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With France Out Of The Way, Turkey Can Deal With Iran's Nuclear Prog

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  • With France Out Of The Way, Turkey Can Deal With Iran's Nuclear Prog

    WITH FRANCE OUT OF THE WAY, TURKEY CAN DEAL WITH IRAN'S NUCLEAR PROGRAM

    http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/with-france-out-of-the-way-turkey-can-deal-with-iran-s-nuclear-program-1.415954
    Published 22:49 01.03.12

    Israel, Turkey can take a lesson from the way Paris and Ankara returned
    to normal after a French attempt to make the denial of the Armenian
    genocide illegal threatened the longtime relationship.

    By Zvi Bar'el Tags: Israel Turkey Iran nuclear Recep Tayyip Erdogan

    After the storm of the "Armenian genocide bill" rattled Turkish-French
    ties to the point of crisis, both nations could breathe a sigh of
    relief on Wednesday. France's Constitutional Council struck down the
    bill, saying that it was ran counter to the country's constitution,
    to 1789's the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and 1879's Act of
    the Freedom of the Press. The Constitutional Council did so, in the
    words of the eminent pundit Mehmet Ali Birand, to prove that "France
    is France," and mainly to take France off the tree Turkey placed it on.

    The aforementioned bill aimed to sentence anyone who denied the
    Armenian genocide to up to one year in prison, along with a fine of
    45,000 Euros. When it was passed both in the house of representative
    and the Senate, Turkey saw red. It sanctioned French warships and jets
    that wished to use its ports and airports, chilled its diplomatic
    relations with France, and it seemed that the two countries were
    headed on a full-on collision course.

    Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (R) shakes hands with Turkey's
    Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul May 9, 2011.

    Photo by: Reuters

    "France is restricting free speech," Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip
    Recep Erdogan said, while the mayor of Ankara swore to change the
    name of the capital's Paris St. to "Algeria St.," to commemorate
    the Algerians who were killed during the French occupation of their
    country.

    But both countries saw that the tree they climbed on was too high,
    to the point that it threatened not only both economies, but their
    essential strategic relationship. On both sides, lobbying campaign
    ensued advanced by industrial groups to remove the threat of boycott,
    lower the critical tone and return to normal.

    The bill, then, was taken down, and even though French President
    Nikola Sarkozy promised the his country's largest Armenian community,
    the votes of whom he'll need in the coming elections, that he will
    draft a new law, it is nonetheless clear that the affair is over.

    France and Turkey came to understand what Israel and Turkey should
    have understood long ago: even prestige and honor can be reconciled
    if you don't paint argue yourself into a dead end. However, the end
    of the crisis means that Turkey can afford time to its mediating
    activities, something it has been engaged in full on. It aspires to
    host talks on Iran's nuclear program in April, and for that it needs
    Iranian consent and that of the five permanent United Nations Security
    Council members along with Germany.

    In principle, Iran has already voiced its approval to hold a dialogue
    with the West in Istanbul, but the western nations first want to
    find out what is it that they'll be discussing. For that reason,
    Erdogan invited himself to a Tehran visit during the last week of
    March in order to reach the kind of agreements that would make the
    dialogue possible. According to Turkish sources, Erdogan will tell
    Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that time is of the essence for
    "we understand that the Israeli Spring is coming, and with it the
    possibility of an attack on Iran."

    But even before the meeting in Tehran, Turkey will have an opportunity
    to exchange ideas with Iran when next Wednesday the foreign ministers
    of Turkey, Iran, and Azerbaijan will meet in what is being defined
    a routine meeting geared at "promoting regional peace and security."

    It will also serve as another opportunity for Iran to scold Azerbaijan
    for its $1.6 billion arms deal with Israel. Following that transaction,
    the Azeri envoy in Tehran was summoned to the Iranian Foreign Ministry,
    where explanations were demanded and warnings were issued against the
    possibility that the next door neighbor would serve as a "terror base
    against Iran."

    The Azeri envoy explained that the deal was not meant to threaten any
    state but "to liberate Azerbaijan's occupied territory," referring
    to Nagorno-Karabakh, which was taken by Armenia during their war in
    the 1990s. In that way, an occupying country aides an occupied one,
    earning quite a bit of cash along the way.

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