26 November 2001

3. „Britain in bid to break Turkey-EU deadlock”, Britain will try to break a deadlock between Turkey and the European Union which is hampering efforts to build a European rapid reaction force for military crisis management, today.

4. „Turkey still poses a threat to Greece, defence minister says”, Turkey remains a threat to Greece, even if relations between the two neighbours have warmed, Greek Defence Minister Yannos Papantoniou said in a newspaper interview on Sunday.

5. “Ecevit not "very hopeful" on much-awaited Cyprus talks”, Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said Sunday that he did not have high hopes for a solution from the December leaders' meeting on Cyprus where Turkey would never give up its commitment to protect ethnic Turks against the threat of violence it sees from Greek Cypriots.

6. “Aid to Turkey Raising Issue of Motive”, IMF Says Latest Funds Are Not Reward for Supporting Anti-Terror Efforts.

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1. – Turkish Daily News – „Iraq and Turkey reinforce troops”:

Iraq reinforces troops as Turkey does not stay idle. Turkey replaced gendarmerie units in the border region with military and special forces to deter any possible influx of refugees and to prevent the disintegration of Iraq

Lale Sariibrahimoglu

The increased possibility that the United States may use its war against terrorism in Afghanistan as a pretext to rid Iraq of Saddam Hussein, who it has recently once again accused of developing weapons of mass destruction, has prompted both Turkey and Iraq to start taking military measures against each other. Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks against the United States which brought about strikes in Afghanistan to finish terrorist Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network, the Iraqi army has first reinforced its position in the oil rich Kirkuk region. This has been followed by the latest reinforcements of the Mosul and Dohuk region, areas close to Turkey, with a concern that Turkey may intervene.

Turkey on its part has replaced gendarmerie units deployed in the border region with Iraq with military units to prevent any possible major influx of refugees, as well as to be ready to intervene against the disintegration of its southeastern neighbor.

Despite scenarios that Turkey may seize Mosul if the United States stages strikes against Iraq as a second phase of its war against terrorism, no Turkish officials admitted such a possibility. But it is hard to convince either Iraq or other countries in the region, including Iran, a major power broker in northern Iraq, that Turkey will refrain from any such adventurous policy.

Despite Turkish fears of a possible U.S. strike in neighboring Iraq, an increased number of Turkish officials are also of the belief that such a strike can not be ruled out as U.S. President George W. Bush himself has recently implied Iraq as a second target, while his national security advisor Condoleezza Rice openly warned Iraq. Turkey's Ambassador to the United States, Faruk Logoglu's recent statement that if the United States came up with solid evidence that Iraq had links with the al-Qaeda network, Turkey may re-examine its position, has been a conditional green light to the United States for a strike in Iraq.

Some of Iraq's other neighbors, such as Saudi Arabia, however, are firmly opposed to any possible military campaign launched by United States against Baghdad. Saudi Arabia's former intelligence chief Prince Turki bin Faisal said in Riyadh on Nov. 21 that his government had seen no evidence that the Iraqi government had provided support to bin Laden's al-Qaeda network. The New York Times reported that he said Saudi Arabia would not support making Iraq a military target of the war on terrorism.

Prince Faisal said that his country regarded the Iraqi leader as one of the world's most active terrorists. But he said the best way to topple him would be a coup carried out inside Iraq, and that the United States and its allies should avoid further military strikes in the region.

There are some hawks within the Bush administration who advocate using the war on terrorism to increase pressure on the Iraqi regime, perhaps through zones in southern and northern Iraq in which forces opposed to Hussein would be given sanctuary by American troops.

Kurds of Iraq fear repetition of Saddam attacks

U.S. efforts to topple Saddam Hussein by reuniting the Iraqi opposition under a Washington process launched in 1998 has not so far yielded any result to this end. But one of the stronger opposition groups of Iraq, the Kurds, mainly in Northern Iraq, are also among those who are worried about the repercussions of a possible U.S. strike on Iraq.

Both the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) have an armed force of about 80,000. They say that any proposed change of leadership in Iraq should be consulted with them. The Kurdish groups' other concern is the possible repetition of Saddam's forces attacking the Kurds, as was the case in 1991 during which U.S. led coalition forces thwarted Iraqi occupation forces out of Kuwait. The Kurdish groups seek to ensure that the United States should not provoke an attack on the Kurds by Saddam forces.

The northern no fly zone based at Incirlik, Turkey, has been one of the two no fly zones, together with southern no fly zone, protecting the peoples of both regions against Saddam's forces.

Active since 1991, the Northern Watch Operation at Incirlik, composed of U.S. and British forces, have been conducting surveillance flights in the north of the 36th parallel of Northern Iraq, to deter Saddam's forces from attacking the mainly Kurdish populated region. Protecting and safeguarding the interests of the Turkomans in Iraq of Turkish origin is another priority foreign policy agenda of Ankara.

Incirlik has now turned into an international logistics center for the United States, as well as other NATO allies of Turkey, participating in the U.S. war in Afghanistan.

The Northern Watch Operation infrastructure, meanwhile, is speculated to be an ideal staging ground for the United States for any strikes against Saddam.

Among the many dangers of U.S. strikes against Iraq will be a fierce diplomatic battle taking place among the countries of the region, including Turkey, predominantly Muslim but secular by Constitution, as well as Iran and Saudi Arabia, who will seek to impose a political leadership in Baghdad that will serve their interests.

As the U.S. led forces have expelled Taliban rule and the al-Qaeda network from the majority of Afghanistan, a similar row has already been taking place among many Afghani opposition tribes who are ethnically close to Pakistan and Iran.

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2. – Junge Welt – „Grim balance: Women`s Rights Bureau in Istanbul reports on rapes in Turkish police custody”:

By Karin Leukefeld / translated by Kurdish Media

Approximately 146 women have to date sought help from the Women’s Rights Bureau on account of sexual torture in Istanbul.

The Bureau reported this figure in its just-released statistical report, according to which 48 of the women had been raped while in police custody. The majority of the women, 89, were sexually abused and abducted. Six women later died; two committed suicide, and one woman, as well as a 14-year-old girl, were killed by family members “to save the family’s honor”.

Yet another woman died as a result of the long-term consequences of torture, while another died in a death fast carried out among political prisoners. Five women suffered miscarriages resulting from rapes, while five others were tortured either along with, or in the presence of, their own children. The ages of the abused women ranged from ten to 67 years old.

The perpetrators, according to the statistics, come from all branches of the Turkish security forces: police, Gendarmerie (military), Village Guards, and prison officials. The Women’s Rights Bureau notes that the background to the incidents varies. One factor has been the 15-year war in the country’s Kurdish region; over 100 of the women in question are of Kurdish origin. Many of these cases of abuse came when villages were being forcibly evacuated or were carried out against women who were taken into custody for political activities. In many cases, the object was to force out of them information as to the locations of male relatives. Often, however, they were simple demonstrations of male power against politically active but captive women.

Not every such case comes before a judge. To bring charges of sexual abuse requires great courage from the women. Even female attorneys are subjected to persecution. Currently, 75 cases are pending before courts, including 25 cases before the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. The women are often pressured to withdraw their complaints. One such case was that of a 32-year-old woman whose case Amnesty International publicized as an urgent action case (EUR 44/082/2001).

Ms. O, who is also being aided by the Women’s Rights Bureau, was in custody from 1997 to 2000 for “support to the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party)”. She was heavily tortured and also sexually abused. She brought charges against eight police officials who had been involved. The trial is currently underway in Diyarbakir. Since her release, Ms. O. has been living in Izmir. For the past several months, her children have been threatened, taken into custody, and beaten. Most recently, her daughter was forced into an auto. Her eyes were blindfolded and she was threatened with rape. She was then thrown out into the street.

Ms. O. herself, who has been pressured repeatedly to withdraw her complaint, has also been threatened: “We hope that nothing happens to you.”

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3. – Reuters – „Britain in bid to break Turkey-EU deadlock”:

Paul Taylor

Britain will try to break a deadlock between Turkey and the European Union which is hampering efforts to build a European rapid reaction force for military crisis management, today.

A senior British official will hold talks in Ankara with Turkish civilian and military policy makers aimed at overcoming Turkey's objection to granting the EU assured access to NATO assets and planning facilities for European military operations.

The mission by Foreign Office political director Peter Ricketts is billed as the last chance to crack the problem before the 15 EU leaders declare the first elements of their future force operational next month.

"The good news is that the Turkish general staff are in the talks and engaging, whereas they stood aside from previous diplomatic efforts in May," a senior EU diplomat said.

However, other diplomats say that in the changed strategic situation since September 11, the Turks feel the United States needs their support so badly in Afghanistan that it will not apply pressure to yield to the Europeans.

Diplomats say Turkey, a candidate for EU membership not likely to join for at least a decade, is demanding an effective right of veto over EU crisis management operations in what it regards as its security space -- a vague concept.

Turkish veto?

Turkish officials say Ankara seeks a guaranteed right to participate in any and all such EU military operations.

The EU says this would be tantamount to letting Turkey veto missions of its 60,000-strong crisis management force, due to be fully operational -- ready to be deployed within 60 days in and around Europe -- by mid-2003.

Diplomats say Ricketts' task is to provide Ankara with satisfactory assurances of consultation and involvement in EU security policy without granting the Turks a veto over any European action.

They say Britain has U.S. backing for its mediation effort, but it is not clear how strongly Washington is prepared to press its strategic NATO ally on the issue.

Turkish Defence Minister Sabahattin Cakmakoglu said in Brussels last week that Ankara was adopting a flexible and imaginative stance ahead of the talks but he was non-committal on its outcome.

Other non-EU members of the Western alliance are in favour of granting free access to the EU force.

Turkey argues that 11 of NATO's 17 threat scenarios are in its area, giving it special security responsibility and making its involvement in case-by-case decision-making on the use of alliance assets by the EU indispensable.

Diplomats said Turkey also fears that an EU military force could be used against its interests, for example in Cyprus.

The two sides came close to settling the dispute last May but Turkish sources said the influential general staff vetoed a tentative deal worked out by Foreign Minister Ismail Cem.

Keen to lower the stakes in Monday's talks, EU officials are now saying the absence of a deal would be a handicap, but not a "show stopper", for the European defence initiative.

An agreement on EU-NATO ties might help defuse a looming crisis between Brussels and Ankara over the prospect of Cyprus concluding negotiations next year to join the Union.

Turkey, which invaded the East Mediterranean island in 1974 in response to a short-lived pro-Greek coup in Nicosia, has threatened to annex the northern third of Cyprus it occupies if the EU admitted a divided island.

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4.. – AFP – „Turkey still poses a threat to Greece, defence minister says”:

ATHENS

Turkey remains a threat to Greece, even if relations between the two neighbours have warmed, Greek Defence Minister Yannos Papantoniou said in a newspaper interview on Sunday.

"The Turkish threat persists, unfortunately, just as much as in the past," Papantoniou said in the interview published by To Vima. The two arch rivals, both NATO members, have been at loggerheads over territorial disputes in the Aegean, human rights and the divided island of Cyprus. However, ties warmed in 1999 when the two helped each other out after both countries were rocked by major earthquakes within days of each other.

Papantoniou said in the interview that Turkey still maintained some unacceptable demands. "We do not negotiate our sovereign rights with the Turks," he said. He said, however, that Greece would press on with efforts at rapprochement, which would include backing Turkey's bid to join the European Union. Turkey was declared a candidate for EU membership in 1999, but has not been allowed to join 12 other countries in membership talks.

"The efforts at rapprochement with Turkey are not a lost cause," he said, saying there would be no u-turn in Greek efforts. "Greece has every interest in protecting the friendship and cooperation and also in promoting Turkey's accession into the European Union," he said.

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5. – AFP – “Ecevit not "very hopeful" on much-awaited Cyprus talks”:

ANKARA

Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said Sunday that he did not have high hopes for a solution from the December leaders' meeting on Cyprus where Turkey would never give up its commitment to protect ethnic Turks against the threat of violence it sees from Greek Cypriots.

Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash and Cyprus President Glafcos Clerides are scheduled to meet on December 4 for their first face-to-face meeting in four years in the presence of a UN official without any preconditions to seek ways to end the long-standing division of the island. "It would be beneficial to be optimistic. I hope they (Cyprus leaders) will reach an atmosphere of consensus, but I am not very hopeful," Ecevit told the state-run TRT channel.

His remarks came just before Denktash arrived in Ankara Sunday for a health check-up and a meeting with President Ahmet Necdet Sezer to discuss the Cyprus issue. Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when Turkey seized its northern third in response to an Athens-engineered coup in Nicosia seeking to unite the island with Greece following years of ethnic violence. Denktash, backed by Turkey, supports a confederation of two states, putting recognition of his breakaway Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) as a pre-condition.

But the internationally recognized government in the south and the international community reject the idea in favor of a bi-zonal federation. The Cyprus issue has become even more complicated with Greek Cyprus' prospects of becoming a European Union member as soon as 2004, which would entail the admission of a country part of which is occupied by another candidate, Turkey.

Ecevit said on TRT that the reunification of Cyprus in a single-state federation, urged by the European Union and the United Nations, would trigger fresh inter-communal strife. "If a solution in line with the wishes of Greek Cypriots and the European Union is brought on the agenda and tried to be implemented, it is inevitable, in my opinion, for Turkish Cypriots to face a new genocide," he said. Ecevit, who gave the 1974 order for Turkish troops to storm Cyprus, added that Turkey would not make any concessions on the security and protection of the island's ethnic Turks.

"There is no difference between sacrificing the TRNC and a part of Turkish soil. The TRNC is of vital importance for the security of not only Turkish Cypriots, but also Turkey itself," he said. In a recent newspaper interview, Ecevit warned that Turkey would annex northern Cyprus if the Greek Cypriot government took the island into the EU, drawing a warning from Brussels that such a move would strain EU-Turkish relations.

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6. – Washington Post – “Aid to Turkey Raising Issue of Motive”:

IMF Says Latest Funds Are Not Reward for Supporting Anti-Terror Efforts

By Paul Blustein

At a time when practically all major news connects one way or another to Osama bin Laden, it looked like no coincidence when Horst Koehler, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, announced last week that the IMF plans to boost lending to Turkey by about $10 billion in the hopes of quelling the country's latest financial crisis.

Turkey had recently declared its intention to dispatch special forces and peacekeeping troops to Afghanistan, providing valuable support from a Muslim ally to the U.S. military presence there. So despite the economic rationale cited by Koehler for the new loan, cynics perceived a geopolitical quid pro quo.

"Bin Laden Saves Turkey!" proclaimed a headline in Tuesday's Turkish Daily News, where columnist Mehmet Ali Birand wrote: "We are about to get fresh funds from abroad because Turkey's strategic importance has increased in the post-Sept. 11 climate. . . . If it wasn't for bin Laden, we would not be getting anything. We would have gone bankrupt."

Such assertions evoke indignant reactions from top IMF officials, who maintain that the Turkish government has abided by the stringent terms of its previous IMF loans and deserves international assistance to overcome problems its economy has suffered since Sept. 11. Asked whether the IMF was showing favoritism to Turkey, Koehler replied: "I don't think this is right, and it's also not fair."

But while some experts agree that a new Turkish rescue can be justified on economic grounds, the decision is being watched closely as a possible case in which the IMF's most powerful shareholders, especially the United States, are using the fund to reward governments for backing the anti-terror coalition.

During the Cold War, Washington regularly exercised its clout to ensure that regimes opposing the Soviet Union received loans from the IMF and its sister institution, the World Bank. The results often proved of little benefit to the long-term economic development of the countries involved, because the money helped prop up inefficient and corrupt governments, a notorious example being that of Mobutu Sese Seko in Zaire. Within the IMF and World Bank staffs, worries abound that, in this respect, history will repeat itself in the war against terrorism.

Turkey's case is noteworthy because last week's announcement was the third time in a year that the IMF has pledged to substantially increase its aid to the country. An $11.4 billion loan granted last November failed to prevent a disastrous plunge in the Turkish lira two months later, and when the IMF lent Ankara an additional $10 billion in the spring officials in Washington swore that they would offer no more. Yet now they are readying another $10 billion; furthermore, it comes at a time when the IMF is balking at lending any more to Argentina, whose government has desperately sought another bailout to avoid defaulting on its debts.

"Turkey's political importance, which has become more acute after Sept. 11 and the war on terrorism, is a factor that weighs heavily in Turkey's favor, and those factors just don't play in the same way for Argentina," said Michael Mussa, who retired this summer as the IMF's chief economist and is now a scholar at the Institute for International Economics. "The fact that that is vigorously denied tells you that it is undoubtedly true."

In a speech Wednesday in Washington, Kemal Dervis, Turkey's economy minister, acknowledged that one of the reasons for the IMF's continued aid is that "Turkey is a responsible member of the international community and has taken the right decisions in the political field."

But that alone wouldn't suffice, argued Dervis, a former top World Bank official. "International financial support is clearly linked to our economic policies and success in meeting the economic criteria" set in the IMF program, he said, citing deep cuts in government spending and major reforms of the state-owned banking system, which has been plagued by losses stemming from interference by powerful politicians over lending policies. "I wish Argentina well," Dervis added, "but they have missed every single criteria in their [IMF] program," such as requirements for elimination of the budget deficit.

"If the economic case wasn't there, I don't think the talk of additional aid would have materialized," agreed Dani Rodrik, a Turkish-born economist at Harvard University. "Turkey has by and large done everything that the fund has asked it to do; the problem is that the economy has not reacted as speedily as the IMF and the Turkish authorities were expecting," as a deep recession persists and interest rates remain in the high double digits.

One of Turkey's greatest advantages, Rodrik noted, is the low value of the lira, which has fallen by more than half against the U.S. dollar this year. Although the collapse in the lira was hardly desirable, it does have a bright side because it makes Turkish exports much more competitive on world markets. In that respect, Turkey can claim that it stands a better chance of climbing out of its rut than Argentina, where the peso is rigidly fixed to the dollar and the country's goods suffer competitively against cheaper products made in neighboring countries.

Still, Rodrik said, the big question is whether a new IMF loan "will at most buy time" -- that is, give Turkey the means to pay principal and interest on its staggering debt for a while longer without doing much long-term good.