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CHANGES IN TURKEY'S BORDERS?
by MURAT YETKİN
Hurriyet
July 26 2012
Turkey
The fact that some Syrian border posts are no longer controlled by
troops loyal to Bashar al-Assad but by Syrian Kurdish rebel groups, and
that Kurdish flags have been raised in some Syrian border towns with
Kurdish populations, has seriously disturbed the Turkish government.
One group in particular has attracted Turkey's attention, the
well-organized Democratic Union Party (PYD), which according to
spokespersons "shares the same ideology" with the Kurdistan Workers'
Party (PKK). The PKK has been waging an armed campaign against Turkey
for the last three decades, claiming more than forty thousand lives
to date.
Concern about the rise of the PYD caused Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan
to convene an emergency meeting in Ankara with his top security and
foreign policy team members. Another matter of concern to Ankara
was the fact that some of the Syrian Kurdish militants in Syria have
been sheltered and trained by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG)
in Iraq, while the KRG's leader Masoud Barzani has promised Erdogan
that he will convince the PKK (based in his territory) to give up
its "armed struggle" against Turkey. The government is going to take
some "additional measures" against the PKK presence along the Turkish
borders with Syria and Iraq, according to a statement issued following
the meeting.
Turkey's border with Iraq was settled in an agreement with the United
Kingdom when it was the mandatory power there, following a serious of
Kurdish uprisings (supposedly assisted by British-backed agitators)
in 1926, three years after the regime change in Turkey from Sultanate
to Republic. The border with Syria was settled when the people of
the border province of Hatay voted to be a part of Turkey rather than
remain with the newly founded Syria under French mandate in 1938.
Actually, the territories of the failing Turkish Empire under the
Ottoman dynasty almost a century ago were "shared" among Britain,
France and Czarist Russia, via a secret agreement to the Sykes-Picot
plan of 1916, which was then exposed in the Brest-Litovsk peace
agreement in 1918 by the Soviet leadership who seized power in Russia
through the Bolshevik revolution of 1917.
Another wave of border changes came about with the collapse of
the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Some were peaceful, like the
reunification of Germany and the "Velvet Divorce" that gave birth
to the Czech and Slovak Republics. But Yugoslavia was split into six
parts via a human disaster that has not come to an end even today.
Borders in the Caucasus are also not in a stable condition yet, with
ongoing disputes between Azerbaijan and Armenia and Russia and Georgia.
Following the instability of borders in regions northwest and northeast
of Turkey, now the Arab Spring has caused instabilities on Turkey's
southern and southeastern borders, which consist mostly of straight
lines drawn in the sand by Mr. Sykes and Mr. Picot according to
their strategic value as determined by energy resources. As the
territorial integrity of Syria and Iraq is in greater jeopardy with
every passing day, the borders become more unstable and the Kurds
arise as independent actors in regional politics.
Yet there are three countries in the region which have the capability
to expand, rather than shrink: Israel, Iran and Turkey. There are
already political and economic actors trying to push Turkey to claim
some energy-rich parts of Iraq and Syria, which would mean a regime
change such as a federated Turkey, with Kurdish and possibly Arabic
members. But Ankara instinctively resists the idea of border changes,
which could drag the whole region into a chain reaction of wars. The
region is heading towards a dangerously unstable phase because of
the civil war in Syria.
by MURAT YETKİN
Hurriyet
July 26 2012
Turkey
The fact that some Syrian border posts are no longer controlled by
troops loyal to Bashar al-Assad but by Syrian Kurdish rebel groups, and
that Kurdish flags have been raised in some Syrian border towns with
Kurdish populations, has seriously disturbed the Turkish government.
One group in particular has attracted Turkey's attention, the
well-organized Democratic Union Party (PYD), which according to
spokespersons "shares the same ideology" with the Kurdistan Workers'
Party (PKK). The PKK has been waging an armed campaign against Turkey
for the last three decades, claiming more than forty thousand lives
to date.
Concern about the rise of the PYD caused Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan
to convene an emergency meeting in Ankara with his top security and
foreign policy team members. Another matter of concern to Ankara
was the fact that some of the Syrian Kurdish militants in Syria have
been sheltered and trained by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG)
in Iraq, while the KRG's leader Masoud Barzani has promised Erdogan
that he will convince the PKK (based in his territory) to give up
its "armed struggle" against Turkey. The government is going to take
some "additional measures" against the PKK presence along the Turkish
borders with Syria and Iraq, according to a statement issued following
the meeting.
Turkey's border with Iraq was settled in an agreement with the United
Kingdom when it was the mandatory power there, following a serious of
Kurdish uprisings (supposedly assisted by British-backed agitators)
in 1926, three years after the regime change in Turkey from Sultanate
to Republic. The border with Syria was settled when the people of
the border province of Hatay voted to be a part of Turkey rather than
remain with the newly founded Syria under French mandate in 1938.
Actually, the territories of the failing Turkish Empire under the
Ottoman dynasty almost a century ago were "shared" among Britain,
France and Czarist Russia, via a secret agreement to the Sykes-Picot
plan of 1916, which was then exposed in the Brest-Litovsk peace
agreement in 1918 by the Soviet leadership who seized power in Russia
through the Bolshevik revolution of 1917.
Another wave of border changes came about with the collapse of
the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Some were peaceful, like the
reunification of Germany and the "Velvet Divorce" that gave birth
to the Czech and Slovak Republics. But Yugoslavia was split into six
parts via a human disaster that has not come to an end even today.
Borders in the Caucasus are also not in a stable condition yet, with
ongoing disputes between Azerbaijan and Armenia and Russia and Georgia.
Following the instability of borders in regions northwest and northeast
of Turkey, now the Arab Spring has caused instabilities on Turkey's
southern and southeastern borders, which consist mostly of straight
lines drawn in the sand by Mr. Sykes and Mr. Picot according to
their strategic value as determined by energy resources. As the
territorial integrity of Syria and Iraq is in greater jeopardy with
every passing day, the borders become more unstable and the Kurds
arise as independent actors in regional politics.
Yet there are three countries in the region which have the capability
to expand, rather than shrink: Israel, Iran and Turkey. There are
already political and economic actors trying to push Turkey to claim
some energy-rich parts of Iraq and Syria, which would mean a regime
change such as a federated Turkey, with Kurdish and possibly Arabic
members. But Ankara instinctively resists the idea of border changes,
which could drag the whole region into a chain reaction of wars. The
region is heading towards a dangerously unstable phase because of
the civil war in Syria.