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  • Friends By The Bosporus

    FRIENDS BY THE BOSPORUS

    Economist
    http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystor y.cfm?story_id=13447023
    April 8 2009

    Turkey basks in the glory of a two-day visit by Barack Obama

    IT WAS sealed with an embrace. Barack Obama concluded his wide-ranging
    address to the Turkish parliament on April 6th by kissing the prime
    minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on both cheeks. That seemed to please
    his audience of parliamentarians, as did the American president's
    pledge that his country was "not at war with Islam." He pointed out
    that many Americans are part of Muslim families, and others have lived
    in countries where Muslims are in the majority. "I know, because I
    am one of them," he said, prompting wild applause.

    Mr Obama delivered a high-class performance, charming his audience by
    calling Turkey a "critical" ally and an important part of Europe. Its
    secular free-market democracy is just the sort of model America hopes
    might inspire Muslims everywhere. That message was also received by
    millions tuned into Al-Jazeera's live coverage of Mr Obama's speeches
    during his two-day tour to Ankara and Istanbul.

    Mr Obama's decision to add Turkey to his European tour went beyond
    confirming (to the joy of Turkey's secular elite) the country's western
    credentials. It highlighted Turkey's emergence as a regional power that
    matters and as a large, mainly Muslim member of NATO (tiny Albania,
    another Muslim country, has just joined NATO as well). After seven
    years under the mildly Islamist Justice and Development (AK) Party,
    Turkey enjoys growing influence and popularity in the Arab world.

    Turkish support will be critical as America prepares to withdraw from
    Iraq and switch its focus to Afghanistan. Mr Obama (who went on from
    Istanbul to Baghdad for a flying visit) reportedly urged Abdullah Gul,
    the Turkish president, to send more troops to Afghanistan, some of them
    for combat. Turkey already has 900 soldiers in Afghanistan and is a
    transit hub for supplies to American troops both there and in Iraq. The
    Turks have also acted as a conduit for messages between America and
    Iran as the two countries consider re-establishing dialogue.

    Mr Obama's trip comes after a prolonged chill between America and
    Turkey, prompted largely by differences over Iraq. The Turkish
    parliament provoked fury, especially in the Pentagon, when it voted
    in March 2003 against letting American troops use the country as a
    route for opening a second front in Iraq. America's refusal to take
    action against separatist rebels from the Kurdistan Workers' Party
    (PKK) in northern Iraq then fed Turkish anger. Some opinion polls
    showed support for America in single digits when George Bush was
    president. But America's decision in late 2007 to provide intelligence
    on the PKK and to let Turkish planes bomb rebel bases in northern
    Iraq changed the mood. So, even more, did Mr Obama's election.

    EPA

    Obliging Obama charms earnest ErdoganPerhaps the most important change,
    as Mr Obama acknowledged, is that America has overcome its cold-war
    habit of engaging mostly with Turkey's generals. As democracy has
    taken root, public opinion has come to count. Turkey's generals found
    this out when voters returned the AK for a second term in the July
    2007 general election with a thumping 47% of the vote soon after the
    top brass threatened a coup.

    Mr Obama's 25-minute speech to the Turkish parliament offered
    something for everyone, whether secularist, Islamist, nationalist
    or Kurdish. Even the generals showed up to listen. They have been
    boycotting parliament ever since 20 members of the pro-Kurdish
    Democratic Society Party (DTP) were elected in 2007.

    Most of his listeners will have been pleased to hear Mr Obama stress
    Turkey's Western orientation, saying that America supported Turkey's
    aspirations for European Union membership "not as members of the EU but
    as close friends of both Turkey and Europe." The Islamists liked his
    reference to Turkey's Muslim identity. But he also called for respect
    for minorities, declaring that the Greek Orthodox seminary on Halki, an
    island off Istanbul, must be reopened. In a bold gesture he included
    the DTP's co-chairman, Ahmet Turk, among the opposition leaders
    whom he met. Mr Turk has long sought an audience with Mr Erdogan,
    but never had one because he refuses to label the PKK as "terrorist".

    Only one cloud hung over Mr Obama's trip: his campaign pledge to call
    the mass killings of the Ottoman Armenians in 1915 "genocide". In a
    press conference after his talks with Mr Gul, the American president
    said that he had not changed his view of history. But in a blow to
    the Armenian diaspora, which has long lobbied for a congressional bill
    to label the massacres as genocide, Mr Obama suggested that Turkey's
    recent efforts to reopen its border and re-establish diplomatic ties
    with Armenia should not be overshadowed by America's position on the
    issue. Turkey and Armenia are expected soon to sign an agreement,
    after months of Swiss-sponsored talks in Bern. Officials close to
    the negotiations say that a document could be initialled by both
    sides in "a matter of days" and that the border could be reopened
    "within months".

    This was not all a cynical fudge. During his parliamentary speech,
    Mr Obama declared that "history...unresolved can be a heavy weight...I
    know there are strong views in this chamber about the terrible events
    of 1915. While there has been a good deal of commentary about my views,
    this is really about how the Turkish and Armenian people deal with the
    past. And the best way forward for the Turkish and Armenian people
    is a process that works through the past in a way that is honest,
    open and constructive."

    Not all Turks agree. An Ankara court recently overturned an Istanbul
    prosecutor's decision not to investigate some 30,000 Turks who have
    signed an online declaration apologising to the Ottoman Armenians
    for the "great catastrophe" that befell them in 1915.

    Tensions are also running high in the mostly Kurdish south-east. Mr
    Obama praised the recent launch of a state-run 24-hour Kurdish-language
    television channel. But only days before his arrival, two Kurdish
    youths were killed in clashes with police during a rally called to
    mark the birthday of the captive PKK leader, Abdullah Ocalan. Over
    50 demonstrators who turned out to protest against the deaths are
    still in police custody.

    Many friends of Turkey hope that Mr Obama will stick by his pledge on
    the Armenian genocide. They say that would restore America's moral
    credibility and would allow it to draw attention to Turkey's patchy
    human-rights record. Until recently, the EU's remonstrations counted
    most. But Europe's habitual foot-dragging during Turkey's membership
    talks has meant that it "has neither any carrots nor any sticks left,"
    confesses an EU envoy in Ankara. Enter Barack Hussein Obama to fill
    the void.
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