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CRACKDOWN ON PROTESTERS REVEALED BAD SIDE OF ERDOGAN'S POLICIES - ANALYST
09:23 28/06/2013 " INTERVIEWS
Press TV has conducted an interview with Ian Williams, with the
Foreign Policy In Focus from New York City, to shed more light on
the issue of the Turkish government's crackdown on protesters and
the subsequent decision of the European authorities to postpone the
country's EU accession talks.
Following is a rough transcription of the interview.
- Mr. Williams, first of all how much did Turkey's crackdown on
the demonstrations in Istanbul and Ankara have an impact on its EU
accession bid?
- Well, the accession talks are going ahead. The immediate one,
scheduled for Wednesday is canceled; and the rest of the European
countries, sort of, hammered out this compromise with the Germans and
the Austrians and the Dutch who wanted to send a message, but part of
the problem is of course, that the Germans and the Austrians don't want
Turkey in any way, so this looks like that they are using an excuse
but there are genuine grounds that the rest of Europe recognizes that
there should be some type of protest to the Erdogan government about
the severity of the crackdown on demonstrators.
- Will this policy be long-term to postpone Turkey's EU accession bid?
- From the compromise that was hammered out, it looks like they
will send a signal by postponing talks this Wednesday but they are
going to continue with the overall program and the rest of Europe
are looking and they are saying to themselves, Hey! we let Greece
in, we know the Greek government put down the riots quite brutally,
why are we are picking on Turkey? And that is just strange.
You know, Erdogan is being castigated for being Islamist but one
commentator pointed out that in this context he was being more Turkish
than Islamist as a long tradition of what you might call a lack of
gentleness on the part of the Turkish security forces and Erdogan
certainly should do more to rein them in but he can .....be blamed
for what generations of Turkish cops have grown up to do.
- And how does the EU justify its own crackdown on protests, especially
what we saw, the protests against the financial crisis in Europe?
- Well, pure hypocrisy, it does not of course! You know, people got
killed in Greek riots against the austerity measures, actually being
pushed for by the European Union countries in Greece and nothing is
said but in Turkey it gives an excuse to the Germans and the Austrians
to slow things down, which makes Angela Merkel look good back home in
Germany because she can say, Look! I am holding up the Turks coming
in and appeal to her conservative constituency there.
So there is a lot of hypocrisy to go around here but I think that there
is a general feeling that the crackdown in Istanbul has not revealed a
good side of Erdogan's policies which in some ways have actually been
fairly progressive, he has been more prepared to talk to the Kurds
and the Armenians and the others than many of his ultranationalist
predecessors. But this seems to be disintegrating in what looks like
traditional, almost Ottoman authoritarianism.
Source: Panorama.am
09:23 28/06/2013 " INTERVIEWS
Press TV has conducted an interview with Ian Williams, with the
Foreign Policy In Focus from New York City, to shed more light on
the issue of the Turkish government's crackdown on protesters and
the subsequent decision of the European authorities to postpone the
country's EU accession talks.
Following is a rough transcription of the interview.
- Mr. Williams, first of all how much did Turkey's crackdown on
the demonstrations in Istanbul and Ankara have an impact on its EU
accession bid?
- Well, the accession talks are going ahead. The immediate one,
scheduled for Wednesday is canceled; and the rest of the European
countries, sort of, hammered out this compromise with the Germans and
the Austrians and the Dutch who wanted to send a message, but part of
the problem is of course, that the Germans and the Austrians don't want
Turkey in any way, so this looks like that they are using an excuse
but there are genuine grounds that the rest of Europe recognizes that
there should be some type of protest to the Erdogan government about
the severity of the crackdown on demonstrators.
- Will this policy be long-term to postpone Turkey's EU accession bid?
- From the compromise that was hammered out, it looks like they
will send a signal by postponing talks this Wednesday but they are
going to continue with the overall program and the rest of Europe
are looking and they are saying to themselves, Hey! we let Greece
in, we know the Greek government put down the riots quite brutally,
why are we are picking on Turkey? And that is just strange.
You know, Erdogan is being castigated for being Islamist but one
commentator pointed out that in this context he was being more Turkish
than Islamist as a long tradition of what you might call a lack of
gentleness on the part of the Turkish security forces and Erdogan
certainly should do more to rein them in but he can .....be blamed
for what generations of Turkish cops have grown up to do.
- And how does the EU justify its own crackdown on protests, especially
what we saw, the protests against the financial crisis in Europe?
- Well, pure hypocrisy, it does not of course! You know, people got
killed in Greek riots against the austerity measures, actually being
pushed for by the European Union countries in Greece and nothing is
said but in Turkey it gives an excuse to the Germans and the Austrians
to slow things down, which makes Angela Merkel look good back home in
Germany because she can say, Look! I am holding up the Turks coming
in and appeal to her conservative constituency there.
So there is a lot of hypocrisy to go around here but I think that there
is a general feeling that the crackdown in Istanbul has not revealed a
good side of Erdogan's policies which in some ways have actually been
fairly progressive, he has been more prepared to talk to the Kurds
and the Armenians and the others than many of his ultranationalist
predecessors. But this seems to be disintegrating in what looks like
traditional, almost Ottoman authoritarianism.
Source: Panorama.am