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ANKARA: Turkish Foreign Policy In The New Era

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  • ANKARA: Turkish Foreign Policy In The New Era

    TURKISH FOREIGN POLICY IN THE NEW ERA
    Sedat Laciner

    Journal of Turkish Weekly
    Nov 9 2009

    There are some that accuse Turkey of deviating from its Western foreign
    policy to that of the East. First of all, as President Abdullah Gul
    said in his speech at International Strategic Research Organization
    (USAK) this week, we should not look at Turkey's current trade
    relations or official visits to understand Turkey's direction.

    We have to look at the values of Turkey to assess whether there
    has been a change in the direction. In the last seven years Turkey
    has made great reforms and transformations. For example, the Kurdish
    policy of the Turkish State has changed dramatically, even mentioning
    the term Kurd in Turkey was taboo in the 1990s, but now there is a
    Kurdish State TV channel, TRT 7 (TRT Ses). These developments have
    not only been in Kurdish broadcasting, but many other fundamental
    rights have been given to the Kurdish people as well.

    With matters concerning Armenia, Cyprus, relations with Greece, and
    many other problematic issues, Turkey has changed its policies and
    Turkish laws have been liberated and made more democratic. Turkey's
    economic relations with regional and neighboring countries have
    increased as well. After Turkey's application to the EU for full
    membership, much progress has been made and the EU countries have
    confirmed Turkey's progress from a relatively backward country to one
    that has begun to comply with EU standards. It is clear that Turkey
    is not leaving the West; Turks have developed much more due to a
    desire to join the West, the EU. Turkey is increasing its economic
    relations; it is not trading in its Western values for those of its
    Middle Eastern neighbors.

    The Main Objectives and Lasting Effects of the Zero Problem with
    Neighbors Policy

    Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and the current government's policy of
    zero problem with neighbors aims to foster cooperation with the region:
    the Balkans, Caucasus and the Middle East. Following cooperation,
    its next objective is integration of the region, but when we say
    integration we mean economic integration not political. Some argue
    that since Turkey is improving its relations with Iran, Syria and
    Iraq, it means they are shifting their direction towards the east, but
    this is not true, Turkey wants cooperation and economic integration,
    it does not desire to turn away from the EU or the West in general.

    People are asking Turkey why it is developing its relations with
    Syria and Iran, but before questioning Turkey's relations with these
    countries we should understand that Turkey is not a lucky country. Our
    neighbors are Syria, Iraq, Iran, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria
    and Greece. If Turkey was France, which has neighbors like Spain and
    Germany, its foreign relations could be easier but our neighbors are
    maybe the most problematic countries in the world. We have to 'tame'
    them and even change them, and of course Turkey's direction is not
    towards Iran or Syria. If we look at Turkey's values like liberal
    democracy, transparency, free liberal economic market, human rights
    and all other western values that the current and previous government
    focused on and accepted, we can see that Turkey is trying to reach
    the standards of the EU and the West, not the Iranian understanding
    of values.

    Turkey's policies are quite different than the Iranian understanding
    and approach, these two countries have always been competitor
    countries in the region, but we have to have cooperation with Iran;
    Turkey is not the neighbor of the United States or Germany, Iran is our
    neighbor, Syria and Iraq are our neihbours. Thanks to the new Turkish
    neighbor policies, millions of Iranian tourists come to Turkey every
    year. Similarly millions of Arabs and about 500.000 Israelis come to
    Turkish resorts every year. All these Middle Eastern people travel
    and absorb and see the Turkish way of life. They are changing and
    influenced by the Turkish model, and not just because of travel, but
    due to exposure to Turkish broadcasting as well. Arabs and Iranians
    watch Turkish soap operas, they are learning Turkish so that they
    can understand these soaps and the most popular soaps are Turkish
    in the region. The influence is apparent because in Saudi Arabia
    for example, some men applied to the courts to ban Turkish series'
    because they argue that these programs are influencing society.

    Turkish culture, tourism, and economic relations between these
    countries, all social and economic relations are changing the society
    in the region. We say it is the soft power of Turkey; it is perhaps
    the only country that can change the Middle Eastern societies because
    Turkey was the ruler of this region for centuries, and the Turks
    unlike the Americans and othe outsiders can understand these peoples.

    Syria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Algeria, and Iraq were all under
    Ottoman rule and there are many Turkish people amongst the peoples
    of the Middle East and both sides are Muslim and know each others
    culture very well. I think the U.S and EU countries cannot understand
    the Middle Eastern culture or politics, but Turkey can. For instance,
    during the Bush era in the United States, they thought that if you
    change leaders, you can change the regime, change the borders and
    create a new democratic Middle East but it did not work. Saddam is
    gone but terror came to replace him. There was not terror under Saddam;
    Iraq was a terror free state during his time. The 9/11 attacks were not
    carried out by citizens of Iraq, but the U.S. still attacked Iraq and
    nothing has changed, maybe it has put Iraq in a much worse situation.

    Turkey is against military attacks against any Middle Eastern
    countries, including Iran, because Turkey argues that we need
    soft power, we need to gain the hearts and minds of the people. Any
    attacks in the Middle East will also harm the Turkish economy and our
    interests. This is why the Turks are trying to solve the conflicts
    and problems in the region.

    Turkey was the moderator or facilitator between Israel and Syria,
    between Afghanistan and Pakistan, between the various sects in Iraq
    and even between the United States and Iran. Turkey is trying to
    solve all the regional problems because the Turkish leaders know
    that if Turkey cannot, those problems will overflow into Turkey,
    like the Kurdish problem; Northern Iraq has become a base for the PKK
    terrorists who are attacking Turkish targets. So Turkey is not changing
    its direction but perhaps discovering the region and trying to further
    its good relations with the region. Turkey is improving relations with
    the Middle East, Caucasia and the Balkans but not at the expense of
    boosting its relations with the West, because a stronger partner is
    better than a weaker partner for the United States and the EU.

    Neo-Ottomanism?

    Neo-Ottomanism is not possible because the world is a different place
    and if any resemblance of Ottoman policy were initiated then all the
    former states in the region would be against Turkey. Turkey should
    unite the regional countries and change the surrounding region; it
    should democratize and liberalize the region, especially the Muslim
    countries. Some of them are so backward in education and in where they
    position women in society, their economic development and so forth.

    Turkey has to change these societies and not by imposing something
    as the empire did. First, Turkey needs to solve the problems and then
    it should make cooperation and integrate, this ensures equal relations.

    This understanding can be named 'Neo-European Unionist policy'
    because this is the EU spirit. Turkey is following the EU experience,
    not the Ottoman experience.

    Relations with Israel under the AKP

    There are some Israelis and Jewish people that have thought the
    AKP (AK Party) was an Islamist party and that they were against
    relations with Israel, but this is not the case. The previous Israeli
    ambassador to Turkey gave a lecture at the USAK a few years ago and
    he argued that Turkey's relations with Israel peaked during the AKP
    administration. Economic relations reached over 10 billion dollars,
    and tourism, direct investments and trade have developed further and
    those cannot be compared to past relations between Turkey and Israel.

    The AKP is not against Israel, or against the West, they have complied
    to EU regulations in almost all dimensions with Israel, but at the
    same time, Turkey has decided to solve its problems with its neighbors.

    The Neo-Cons, some of the Jewish organizations, some of the pro-Israeli
    think tanks in the US, and right wing extremists in Israel have
    accused Turkey of being anti-Israeli in the last 3 or 4 years.

    After the Lebanon war and the Gaza conflicts, Turkey harshly criticized
    Israel because in both cases more than 1.400 people were killed by
    Israeli forces and many were women and children. Perhaps 100-150 were
    militant while the rest were civilians. Turkey harshly criticized
    Israel and said their way of combating Palestinians is not effective
    and their efforts are only creating more terrorists but terrorizing
    the region. Israel creates these problems and Turkey like the whole
    of the region is paying the cost. It is ironic that some Israeli
    experts are now accusing Turkey of being anti-Semitic although Turkey
    is maybe the best country in terms of anti-Semitism records.

    During Ottoman times, Jewish people took shelter here, Sephardic
    Jews came to the Ottoman State, they were a main component of the
    empire and when the empire was collapsing Turkey and it's minorities
    cooperated together. There were some Jews who were against having
    a Jewish State because they had the protection under the Empire, a
    safe haven. They declared that they had a Jewish state and a country
    that protected them and during the 20th century, you cannot see any
    anti-Semitic political current in Turkey. Israel accuses all critics
    of being anti-Semitic but this is not good for Israeli interests.

    Turkey believes that friends need to criticize each other sometimes
    in order to maintain both parties interests. We are not enemies.

    We also see some extremist groups in Israel organizing campaigns
    against the AKP. They organize secret reports and secret gatherings
    that argue the U.S. should support a military coup in Turkey because
    they claim the current political party here cannot develop strong
    Turkey-Israeli or Turkey-U.S. relations. They have waged a dirty
    campaign in Washington to create a gap between the Turkish and U.S.

    administrations and the Turkish State is well aware of these dirty
    campaigns. For example, the Jewish group MEMRI is translating Turkish
    speeches and Presidential reports in order to manipulate American
    society. They translate words with a quite different spirit. If
    the Prime Minister says we are friends of Israel that is why we are
    criticizing them, they translate it into we are criticizing Israel
    because Israel deserves that. They apply dirty tricks to manipulate
    American politics.

    Last year, after the Davos crisis, a high ranking Israeli general
    accused Turkey in all policy areas, including our policies with the
    Kurds, Armenians and Greeks, all issues that Israel supported during
    the 70's 80's and 90's so what happened in 2009? Nothing has changed
    but the problem in Israel is that some politicians and military
    personnel are very emotional. I understand they are under fire, they
    are surrounded by some hostile Muslim countries and since the 1920s,
    they have been in hot conflicts; this environment has had negative
    effects for them and maybe they cannot think with a healthy mind
    frame, but if they continue to behave towards Turkey in this way,
    and undermine Turkish-United States, EU and Israeli relations, this
    behavior will cause long lasting damage in relations.
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