve the conflict and bring relief to the Syrian people.

Over the weekend, Davutoglu responded to the UN Security Council's failure to adopt a resolution regarding Syria by declaring that Turkey would be opening up its doors to refugees escaping the violence that intensified after the vote.

Then, on Tuesday, Prime Minister Erdogan announced that Turkey would be launching a new initiative regarding Syria. Erdogan's news followed comments that Assad had chosen the "path of the pharaohs," and that he would be punished for his decision. The prime minister's remarks came on the thirtieth anniversary of Hafez al-Assad's massacre of hundred at Hama, in whose footsteps he said Bashar, Hafez's son, was now following. Speaking rhetorically to Assad, Erdogan then declared that Assad would reap what he sowed.

On yesterday, Davutoglu followed up with details as to the initiative, announcing plans for a contact group that will include the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) countries, in addition to the Arab League and members of the UN Security Council. The foreign minister also discussed possible plans for bringing humanitarian aid to Syria, which raises the possibility of establishing a humanitarian corridor inside Syria for which Turkey, along with other countries and most likely the United Nations, would be responsible.

Turkey had been waiting for the outcome of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavarov's talks with Assad to come to an end, and Davutoglu said that Assad's promises for reform announced soon after the meeting could not be trusted. 

Turkish newspapers report that Turkey is making plans to accommodate more refugees fleeing the conflict, including a container town to accommodate up to 10,000 refugees similar to that constructed in Van following Saddam Hussein's campaign against Iraqi Kurds. Syria has so far accepted 12,000 refugees.


UPDATE I (2/11/12) -- At the Center for Strategic and International Studies on Friday, Davutoglu linked the government's policies in Syria to Turkey's support for peoples instead of states. In the speech, Davutoglu reports that when asked why Turkey was friendly with Assad before the Arab Spring, he is able to easily respond that at this point Assad was not fighting against his own people.

The foreign minister's speech touched on the need to side with peoples instead of states in the new post-Cold War age, and he contextualized Syria as a state whereby the people had clearly turned against the state. Given this situation, Turkey could not be expected to continue to side with Assad.

I am sure CSIS is soon to post a transcript, but until then, you might read Davutoglu's remarks against Soli Ozel and Gencer Ozcan's recent article in the October issue of the Journal of Democracy on Turkish foreign policy and democracy promotion.

UPDATE II (2/15/11) --  Davutoglu met with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton where both reported Syria was at the top of their agenda. The leaders are expected to join representatives of the Arab League in Tunis on Feb. 24 to discuss a new approach to Syria. There still seems to exist difference on the American and Turkish sides as to whether Russia and China should be invited to the meeting. Also on the table will be the issue of a possible humanitarian corridor to be established in order to deliver aid to Syrians affected by the violence. Turkish papers are reporting Turkey to be in favor of opening up the corridor through the Mediterranean rather than using Turkish soil, a prospect Turkish officials are saying would pose a security risk.

Additionally, though Davutoglu continues to say all options are on the table, there seems to be little appetite for a buffer zone to be setup along the Turkish-Syrian border.

Also on Monday, and shortly after Davutoglu's visit with Cointon, U.S. Central Command head James N. Mattis held a meeting with Turkish Chief of General Staff Necdet Ozel presumably at which possible operations involving Syria were discussed.

According to Milliyet columnist Asli Aydintasbas, Syria is more keen for intervention than the United States and tabled a strategy to include military, diplomatic, and humanitarian elements while the American side is still reluctant to get to engaged in the conflict during an election year.

And, one more note: the Center for Strategic and International Studies has posted the video and transcript of remarks Davutoglu delivered there on Friday.

Fleeing for Their Lives

PHOTO from Hurriyet Daily News

Syrian refugees flooding over the border with Turkey now number over 3,000 persons as Turkish officials struggle to deal with the influx. Turkish sources are reporting that the government is prepared for 15,000 more to arrive from the town in the coming days.

Jandarma have been on the border since Wednesday when the killings begun, and there is talk of setting up a buffer zone (in Turkish) to check the identity of Syrian refugees before they are escorted to one of the four refugee camps that have been setup along the border. The buffer zone will be designed to prevent PKK members from using the crisis to enter Turkey. However, plans are still being drawn up and Turkish authorities are saying it will not be necessary unless the number of refugees

Meanwhile stories of the crisis continue to emerge from refugees. From Hurriyet Daily News:

Some Syrians waiting at the border are also meeting up with their relatives from the other side who bring them provisions, which they then carry back into Syria.

The town of Jisr al-Shughour was besieged from three directions, another Syrian refugee, Ahmet Arafat, 40, claimed. “There are wounded [people] in Jisr al-Shughour, and no one can help them,” he said.

“We had restaurants and shops in Jisr al-Shughour. They razed them to the ground. They are shooting protesters too. They even poisoned the waters. We saw people as they drank from the water and died,” said another Syrian refugee, K.F., 24.

Prime Minister Erdogan has said that today and Saturday will be very important in terms of determining Turkey's future relations with Assad. The National Security Council (MGK) is set to meet after Sunday's elections.


UPDATE I (6/10) -- Hurriyet Daily News correspondent Ipek Yazdani reports that Syrian refugees coming from Jisr al-Shughour, a town of 50,000 people just 12 miles over the Turkish-Syrian border, are telling Turkish authorities that Syrian security officials attacked the town early this morning. The town has been surrounded from three sides since Wednesday.

HDN had the exclusive footage of the Syrian refugees waiting at the Syria-Turkey border on Friday showing them protesting against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

"Syrian soldiers killed all the young men in the village", an old woman amongst the Syrian refugees waiting at the border said in an excluseive footage obtained by the HDN.

Syrians escaping from the Syrian security forces who allegedly made a military operation to Jisr al-Shughour, Ghani and other villages massed in Turkish border, chanting slogans like "We want freedom, we want liberty."

A woman from Sıleybi village said the Syrian soldiers killed her husband. "They (Syrian government forces) attacked us at 6:00 a.m., they have been trying to kill us all day long and they killed my husband. Now they pretend like nothing is happening, they are lying! They threw us out of our country, they threw us out from our land," she said.

Another woman who showed her baby to the cameras said, "President Assad, you left this one without a father. Don't you have any fear of God?"

A man who talked to the camera while walking said, "Assad, don't you have any conscience? Is this Bashar's justice? We were all kicked out of our homes, you see all of us, all the Syrians in this region are gathering here now. So all the world shall see what we are going through."

"They attacked all of us and we had to run away. They killed my husband, he was murdered while he was trying to protect us" another woman said in a different footage shot in a tent by the Syrian side of the border.

"Syrian soldiers killed all the young men in the village, they burned our houses, God punish them, God punish Assad", an old woman shouted to the camera.

UPDATE II (6/10) -- In response to this morning's incursion into Jisr al-Shughour, Prime Minister Erdogan issued his strongest statement yet against Assad, acussing the Syrian government of committing mass atrocities and "behaving inhumanely."

“In the face of violence, we cannot continue to support Syria. We do have relatives living in Syria,” said Erdogan. The prime minister indicated that he has not been in contract with Assad since the seige began.

Turkey is refraining from calling those fleeing refugees, saying he hopes they will soon be able to return home. In the meantime, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is prepared to step in should the Turkish government need assistance. At the moment, Erdogan says neither UNHCR assistance nor a "safe haven" are needed.

Though Turkey is keen to keep Syrian refugees safe and do the right thing here, it is also understandably concerned about its border and the potential for a repeat of Operation Provide Comfort, which played a major role in initiating the Kurdish conflict of the 1990s.

UPDATE III (6/13) --  The number of Syrian refugees is now up to 5,000, with another 10,000 waiting just over the Syrian border, ready to leave if need be. Syrian security forces are in complete control of Jisr al-Shughour.

Financial Support to Libyan Opposition

Speaking on the sidelines of the third Libya contract group, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Aduvtoglu has pledged $100 million to fund the Libyan Transitional Council. From Hurriyet Daily News: 

"There is a real need for humanitarian access as well as for the natural needs of Libya like schools, hospitals and all those facilities," Davutoğlu said, according to a report by Reuters.

Davutoğlu was speaking to reporters at a summit of Western and Arab countries backing Libya's rebels and planned to prepare for a political structure after the departure of leader Moammar Gadhafi from power, Reuters reported on its website.

The statements came at the third meeting of the International Contact Group on Libya in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. Davutoğlu was among participants at the meeting along with his counterparts from 21 countries. The participants also included U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The Contact Group, including the United States, European powers, allies from the Middle East and international bodies, was established during an international conference in London in March to lead international efforts to map out Libya's future. The group held its first meeting in Qatar, the second in Italy. The fourth meeting of the Libya Contact Group will be held in Turkey (click here for more).

Yesterday United States Secretary of Defense Robert Gates criticized Turkey alongside four other NATO member states for not doing enough to support NATO's ongoing military operations. The United Kingdom, France, and the United States have vowed not to quit the strikes until Gadhafi is removed from power. At the third Libyan contact group meeting, Turkey argued the Tripoli regime consisted of more personalities than just Gadhafi.

Syrian Refugees Pour Into Turkey

As Syrian security forces surround the the town of Jisr al-Shughour, located just 12 miles from the Turkish border, traumatized refugees continue to pour into the country. From Hurriyet Daily News:

Turkey will not close its doors to Syrians fleeing unrest in their country, the Turkish prime minister said Wednesday after a group of 169 Syrians fled the border town of Jisr al-Shughour overnight, fearing bloodshed.

“We are monitoring developments in Syria with concern,” Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan said at a news conference, urging Damascus to “change its attitude toward civilians” and “take its attitude to a more tolerant level as soon as possible.”

Turkey has exerted efforts for a peaceful transition process in Syria, but reforms have not been carried out at the desired speed and are being outpaced by growing violence, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu told the private channel NTV in an interview Wednesday. He said Turkey is prepared to deal with a mass influx of Syrian refugees.

“We have taken all necessary precautions in case of a massive flow of crossings,” Davutoğlu said. Implying a security check would be made for Syrian refugees, he added, “We have to determine their intention [in] seeking refuge.”

People who fled the town of Jisr al-Shughour on Wednesday, fearing a crackdown by their government after the alleged massacre of 120 policemen, are sheltering at a camp set up by the Turkish Red Crescent in the Yayladagi district of Hatay, a Turkish city on the Syrian border.

A total of 420 Syrians have crossed the border and stayed in Turkey since the start of the unrest, a Turkish Foreign Ministry diplomat told the Daily News. The Anatolia news agency reported, however, that new groups are continuing to arrive at the Turkish border. Turkish officials also told reporters that many Syrians were waiting at villages near the border.

There are reports in the Turkish press that Syrian opposition is urging Syrians trapped in the conflict to flee over the border. Zaman reports that 200 refugees arrived in Turkey late on Monday night, and that the numbers have increased since. For Syrian expert Joshua Landis's account of what is going on, click here.

As Turkey gears up to respond to an influx of Syrian refugees as it continues to call on Syrian President Assad to cease human rights abuses and institute major reforms, the London School of Economics has released a report stating what is all the more obvious given Turkey's increasingly prominent role in the Arab spring. According to the newly released LSE report, "Turkey's influence and reach are certain to be central to the future of the economic and political development of the region as the revolutions responsible for overthrowing governments make the difficult transition to constructing them." For the full report, click here.


UPDATE I (6/9) -- Sabah reports (in Turkish) that the number of refugees arriving from Jisr al-Shughour now total over 400. According to the paper, the government has allocated 30 million Turkish Lira to deal with a wave of refugees it is expecting to total from 500,000 to one million persons. Prime Minister Erdogan has said the border will stay open. At the moment, Turkey is the only country to have an open border with Syria.

Additionally, refugees are giving Turkish authorities information that what Syria alleges was a massacre of 120 people by the opposition was instead a massacre of 120 people committed by Syrian security officials following a mutiny within the country's security apparatus.

UPDATE II (6/9) -- Refugees coming from Jisr al-Shughour are continuing to confirm stories that a mutiny occurred when Syrian security officials refused to do the regime's dirty work. From Hurriyet Daily News: A Syrian security officer who fled with the civilian refugees told the Hürriyet Daily News:

that they received an order by phone Friday to kill all the protesters in the town.

“We received a phone call from the center, and they ordered us to shoot and kill all the protesters,” said Ahmad Gavi, 21, a Syrian soldier who fled to Turkey following the deadly clashes in Jisr Al-Shughour.

“Five soldiers who refused to follow this order were killed immediately in front of me. Then commanders and some soldiers started to shoot each other,” Gavi said. “There were 180 soldiers at the security check post and 120 of them were killed.”

Gavi said he dropped his gun and ran away to Turkey as a refugee. “It was not the protesters who killed the soldiers, it was the commanders who killed them; most of the soldiers ran away with the protesters then,” he said, adding that there are 60 Syrian soldiers in the group that fled to Turkey.

Over 200 Syrians are reported to be hospitalized in Hatay. The narratives drastically increase the likelihood that Erdogan will strangthen the Turkish government's line with Assad. The National Security Council (MGK) is scheduled to meet after Sunday's elections.

Syrian Opposition Plans a Second Meeting after Elections

Syrian opposition figures are planning another meeting in Turkey after the elections on June 12. Opposition spokesman Khaled Khoja told Turkish press the opposition did not want to create problems for the Turkish government before elections, but that the next meeting will be larger than the one held in Antalya last week and draw on the opposition in Syria who were not able to attend the earlier meeting. However, whether the opposition will be able to cross the border given Syrian security remains to be seen.

The opposition is also hoping for more support and facilitation from the Turkish government, which at this time, is still in regular contact with President Assad. Anonymous Turkish diplomatic officials are telling Turkish press that the Turkish government has given Assad an ultimatum: reform or be prepared for a withdrawal of Turkish support. From Hurriyet Daily News:

In a televised interview over the weekend, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said his government would place much focus on the developments in the Middle East and North Africa after the elections.

“We cannot repeat our previous performance during the election time. I am actually quite interested in Syria at this time … I talked on the phone with Mr. Bashar al-Assad,” he said.

The Syrian president is misinforming the Turkish government, according to the Syrian opposition.

“Al-Assad is sending some messages to satisfy the Turkish government that he is going on with new reforms but we don’t believe it at all. This is just to satisfy the public opinion in Turkey and in the international community,” Khoja said.

Asked if they had any contacts within the Turkish government, he said: “At the low level we have some contacts but at the high level, no.”

The planned meeting after the Turkish elections will be more important than the Antalya meeting “because a lot of committees from Syria will gather here,” Khoja said.

“Now they are preparing in Syria to send representatives, some of whom are from Damascus. This will represent the real movement in Syria,” he added. “The opposition outside Syria can only support the movement inside Syria but since the movement in Syria will represent itself at that upcoming meeting, it will be more important.”

Khoja said the group chose Turkey as a venue for its meetings “because Turkey is in the middle of the active countries and it’s so easy to gather here without any visas.” Turkey and Syria abolished visa requirements for travel in 2009.

For an English-language translation of the declaration drafted at the conclusion of the conference on Friday, see Joshua Landis's excellent blog, Syria Comment. Human rights groups are reporting that security forces killed 35 demonstrators over the weekend.

Syrian Opposition Meeting in Antalya

PHOTO from Hurriyet

News is breaking that Syrian opposition leaders are planning to meet in Antalya next week. According to Hurriyet, the meeting is scheduled for May 31 to June 2 at the five-star Falez Hotel. Ammar Qurabi, president of the exiled Syrian National Organization for Human Rights, has confirmed the meeting will draw together numerous members of the opposition from across different factions.

Turkey's role in organizing the meeting is unclear, though there is no word from the government or in the Turkish press that the government is doing anything other than allowing the meeting to take place. Travel to and from Syria to Turkey became visa-free in 2009.

In April, MUSIAD, the Islamist-affiliated Independent Industrialist's and Businessmen's Association, organized a conference of the Muslim Brotherhood in Istanbul. This meeting will apparently include more parties than just the Brotherhood.

An interesting tidbit (if true) from the hardline Debka website has also appeared. According to Debka, Turkey has taken is taking serious steps to distance itself from Assad.

1. The following message was posted to Damascus on Tuesday, May 24: Turkey is not a member of the European Union and is therefore not bound by its sanctions it has imposed freezing Assad's assets and barring him and his regime heads from travelling. Nonetheless, the Syrian ruler is advised not to try and test its intentions by trying to visit Turkey.

2. Assad's repression of the uprising in the Kurdish regions of northern Syria is causing ferment among the Kurds of southern Turkey. Unless it is stopped forthwith, Ankara will take overt action against the Syrian ruler.

3. Erdogan has discontinued his almost daily phone conversations with Assad. In any case, his advice to the Syrian ruler on how to overcome the uprising against him was never heeded.

Our sources report that he also ordered the Hakan Fidan, chief of Turkish MIT intelligence service, to stop traveling to Damascus with updates on Syrian opposition activities. Assad has thus lost his key source of information about what the opposition is up to.

My understanding is that this information should be treated with a grain of salt, and according to official Turkish government reports, Erdogan is still in regular contact with Assad.

More as it happens . . .


UPDATE I (5/26) -- Joshua Landis of Syria Comment has a few more details on the meeting, as well as some history of the MUSIAD meeting from April and its potential to seriously irritate Assad's Syria.

UPDATE II (5/27) -- More on the opposition meeting from Joshua Landis's blog can be found here. Still not much in the Turkish press . . .

Averting Another Flotilla Crisis

The Turkish NGO Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief (IHH) is preparing another flotilla campaign involving vessels sailing from multiple European countries, including the Mavi Marmara, which will once again sail from Turkey. The vessels are set to sail after the Turkish elections on June 12.

Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Philip Gordon has said the United States is urging Turkey not to allow the IHH to send another flotilla. In testimony to the U.S. Senate before Congress yesterday, Gordon said, “In the year since the last flotilla episode, Israel has changed the humanitarian regime for Gaza [and] made it very clear that there are alternative ways to get humanitarian assistance to Gaza. We have been very clear with the Turkish government that that’s the case.”

The Turkish government, as before, has said that Turkey is in no position to prevent lawfully registered NGOs from setting sail for Gaza. The IHH is accepting applications for the campaign, heavily advertising in Turkey and throughout Europe.

For more on the IHH and last year's flotilla incident, click here. For my feature in the Jerusalem Post analyzing Turkey-Israel relations in the wake of the flotilla, click here.

A Minority Rights-Based Approach to Cyprus

International Minority Rights Group International has published "Minority Rights: Solutions to the Cyprus Conflict." Here is a summary:

Attempts to resolve the ongoing conflict in Cyprus over the past forty years have been marked by one common feature: the systematic failure to recognize the presence of most minority groups on the island, and to involve them in conflict resolution processes and in drawing up plans for the island’s future status. This reflects the wider marginalization of minorities in both northern and southern Cyprus, who are effectively silenced within a discourse of competing Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot nationalisms. Drawing on interviews with representatives from minority groups from both parts of the island, as well as on the wealth of literature that has grown up around the ‘Cyprus problem’, this report argues that minorities in Cyprus have a vital role to play in any future settlement, as well as in ensuring ongoing peace, prosperity and security on the island.

I have not yet had the opportunity to review the report, but thought I would go ahead and post it.

The Hamas Question

In the wake of the flotilla crisis, Prime Minister Erdogan has been issuing statements supportive of Hamas, characterizing the group as resistance fighters who won an election. These statements not only further heighten tensions with Israel, but also threaten Turkey-United States relations, prompting U.S. State Department spokesperson Philip Crowley to reiterate emphatically that the United States considers Hamas a terrorist organization. Just as importantly, the prime minister's statements have not gone without domestic criticism.

Turkish critics, many of whom are supportive of strongly condemning Israel's attack on the Mavi Marmara, fear the pro-Hamas rhetoric risks conflating Israel's raid on the Mavi Marmara (an issue between Israel and Turkey) with Israel's relations with Hamas. Some have even gone so far as to argue that Erdogan personally identifies with Hamas, a political organization that has gained popularity with Palestinians in part due to some Palestinians' perception that rival Fatah is elitist, too secularist, and out of touch with the masses.

Hamas, of course welcoming the prime minsiter's statements, has for its part expressed support for Erdogan's political model. Hamas Foreign Minister Ahmad Yusuf recently gave an interview to Hurriyet, more or less comparing Erdogan's politics with that of the Taliban. From the interview:

According to Yusuf, who said he is writing a book called “Erdoğan and a New Strategic Vision,” the Taliban is “opposed to everything,” including education and women’s rights.

“Erdoğan’s model, on the other hand, is liberal. It is a model that dares to take responsibility and change things and establishes good relations between the religious and secular elements of society,” he said. “It is a model that works for democracy and human rights, and supports an open society. That is what we want.”

Yusuf's statements fits within Hamas' broader attempts at what Thanassis Cambanis terms "tunnel diplomacy." From Cambanis'articel in Foreign Affairs:

Since Israel has claimed that it will end the Gaza blockade only if Hamas surrenders power, the movement has been willing to improvise and embrace whatever works -- a merchant’s approach of finding the best deal and then justifying it retroactively.

Hamas has applied the same formula to its diplomatic strategy. It has hedged its bets, alternately hectoring and wooing Egypt, cozying up to Iran and Turkey, and shaming the Gulf petro-states into giving it money and political cover. In January, Gaza’s prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, chastised Egypt from the minbar at Friday prayers in Gaza City for “losing its compass” and joining the ranks of those who “criminalize the resistance.” The Arabs, he argued, must draw close to Turkey: “We are working to build a new balance against the Israelis in the region.”

Since the 2006 elections, Hamas’ brain trust has been trying to plot a path out of global isolation. Ahmed Yousef leads the effort, drawing on his experience running an Islamic think tank in what he calls the “paradise” of Washington, D.C., for more than a decade. The number-two official in Hamas’ foreign ministry in Gaza, he is at once a consummate politician and a fierce defender of Hamas’ resistance ideology. He may be a conciliator, but he is no moderate.

“We want the West to understand it can do business with us,” he told me in January during a long conversation in his Gaza City office. “They want to know if we are more like the Taliban or like [Turkey’s Islamist prime minister, Recep Tayyip] Erdogan. They will see that we are closer to Erdogan. We are flexible.”

Diplomatically, Hamas has cast a wide net. The group has launched Web sites in English and Turkish and has dispatched senior officials to meet with any influential Westerners willing to talk, in public or in secret. Now, Hamas is benefiting from the results of its diplomatic groundwork. The flotilla that it did not organize has played right to Hamas’ strategy, earning it a spate of attention and summoning international pressure on Israel to loosen the blockade.

Diplomatic relations between Turkey and Hamas began in 2006 when a five-man delegation headed by Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal visited Ankara.

Not writing about the AKP government's identification with Hamas, bur rather the Palestinians as a whole, Orhan Kemal Cengiz had a provocative column yesterday in Today's Zaman. An excerpt:

Erdoğan’s defense of human rights of the Palestinians is based on identification. This makes him reactionary and prevents him from playing a vital role in solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since he could not rise above the problem, his way of engaging with the Palestinian question has the serious potential of making Turkey a part of the problem, rather than contributing to a solution.

Can we contribute to the solution of this problem if we turn a blind eye to the sins of Hamas, which is responsible for grave human right violations, has created an oppressive regime in Gaza and has killed many innocent victims in its endless suicide attacks? Can we seriously and effectively defend the rights of the Palestinians while we are turning a blind eye to human rights violations in Darfur and in Iran?

Can we be taken seriously when we try to draw attention to the war crimes Israel has committed in Gaza while we still refrain from endorsing the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court?

Erdoğan and his government could be a perfect mediator between Israelis and Palestinians if they end this identification. I cannot imagine any other government in the world which could show Hamas that their obsession with the extinction of Israel is actually one of the biggest obstacles to the solution of this problem. I cannot imagine any other government which could convince Iran and Syria that they could peacefully coexist with a peaceful Israel in the region.

But instead we will witness the dance of anger for a while.

Never the Same? -- A Reading of Turkey After the Mavi Marmara

Protests in Istanbul continued on Saturday, drawing crowds in the thousands. AP Photo from Hurriyet Daily News

Upon the return of Turkish Ambassador Oguz Celikkol to Ankara, President Gul declared that Turkey's relations with Israel "will never be the same."

Departing for Ireland the day Israeli commandos raided the Mavi Marmara in international waters, I left Istanbul's Taksim Square with the images of enraged protestors fully in my mind. From Ireland, reports of continued mass protests drawing crowds of up to 10,000 and feiry statements of Turkish government officials flooded Irish radio and the BBC.

Ireland, too, was not without protest: the Irish-flagged Rachel Corrie, part of the same flotilla, had lagged behind the other vessels and the Irish government was insisting that it be allowed to reach Gaza without incident. Protests occurred in Dublin and Belfast, as they did in other places across the world. Though Ireland was much less at the center of the raid than Turkey, it was clear that the Israeli raid would affect not only Turkey-Israel relations, but how Israel was perceived throughout the world.

I won't take the time here to regurgitate the news surrounding the raid and the deaths of nine Turkish citizens, one of them also a dual citizen of my own country, other than to focus on the Turkish response and Turkey's demand that a UN-backed investigatory commission be authorized to investigate the incident (which Israel rejects) -- an insistence all the more justified in Turkish minds following the release of autopsy reports revealing that the nine victims had been peppered with bullets and some shot at a very close range.

Soon after the raid, the Turkish government condemned the Israeli action as tantamount to murder, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu describing the actions in front of the UN Security Council as "piracy" and "banditry." The response elicted from Prime Minister Erdogan, who flew back from a trip to Chile, was just as strong. Erdogan issued aggresive statements throughout the week, comparing the incident to Sept. 11, iterating the commandment not to kill in multiple languages before the glare of video cameras, and characterizing Hamas as an organization comprised of "resistance fighters."

Meanwhile, Israel moved quickly to portray the Turkish citizens killed as Islamic exremists and terrorists bent on waging global jihad against Israel, linking the still murky Turkish humanitarian aid organization at the center of the incident with global terrorist organizations, including al-Qa'ida (for more on the humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH), see Yigal Schleifer's article in the Christian Science Monitor).

The difference in narratives striking, tempers waged throughout the week as the bodies of those killed were returned to Turkey amidst more protests and calls for Turkey to cut off all relations with Israel. The Turkish government recalled its ambassador, cancelled joint military exercises scheduled with Israel, and suspended work on energy projects. The Turkish parliament issued a strong resolution calling on the government to reconsider military and eocnomic ties with Israel.

Calls for an even stonger reaction resided throughout the Turkish public and were not limited to supporters of the AKP or stronger Islamist parties (see this poll), or even to particularly religious people for that matter. Criticism from Turkish opposition parties often urged the government to take stronger action, and newly-elected CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, while urging calm, has criticized the government for being "two-faced": "They’re saying ‘one minute’ in front of cameras, and ‘yes please’ behind closed doors."

Over the weekend, Erdogan and Kilicdaroglu engaged in mutual finger-pointing, both accusing the other of being under the undue influence of Israel. Referring to recent statements made by Fetullah Gulen and Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc that revealed a rift in the party over how to deal with Gaza, Kilicdaroglu declared that the "Tel Aviv advocate" is within the AKP. Tucked away in Pennsylvania, Gulen gave an interview to the Wall Street Journal in which he criticized the IHH's failure to reach an agreement with Israel. In the interview, Gulen seemed to warn the Turkish government to be careful in its posturing vis-á-vis Israel for fear of damaging relations with the United States. Hurriyet Daily News columnist Mehmet Ali Birand picked up on this message in his column today:

Gülen explicitly warns Turkey.

He opposes entering such a process with the National View. For, the IHH is according to him a radical Islamic movement and he believes turning this humane help attempt into an Islamic help movement would harm Turkey very much.

Gülen with his approach does not oppose the AKP. He just criticizes IHH’s attitude. He warns that such steps might go as far as cutting off relations between Turkey, the United States and Israel. He draws attention to how dangerous the situation is. It seems as if he says, “These guys are about to cause trouble for the country, stop them.”

According to Birand, AKP Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc might well have heeded Gulen's call when he said on Friday, "The hoca points in the right direction."

In an interview with KanalTurk on Sunday, Arinc expressed that more tension with Israel should be avoided, seeming to call on the IHH and other organizations to the right to back off. Whether Gulen and Arinc's statements are made for fear of weakening ties with the United States and Israel and/or are motivated by concern that Islamist parties to the right of the AKP might get a boost out of the incident in the same way they did after Israel's incursion into Gaza at the end of 2008 is unclear (see Jan. 14, 2009 post), but the question should be on the radar of those observing the AKP's Israel policy in coming weeks.

If Turkey-Israel relations are to be normalized, and even more importantly, if the United States is to preserve good relations with Israel, efforts should be made to come to a consensus on the investigatory commission proposed by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. Ankara has put the commission forward as essential to its normalization of relations with Tel Aviv, and while Tel Aviv, for its part, continues to resist, it is no doubt looking to gain the approval of the Obama Administration as it moves to craft its own internal investigation. For the United States, the Turkey-Israel alliance forged in 1996 is one of the few bright spots in the Middle East, and given the amount of political ill will toward nine Turkish citizens being killed by Israeli commandos in international waters, it would make sense to do everything in its power to somehow bring Turkey and Israel into some sort of compromise.

Turkey took a powerful first step despite all the feiry -- and, at times, more than unseemly -- rhetoric coming from government officials this week insomuch as it welcomed a rather vague statement coming from the UN Security Council last week without making too much fuss (the statement, falling short of a resolution, condemned "those actions" resulting in death, without assigning responsibility).

Given the gravity of animus toward Israel inside Turkey at the moment, as well as calls from other governments around the world for an independent investigation (including the UN Human Rights Council, the resolution of which the United States voted against), it would make sense for the all parties to do everything in its power to assure a comprehensive and open investigation of both the Israeli military's actions and the activities of the IHH.

For more on Turkey-Israel relations, see past posts.


UPDATE I (6/7) -- Two interesting analyses worth drawing attention to are Hugh Pope's piece in Friday's The Guardian and Steven A. Cook's assessment of Turkey-U.S. relations in Foreign Policy. Pope urges that Turkey's rift with Israel not be looked at as a turn away from the West, but rather as the response to a humanitarian crisis in Gaza. For Pope, when one objectively looks at Turkish policy in the Middle East in recent years, the country can be seen as "explicitly imitating lessons from the EU that proved how such convergence can end cycles of conflict." Cook, examining crucial foreign policy differences between Turkey and the United States, portrays the two countries as "frenemies," concluding the two countries competing strategic powers in the Middle East. See also a very insightful, albeit tragic, analysis by Alon ben Meir thanks to Jenny White at Kamil Pasha.

UPDATE II (6/8) -- Hosting the Conference on Interaction and Confidence-Building Measures in Asia (CICA) in Istanbul, Turkey took the opportunity of the conference to condemn Israel in an attachment to the conference's final declaration. 21 of the 22 countries in attendance, all save Israel and including Russia, joined the statement, calling for an international investigatory commission to be setup and condeming Israel's use of force in international waters. Though not linking the statement to the flotilla incident, Russian President Vladmir Putin said the Blue Steam II natural gas project, linking Russian gas supplies to Israel and Turkey, might not extend to Israel due to lack of demand.

UPDATE III (6/9) -- For a decent summary of the military, economic, and energy ties between Turkey and Israel and potential ramifications of the flotilla affair, see Saban Kardas' analysis in the Eurasia Daily Monitor. Though trade with Israel constitutes only one percent of Turkey's total foreign trade, much of it food imports, Ha'aretz reports that some Israeli supermarkets are already boycotting Turkish goods.

Undermining International Justice

Alongside the United States, China, Russia, India, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia, Amnesty International has specifically called on Turkey to join the International Criminal Court (ICC). Amnesty issued the statement in its annual "State of the World's Human Rights" report, which also documents the state of human rights in countries across the world. According to Amnesty's Secretary-General Claudio Cordone, "China, India, Indonesia, Russia, Turkey and the U.S. have stood aside from - if not deliberately undermined - international justice efforts." Turkey fell subject to harsh criticism from human rights activists last October when it extended an invitation to Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir to attend a meeting of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) in Istanbul (see Jan. 20 post).

For Amnesty's Turkey-specific report, click here.

More Resolutions, More Troubles

Three significant developments unfolded in the past two weeks in regard to Armenia. One, on March 12 the Swedish Riksdag voted by a margin of one vote to define the 1915 massacres of Armenians genocide in a non-binding resolution that the Swedish government has flatly denounced. Two, Obama Administration officials in the State Department have backed off affirmations that the genocide resolution passed in the House Foreign Affairs Committee will not come to a floor vote. Three, Prime Minister Erdogan, in an interview with BBC's Turkish-language service, seemed to threaten to crack down on undocumented Armenians working in Turkey.

Sweden

Following the unexpected March 12 vote, Turkey recalled its ambassador to Sweden, Zeygun Korkuturk, and Prime Minister cancelled a trip he was planning to make to Stockholm on March 17 to sign a strategic partnership with the country that would resemble partnerships already in place with Spain and Italy. The partnership has been put on hold despite assurances from the Swedish government that the resolution has no legal bearing nor will it be adopted as official policy by Sweden's center-reight government. Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt and Foreign Minister Carl Bildt assured Turkey that they thought the resolution unwise, and adopted the Turkish government's position that genocide resolutions passed by foeign parliaments threaten reconciliation with Armenia. Significantly, the Swedish genocide resolution did not limit itself to the Armenian community living in the Ottoman Empire in 1915, but also recognized atrocities committed against other Christian communities. This week the Swedish government announced that it would be providing financial assistance to Turkey to help it along with the EU accession process, including increased funding to Turkish civil society groups. Swedish Minister for International Development Cooperation Gunilla Carlsson said, “Turkish EU membership is strategically important for the European Union. Sweden is in a position to provide support in connection with these needs and can help strengthen civil society by supporting organizations working for the rights of minorities and other groups in need.”

United States

Turkey has yet to send back Ambassador to the United States Namik Tan though three weeks have passed since the U.S. House committee vote on March 2. Erdogan has said that he wants a clear signal from the United States that the resolution will not be passed, and still publicly blames the Obama Administration for not doing more against the resolution. Yet, so far the Obama Administration has proven unwilling or unable to send such a clear signal. At an event held at the Brookings Institution, Assistant Secretary of State Philip Gordon said Congress was an independent body and that "they are going to do what they decide to do." Gordon did echo the Turkish government's position that the resolution is an obstacle to reconciliation. Following an invitation to a summit on nuclear energy to be held on April 13-14, Erdogan said he will not be attending, indiciating that he will send someone lower in the government chain-of-command. With Turkish officials still unwilling to visit Washington in the current climate, the American-Turkish Council and the Turkish-American Business Council have pulled the plans to hold their annual conference on April 11-14. Similarly, the Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen’s Association (TUSIAD) called off a trip to the US that was scheduled for March 16-17. An issue of some curiousity occured when Virgina Foxx, who heads the Congressional Turkey Caucus, told Turkish journalists that House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Howard Berman had told her that the resolution would not move to a floor vote, though Berman strongly denied that such a message was made. When Tan will be sent back to Washington remains unclear, though all eyes will be turned to Washington as April 24 approaches. For an understanding of the genocide resolution's place in American politics, see former Ambasador to Turkey and Century Foundation Senior Fellow Mort Abramowitz' piece in The National Interest.

Perhaps Some of Us Are Not So Armenian After All

In the heat following the Swedish resolution, Erdogan's inclusion to brin undocumented Armenian workers in Turkey into the discussion earned the prime minister domestic and international condemnation (see interview, in Turkish). Erdogan remarked,

Look, there are 170,000 Armenians in my country -- 70,000 of them are my citizens, but we are managing [tolerating] 100,000 of them in our country. So, what will we do tomorrow? If it is necessary, I will tell them, ‘Come on, back to your country.' I will do it. Why? They are not my citizens. I am not obliged to keep them in my country. I mean these are [defenders of the Armenian claims of genocide], their attitude is affecting our sincere attitude in a negative way, and they are not aware of it.

For an excellent report on the Turkish reaction to Erdogan's remarks, see Ayse Karabat's reporting in Today's Zaman. From Karabat:

Leaving aside foreign policy considerations, civil society organizations criticized Erdoğan's remarks on several grounds: first, he mentioned Armenian Turkish citizens together with the citizens of Armenia, and secondly, he was using foreign workers as a tool of foreign policy and neglecting the humanitarian side of the problem.

But Suat Kınıklıoğlu, deputy chairman of the AK Party Foreign Affairs Committee, underlined that Erdoğan was trying to explain that Turkey tolerates the irregular Armenian workers. “As has been known for many years, there are Armenians illegally living and working in Turkey, and as a reflection of our goodwill and efforts toward normalization which started in 2005, we do not really touch them.

We tolerate them and take their difficult circumstances into consideration. In particular, we are not questioning their status due to the acceleration of the normalization process in Turkish-Armenian relations. The prime minister needed to draw this fact to people’s attention, especially now, when resolutions have been accepted which damage normalization. I think Turkey’s magnanimity is being ignored,” he said, and added that the prime minister did not mean he would immediately send those workers back to their country.

Öztürk Türkdoğan, the chairman of the Human Rights Association (İHD), said Erdoğan’s remarks could easily be considered a “threat” and as discrimination. “These remarks could lead some people to think that to expel people is a 2010 version of forced migration. This mentality is far from human rights-oriented thinking. People have the right to work, and this is universal. There are many Turkish workers all over the world; does it mean that Turkey will accept their expulsion when there is an international problem? Secondly, these remarks are discriminatory; there are many workers in Turkey of different nationalities,” he said.

As Karabat goes onto examine, the 100,000 number Erdogan gave the BBC is also quite controversial. A recent study by the Eurasia Partnership Foundation puts the number at between 12,000 and 13,000 Armenian citizens working in Turkey, and CHP leader Deniz Baykal, citing numbers from the Ministry of Labor, put the number at an estimated 14,000. BDP member Ufak Uras also criticized the remarks: “The prime minister’s remarks reflect the deportation concept of the 21st century. While we consider similar remarks as racist or xenophobic when directed to Turkish immigrants living in Europe, it is unacceptable to talk in this manner about the immigrants in our country."

The press' reaction was also quite strong, the Armenian newspaper Agos running the headline, "A Lot of Unionists, But No Progress" (see Today's Zaman columnist Sahin Alpay on the media reaction, as well as his inclusion of more positive statements Erdogan has made on the Armenian Question). Arguing that his comments were taken out of context, Erdogan blamed the media for inflating/maliciously reporting the story.

31 Turkish NGOs signed a joint condemnation of Erdogan's remarks, from which Bianet extracts the following points:

* Nobody abandons the place where he/she was born for insignificant reasons; and nobody stays in a country where they cannot find work.

* The Armenian immigrant workers have the right to humane treatment just as anybody else.

* It is unacceptable to make thousands of defenseless people subject to bargaining in order to dismiss the decisions that might be taken by third countries parliaments.

* Erdoğan is the Prime Minister of a country that alleges to bring together civilizations, to sort out the quarrels and normalize relations with Armenia which are international demands. In these terms, Erdoğan's statement carved out a huge contrast.

For another hearty response to Erdogan's comments, see the Armenian Weekly's Katchdig Mouradian's post on a blog he is writing to chronicle his experiences as a member of an American delegation of analysts and commentators visiting Turkey organized by Economic Policy Research Foundation of Turkey (TEPAV). Also worth a glimpse is Today's Zaman columnist Orhan Kemal Cengiz's look at the work of Turkish historian Taner Akcam. In his column, Cengiz excerpts part of a leter Akcer addressed to Erdogan and Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc, part of which I have excerpted here:

Mr. Prime Minister and Mr. Arınç, the answers to the problems that are the legacy of 1915 can’t be found in the denialist policies of Veli Küçük, Doğu Perinçek, Şükrü Elekdağ and Yusuf Halaçoğlu. Don’t search for the answers there. You won’t get anywhere repeating the chorus they’ve been singing for 95 years. They are your adversaries on the issue of 1915, just as they are when it comes to the Kurdish issue and the issue of the military’s place in politics. You cannot construct your response to 1915 by holding rank with those who want to drag the country into chaos, who murdered Hrant Dink, who have planned massacres against Christians and who have been plotting coups against you.

“If you are going to respond to 1915, you need to search for an answer different from the answers given by Ergenekon or by those who plotted the coups. To do this, you should follow your Muslim roots in Anatolia that have grown alongside your party and take a closer look at what these roots did during 1915.

. . . .

Mr. Arınç, you can’t build a future on the backs of murderers. You can build a future on the backs of those righteous Muslims in Anatolia who challenged the murderers. In the same way that you can’t resolve today’s problems by supporting Hrant’s murderers, the ‘Samasts’ and the ‘Veli Küçüks,’ you won’t get anywhere supporting the murderers of the Hrants of the past. The answers to 1915 can’t be found in the answers of Doğu Perinçek or Veli Küçük. They are members of the Ergenekon gang that killed Hrant Dink; it’s natural that they defend the murderers of the Hrants of the past. Let the ‘Veli Küçüks’ defend the murderer Samast of today and the murderers Talat, Enver and Kemal of yesterday. Your place is not at the side of Veli Küçük. Your duty is to stand by the side of the ‘Haji Halils,’ to stand up for those Muslims who put themselves and their families at risk by opposing the massacres.

As for the status of the protocols, which seem most certainly dead in the water, Armenian President Serzh Sarksyan continues to accuse Ankara of using the genocide resolutions as another pretext not to introduce ratification. With the prime minister's most recent remarks, ratification might indeed prove all the more difficult in Armenia, the diaspora and Armenian nationalists having been handed a huge propaganda gift.


UPDATE I (3/24) -- Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc announced plans to make new policies ensuring that the children of Armenian immigrants receive proper education in Turkish schools.

Also, TUSIAD has announced that it will send a delegation to the United States after all. The visit will occur April 19-20, just days before Obama will issue a statement addressed to the Armenian community on April 24 in which all eyes will be on the American president to see if he uses the word "genocide" to label the massacres of 1915. Last year, he chose to refer to the events as the "Great Catastophe (Metz Yeghern in Armenian)," a phrase many Armenians have for years used, and which recently some Turks have employed, albeit quite controversially.

UPDATE II (3/26) -- Prime Minister Erdogan has announced that Korkuturk will return to Stockholm next week. Also, Today's Zaman columnist Etyen Mahcupyan, with whom Bulent is likely to disagree, argues that the reaction of the press and of some AKP supporters was quite critical of Erdogan. From the column:

The prime minister’s unfortunate remarks served as a litmus test that brought to surface the change in Turkey. All media organizations reported his remarks along with interviews with Armenians. All human rights associations condemned Erdoğan, and perhaps as a more important indication, Muslim readers sent messages protesting or criticizing him. This incident indicates once again the risks before the Justice and Development Party (AK Party). Today, the AK Party does not face serious competition in the political spectrum, but its supporting demographic are freeing themselves more quickly from the party.

And, on the issue of formerly Armenian property:

If, in addition to this policy of denial, Turkey shows extraordinary resistance to returning the properties that belonged to the foundations of non-Muslim minorities, this possibility of attaching the “genocide” label to the incidents will increase further. This is because the story of 1915 and its aftermath is not only one of the people who were displaced or killed, but also one of a community whose cultural assets and properties were usurped. Turkey not only refuses to carry the burden of the dead people, but also continues to hold a handful of their properties as spoils. This inevitably adds credence to the genocide-still-continues discourse.

UPDATE I (4/2) -- Erdogan announced that Tan will be returning to Washington next week. The primme minister also confirmed plans to attend a summit on nuclear proliferation to be held April 12-13.

Iranian Refugees Face Problems in Turkey

Accusations have arisen in recent months that Iranian refugees seeking asylum in Turkey have been threatened by Iranian security agents, and that these security agents have in some cases worked with local Turkish police in a campaign of intimidation. Turkey is a popular destination for refugees thanks to its long border with Iran and its lax visa laws, though under Turkish law only Europeans can claim asylum status. It is the responsibility of the UN Refugee Agency(UNHCR), whose Turkey office is in Ankara, to re-locate asylum seekers. From the Guardian's Robert Tait, who is based in Istanbul:

The intimidation campaign comes after a senior revolutionary guard commander, Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri, told the hardline Keyhan newspaper that foreign-based supporters of the opposition green movement would be targeted as "extensions of a soft coup".

"So far, a large number of the infantry of the enemy has been identified," he said. "The Islamic Republic will not allow the extensions of a soft coup to act on further sedition and if necessary, the government will make them face serious challenges."

Iranians do not need visa requirement to enter Turkey, meaning it would be easy in theory for Iran's state agents to operate clandestinely within Turkey's borders. Western diplomats have privately voiced concerns about the security of Iranian refugees from the election upheaval.

However, Metin Corabatir, external affairs officer with the UN's high commission for refugees, insisted they were safe in Turkey. "The Iranians are under the protection of the Turkish state and Turkey is a secure country," he said. "If there are some high profile people, extra measures are taken to ensure they are protected. But we know of no incident and there is no threat to these people."

Yet, Tait has interviewed numerous refugees whose stories belie Corabitir's assurances. In one case, two men beat a refugee on the streets of Kayseri and stole her mobile phone. Maryam Sabri, the victim, claims she was raped by Iranian authorities and fears the attack was carried out by Iranian authorities keen to prevent her from telling her story. In Sabri's case, the UNHCR in Turkey took the word of the police, who have concluded the attack to be a simple street crime. Though a local NGO, the Association for Solidarity with Asylum Seekers and Migrants (Asam), has agreed with the police, United States authorities are reported to have sped up Sabri's application. Tait documents other cases of rape victims who have been intimidated, as well as reported that some victims have alleged Turkish police have asked them to keep quiet about the rape and torture from which they purport to be escaping, in some cases even threatening to hand refugees over to the Iranian authorities. The UNHCR continues to maintain that the victims are safe in Turkey.

And, another aspect of discrimination against Iranian refugees that has come to my attention involves gay Iranian asylum seekers who the Turkish government has re-located in the conservative central Anatolian town of Kayseri, no doubt a bizarre choice. According to Hossein Alizadeh,

While in Turkey, the authorities insist that refugees can only stay in one of 30 designated small cities. These locations are assigned based on the asylum seeker’s nationality, gender, age, and reason for seeking asylum.

. . . .

In a society where job opportunities are rare and financial resources are limited, refugees usually encounter public hostility. But for LGBT refugees, the picture is particularly frightening. Gay people, especially in more conservative areas, are perceived to be moral degenerates who will destroy social cohesion and promote prostitution. In this context, many view gay refugees as the “bottom of the barrel”—the public (and unfortunately sometimes the authorities) see them as parasites who not only suck blood from their host’s body, but who will fatally damage this body if left unchecked. For this reason, some “concerned citizens,” and occasionally local law enforcement agents, take it upon themselves to continuously intimidate gay refugees to make their lives as unpleasant as possible.

For LGBT refugees in Turkey, this is the daily struggle they must contend with: away from family and friends, with painful memories of persecution and harassment in their native country, they are now unwelcome strangers, living in extreme poverty, isolation and hopelessness, waiting for what feels like an eternity to find out if any country on the planet will give them a chance to live like human beings.

Alizadeh also documents difficulties all refugees in Turkey face, and gives their total number at 18,000 (as of June 2009), and I assume this number includes only those who have filed applications with the UNHCR. I have no idea how many are Iranians, and the number has no doubt increased following this summer's unrest. See also Alizadeh's June 11, 2009 post and this story from Voice of America.

Cake Can Not Be Had and Eaten

Prime Minister Erdogan, addressing a press conference at the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) headquarters in Jeddah this past Wednesday, affirmed Turkey's European vocation while declaring that “Turkey will not lean to either left or right and will not leave its values and principles during its continuous negotiations to join the European Union.”

However, in November, many EU officials were left to wonder just what those principles when Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir was due to attend an OIC meeting in Istanbul. The decision raised the ire of plenty of internationally-conscious Turks with whom I spoke at the time, many of them AKP supporters, and several of whom generally approve of Erdogan. I post this now because I did not have a chance to before, and because Erdogan's praise of the OIC renews the issues' relevance.

The OIC has consistently supported al-Bashir, widely recognized as responsible for crimes against humanity committed in Sudan's Darfur region. (For an example of this support, see this statement fom the OIC to the UN Human Rights Council in 2006, in which the OIC called on the Council "to reflect and respect the views of the Sudanese Government which is cooperating with the human rights machinery" -- this despite the fact that there is plenty of evidence to more than suggest that al-Bashir was not only complicit in crimes against humanity, but may have acted in a planning capacity.) Muslims make up the vast majority of those targeted by paramilitary groups receiving assistance from the Sudanese government. The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a warrant for al-Bashir's arrest in March.

While the AKP's foreign policy has unequivocally condemned crimes committed by Israel in its invasion of Gaza last January, it has been less keen to raise human rights concerns in regard to Sudan (not to menton Iran). Last March it was widely expected that Turkey would use its temporary seat at the UN Security Council to try to defer the ICC's warrant. This move was followed up in November by plans for the Sudanese leader's visit to represent Sudan at the OIC meeting. While the European Union did not publicly question Turkey's flirtations with intervening on the war criminal's behalf at the Security Council, the OIC meeting proved a different story. Then, the EU made clear to Turkey that it did not approve of Bashir's invitation or its friendly relations with the war criminal. Click here for the story from Hürriyet, and for an international perspective, see this piece from the UAE's the National.

Particularly noteworthy at the time was President Gül's condemnation of EU intervention in Turkish foreign affairs. President Gül has been seen as more Euro-friendly than other AKP leaders, but expressed strong disappoval of "EU meddling." While the AKP's position was that the OIC meeting was not a bilateral meeting between Turkey and Sudan, and that Bashir, as the head of state of a member country, could not feasibly be dis-invited, AKP leaders did not and have not since questioned the OIC's continued support of the war criminal. Most likely under pressure from Turkey, al-Bashir eventually declined the invitation.

However, soon after, Erdogan not only expressed his belief that al-Bashir is innocent of war crimes in Darfur, but said that Muslims could not commit genocide and that crimes in Israel were greater. For a reaction of Erdogan's comments at the time, see Joost Lagendijk's thoughtful column in Hürriyet. Lagendijk is former chair of the EU Parliamentary Committee with Turkey and a long-time supporter of Turkey's EU accession. See also Seth Friedman's column in The Guardian.

Turkey's new foreign policy is said to be centered around creating good relations with all of its neighbors, but eventually, troublesome decisions about human rights will come about. While Erdogan may visit the OIC and express support for it and a vocation for Europe, eventually Turkey will have to deal with where it stands in relation to human rights and realize that those principles -- not exclusively European by any means -- require it to condemn crimes against humanity. Are they not also Turkey's principles? Just as importantly, if they are, these human rights principles call Turkey to use its increasing power and influence for their advancement, including within the OIC. There is nothing inherently inconsistent about Turkey's membership in both institutions, but there will continue to be a nauseating element to the president and prime minister's statements until Turkey makes it clear what its principles are, and just what it will do to uphold them.


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And, as a germane aside, around the same time Erdogan made these comments, he said Turkey would reconsider signing the Rome Statute establishing the ICC if it were to be amended to include terrorism a crime under its jurisdiction. Shortly after, the Dutch proposed an amendment doing just this. The proposal will be formally made at the ICC's review conference in Kampala next June. For some background on this, in Rome, states parties discussed adding terrorism and drug trafficking as crimes justicable under the Court's jurisdiction, but decided not to. There has also been discussion of making pre-emptive war a crime under the Statute as well. Any amendment must be approved by 2/3 of States Parties to the Statute.

In 2004, Erdogan promised to sign the Rome Statute and push for ratification. The Justice and Foreign Ministries assembled a working group while the Foreign Ministry began drawing up plans for ratification following the prime minister's 2004 promise. However, officials in the Justice Ministry ended up opposed (see previous posts). There has been a great deal of mis-information about the ICC by opposition in the Turkish media, including that the Court may try Turkish soldiers involved in the 1974 invasion of Cyprus. (The Court has no jurisdiction over crimes predating its establishmnet in July 2002.) Turkey's signature and ratification are squarely in the hands of the government, which again, expressed in its August 2008 National Program for the Adoption of the Acquis (NPAA) that it planned to join the ICC, which the EU has long called on Turkey to do. Whether it happens, like Turkey's EU membership, is another thing entirely.

Alleged Intimidation of Iranian Refugees a Potential Problem for Turkey

Some Iranian political dissidents seeking asylum after Iran's contested presidential elections in July continue to assert that they are not receiving adequate police protection inside Turkey. While much has been made of Turkey's ever closer relationship with the largly de-legitimized Iranian regime, it is claims like these, especially when combined with continued political repression and dissent in Iran, that risk a public relations nightmare for Turkey along the lines of that the country faced this past November when it refused to disallow Sudanese president and genocidaire Omar al-Bashir from attending the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) meeting. The Guardian's Robert Tait writes

Some Iranians have expressed doubts about the protection given to them by police in Turkey. Two men in a small town in central Turkey said police threatened to hand them over to the Iranian authorities. Others say Turkish police have warned them to keep quiet about the threats they have received from Iranian agents.

The intimidation campaign comes after a senior revolutionary guard commander, Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri, told the hardline Keyhan newspaper that foreign-based supporters of the opposition green movement would be targeted as "extensions of a soft coup".

"So far, a large number of the infantry of the enemy has been identified," he said. "The Islamic Republic will not allow the extensions of a soft coup to act on further sedition and if necessary, the government will make them face serious challenges."

Iranians do not need visa requirement to enter Turkey, meaning it would be easy in theory for Iran's state agents to operate clandestinely within Turkey's borders. Western diplomats have privately voiced concerns about the security of Iranian refugees from the election upheaval.

However, Metin Corabatir, external affairs officer with the UN's high commission for refugees, insisted they were safe in Turkey. "The Iranians are under the protection of the Turkish state and Turkey is a secure country," he said. "If there are some high profile people, extra measures are taken to ensure they are protected. But we know of no incident and there is no threat to these people."

While the UNHCR has maintained the asylum seekers are safe in Turkey, the United States has intervened in at least one case involving the alleged assault of a woman who has been particularly vocal in her complaints about continued intimidation by Iranian authorities, pressing the UNHCR to speed up the woman's application for asylum so she can seek refuge in another country.

Turkey was among the first, if not the first, country to congratulate Iranian President Ahmadinejad on his disputed election victory this past July. While it could well be argued that Turkey did not want to make an enemy of the Iranian regime by criticizing the election, the Turkish government broke its diplomatic silence after the phone call when Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu described the election as "dynamic and well-attended," calling on dissidents to succumb to the result while refraining to comment on the human rights violations that caused other governments to raise concern. In October, Prime Minister Erdogan again decided not to comment on continued human rights violations in Iran, critcizing NATO policy toward Iran's nuclear pursuits as failing to take into account Iran's need to develop critical infastructure while calling the country a "friend" with which it has had no difficulties.

While these strategic choices might be well-grounded, continued dissent in Iran, such as that which occurred during Ashura festivities on Dec. 27, does not bode well for Turkey, nor does any harrassment of Iranian political exiles seeking refuge within its borders.