ERBIL, Iraq, Nov. 21 (UPI) — Turkey, its eyes on becoming the pivotal energy hub between East and West, is set to increase its presence in Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish enclave by taking a majority stake with a British partner in a block containing an estimated 10.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
That’s likely to have considerable political ramifications that are certain to strain already awkward relations between Ankara and Baghdad, and intensify the deterioration of relations between Iraq’s central government and the independence-minded Kurds.
The Middle East Economic Digest reports that Genel Energy, a British-Turkish joint venture, will acquire the majority stake in Kurdistan’s Miran block from the London-listed Heritage Oil which is selling off its 49 percent holding in a production-sharing deal with the Kurdistan Regional Government.
Once the sale is approved by the KRG and Heritage’s shareholders, Genel will have complete ownership of the block and be its only operator.
The joint venture also has nine exploration blocks across Kurdistan, one of 40-plus companies which have signed production-sharing deals with the KRG in the Kurdish capital, Erbil, since 2007.
The Turkish involvement will be particularly galling to Baghdad because Ankara has in recent months made a high-profile move into the KRG’s energy sector in defiance of Baghdad’s insistence such deals are illegal as constitutionally only Baghdad can sanction such agreements.
Ankara recently offered land-locked Kurdistan, which borders southern Turkey, to build oil and gas pipelines from the enclave, which spans three provinces in northern Iraq, to Turkey’s Mediterranean export terminals.
At present, the Kurds have to pump the oil they produce through the state pipeline network controlled by Baghdad.
That export route would free the Kurds from reliance on the Baghdad government, and undoubtedly heighten their aspirations to establish an independent state in northern Iraq.
They’ve already risked Baghdad’s wrath by signing exploration deals with major international companies such as Exxon Mobil and Chevron of the United States and Total of France.
All these companies had secured production-sharing contracts from Baghdad to develop major fields and their defection to the Kurds and the more lucrative contracts they are offering was a major political humiliation for the trouble-plagued government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.
Baghdad needs the companies to make massive investments in southern fields to boost production from the current 3 million barrels per day to 10 million-12 million bpd to challenge Saudi Arabia as the world’s leading producer.
Baghdad’s stiff contract conditions, low financial returns, governmental ineptitude and delays in building the required infrastructure have alienated Big Oil.
But Iraq’s entire reconstruction and economic plans depend on the large-scale — many say overly ambitious — expansion of oil production.
Kurdistan sits on 45 billion barrels of oil. That’s a fraction of Iraq’s known reserves but it’s enough to establish a firm economic base for an independent state.
The KRG’s current crude output is 240,000 barrels per day but it is aiming for 1 million bpd in a couple of years. Some 90 percent of Kurdish oil sales flow from the Tawke and Taq Taq fields where Genel has major interests.
So there’s a lot riding on all this for both Baghdad and the KRG and the Kurds seem to be making all the running.
Maliki cannot afford to let them get away with that and thumb their noses at his government’s authority. So he’ll have to take some unequivocal action on this soon, if only to stamp on the Kurds’ long-held dream of independence and to convince other regions, including the south, that have been talking of gaining more autonomy to back off.
He may have already started.
Earlier this month, Baghdad, in a reprisal against Ankara, booted out Turkey’s state-owned TPAO oil company from a Kuwaiti-led consortium which was about to sign a 20-year, production-sharing agreement with the Oil Ministry for Block 9 in southern Iraq. TPAO had a 30 percent interest in that contract.
Some two-thirds of Iraq’s proven oil reserves of 143.1 billion barrels lie in the south.
“TPAO also has stakes in the developments of another four fields in Iraq: the Badra and Missan oil fields, and the Mansouriya and Siba gas fields,” MEED reported.
“There has been no indication whether TPAO will be removed from these.”
via Turkey increases energy presence in Kurdish regions of Iraq – UPI.com.
Syrians continue to cross into Turkey, fleeing from the dangers of what is now a 20-month conflict. For those unable to leave, Turkey has served as a lifeline for basic supplies. Margaret Warner reports from the refugee camps and internally displaced camps, where the struggle to survive remains a constant concern for civilians.
JEFFREY BROWN: And we turn to another deadly conflict in the Middle East, the Syrian civil war. According to one activist group, the battle between government forces and rebels has claimed the lives of more than 37,000 people.
Margaret Warner is on a reporting trip to the region filing stories for our website and our broadcast. Tonight, she gets an inside look at the opposition in Syria and Turkey’s role supporting it.
MARGARET WARNER: It was a reunion six years in the making. Thirty-three-year-old Syrian Oubab Khalil embraced his younger brothers last week on a street corner in the Turkish town of Rehanle, just three miles from the Syrian border.
Oubab left Syria in 2006, after his civil society activities drew a warning from President Bashar al-Assad’s government.
But from his comfortable life in Dallas, he recently engineered his younger brother’s escape. En route to their meeting, he spoke of his mixed feelings at having to meet them in Turkey.
OUBAB KHALIL, Syria: Very excited to see them, but at the same time, I cannot take, like, the back images that we’re meeting in a foreign country, in a neighbor country, not meeting at home.
MARGARET WARNER: And where was this, Majid?
Majid Khalil had been serving compulsory military duty in intelligence until his assignment changed.
MAJID KHALIL,Syria (through translator): We had to flee because the rise of the regime would have forced us to fight against the people. The orders we got were to crush demonstrations by any means possible, even if we had to run them over with cars or shoot them.
MARGARET WARNER: Wajd Khalil, who was teaching French in Latakia, felt he had to flee too.
WAJD KHALIL, Syria (through translator): Because my brother had escaped, they might arrest and torture me to get information about him.
MARGARET WARNER: Through the help of the U.S.- and Canada-based Syrian Support Group, Oubab got his brothers out to Turkey through a network of sympathizers.
Though the rebellion is often described as a conflict between Assad’s ruling Alawite sect and Syria’s majority Sunnis, the escape of the Khalil brothers, who are Alawite, tells a different story.
OUBAB KHALIL: It’s worth mentioning that the whole operation was done by Sunni. There are, like, Sunni people who risk their lives to rescue and make sure there are, like, Alawites — one of them is a defector, soldier defector in the security forces.
MARGARET WARNER: But millions are still trapped as the rebellion rages on. We traveled to the rebel-liberated zone in northwest Syria to see what 20 months of conflict had wrought.
Syrian ground forces have left, but the devastation remains. Residents get by on a makeshift economy, relying on watered-downed petrol dispensed from oil drums and locally grown vegetables for sale on a roundabout.
Many remain defiant. Friday, demonstrators of Haratan, outside Aleppo, site of a four-month battle for control, mocked Assad and called on the Arab world to help them.
But the regime’s bomber jets thunder daily overhead.
SALEH HAWA, Local Administrative Council, Haratan, Syria: When the airplane comes, children start crying and start shouting, and everybody goes to his mother or father. It’s a very, very, very bad feeling for us.
MARGARET WARNER: English teacher Saleh Hawa leads the local administration council of Haratan, a civilian group working to restore basic town services after government forces and officials withdrew.
SALEH HAWA: We had to take care of everything as educated people, as people who started this revolution against this brutal regime. So, we had to take care of electricity. We had to take care of telephones, of streets, of spreading bread.
MARGARET WARNER: The goal, says Hawa, to keep life bearable enough that people will stay.
SALEH HAWA: Without electricity, everybody would leave home. And we have to stay here to resist this brutal on — and this brutal regime.
MARGARET WARNER: For others, staying home isn’t an option. This camp for Syria’s internally displaced was built two months ago by a young Aleppo man named Farouk. We agreed to shield his face.
A Libyan benefactor bought the tents and tarps, but he’s received little assistance since then, aside from daily half-rations of food from a Turkish NGO.
Now, what’s going to happen here if you don’t get more help?
FAROUK, camp manager: I don’t know that. We are working every day. And we don’t know what happens tomorrow. If the food was finished, I don’t know what I can do. But that’s my work. And I’m so happy.
MARGARET WARNER: Why are you happy?
FAROUK: To help these people, because nobody, nobody take care of them.
MARGARET WARNER: But life is hard in the camp, especially with children; 40-year-old Kadiya Al-Darwish and her 11 were barred official entry to Turkey.
Do you have food?
WOMAN (through translator): Today, they gave us only six tiny meals of old bread.
MARGARET WARNER: And are there bathrooms?
WOMAN (through translator): For all the women in the camp, there are only six toilets.
MARGARET WARNER: And have you needed any kind of medical care for your children?
WOMAN (through translator): If a child gets sick, they prescribe medicine for us, but it’s not available.
MARGARET WARNER: One thing the camp does have, a makeshift mosque. Despite the apparent calm, anger bubbles beneath the surface.
MAN (through translator): We have no shelter, no food. There is no heat. Children are cold and getting sick. This is what Bashar and his people did.
MARGARET WARNER: What help they do get comes through Syria’s neighbors. Turkey is a lifeline for civilians and for the fighters of the rebel Free Syrian Army, or FSA. Money, guns and medical supplies all make it through official and unofficial crossings from Turkish border towns like Antakya.
Along this busy shopping street, locals here in Antakya can buy everything from clothing to fast food to cell phones. But just around this corner, down this cobblestone street, is a back alley where you can find a whole underground economy, an underground economy that helps keep the Syrian resistance going.
A Syrian activist calling himself “Abu Joudy” collects donated medical supplies from Turkish pharmacies, everything from bandages to antibiotics.
So do you feel Turkey is allowing this, enabling this?
“ABU JOUDY,” Turkey (through translator): Turkey helps my group. And when we need it, the Turkish government lets the supplies go through the border, even at official border crossings.
MARGARET WARNER: Also being sheltered in Turkey, Syrian attorney Ahmed Hassoun in Antakya. His Free Syrian Lawyers Association is documenting cases of regime atrocities for trial one day. He concedes rebel forces have been accused of abuses too, and says they will be subject to prosecution.
AHMED HASSOUN, President, Syrian Free Lawyers Association (through translator): In the future in Syria, the laws will be applied to all, regardless of their religion, doctrine or position. The Syrian people didn’t rebel against the dictator to bring another one. They rebelled for freedom, democracy, dignity and the application of the law to everyone.
MARGARET WARNER: Yet even this idealistic attorney dismisses talk from the West of a negotiated end to the conflict.
Do you think there’s a peaceful solution to the conflict in Syria?
AHMED HASSOUN (through translator): I don’t think so. Dictators don’t have a midpoint. It’s either they stay or no one else does.
MARGARET WARNER: So, what is it going to take to solve this conflict?
AHMED HASSOUN (through translator): I think the only solution is arming the organized Syrian opposition.
MARGARET WARNER: A prominent commander in that armed opposition is Colonel Abdul-Jabbar Akidi who heads the Aleppo Region Military Council. We were taken to meet him at a secret command center where he decamped after a targeted airstrike against him two weeks ago.
He outlined for us the scope of the territory his unit holds on the ground, hundreds of square miles bordering Turkey.
COL. ABDUL-JABBAR AKIDI, Aleppo Region Military Council (through translator): We are advancing each new day and winning new battles. We have almost full control of the ground, though they are superior in the air.
MARGARET WARNER: He moved his wife to Turkey for safety and is free to travel there when needed.
ABDUL-JABBAR AKIDI (through translator): Turkey is a friend and neighbor. We won’t forget this good stand by Turkey and its people toward the Syrian people. The Syrian people won’t forget any country that provided them with support and won’t forgive any country that helped the Assad regime.
MARGARET WARNER: But Akidi says he needs more from Turkey and the West: a no-fly zone and anti-aircraft weapons for his men to take down fighter jets and helicopters.
ABDUL-JABBAR AKIDI (through translator): We need the world and the international community to stop supporting Bashar al-Assad. But we are determined to overthrow this regime by any means, even if the whole world is standing by his side and supporting it.
MARGARET WARNER: Do you think the whole word is supporting this regime?
ABDUL-JABBAR AKIDI (through translator): Yes, headed by the USA.
MARGARET WARNER: How so?
ABDUL-JABBAR AKIDI (through translator): Because they are watching Syrian blood being poured out in the streets by this criminal regime. If a cat or a dog were killed in any place in the world, the world would react more than it did to the death of nearly 100,000 Syrians.
MARGARET WARNER: The U.S. government says they’re reluctant to provide anti-aircraft weaponry because of the fear that it will fall into the wrong hands.
ABDUL-JABBAR AKIDI through translator): This is an excuse used by the west. We pledge to the international community that these weapons will be in safe hands, in the hands of specialized officers. There are only a few extremists or jihadists, but the West is directly empowering some of them by not supporting the organized groups.
MARGARET WARNER: Meanwhile, civilian leader Saleh Hawa works hands in glove with Akidi’s FSA unit which protects his town.
SALEH HAWA: We didn’t get anything, any single, — any penny from any people.
MARGARET WARNER: What about from Western governments or NGOs?
SALEH HAWA: Well, we haven’t received anything at all. We are tired now. We are tired now of war. We are tired of shelling every day.
MARGARET WARNER: He’s not sure how long this town can hold out without Western help.
SALEH HAWA: I think not a very long time, not for a long time. Now winter is coming. We have thousands of displaced people who came from Aleppo. We don’t have anything. So I think that our ability to withstand that is very, very, very small.
MARGARET WARNER: Yet, so far, it hasn’t paid to bet against the resilience of the Syrian people. And activists like Oubab and Majid Khalil say they will continue aiding the resistance from outside.
OUBAB KHALIL: I want to reach out to the elements, specifically Alawite, that they don’t have blood on their hands. And we want to make sure that they are on the right side of history. And there are some good people in the regime that they want to cooperate and they want to work with us. And we’re going to reach out to these people.
MARGARET WARNER: Together, they hope all will be welcome in the new Syria they want to build.
JUDY WOODRUFF: In her next report, Margaret looks at the more than 100,000 Syrian refugees who have fled to Turkey.
ISTANBUL—Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Israel of being a “terrorist state” on Monday and criticized world powers for supporting the weeklong bombardment of Gaza that has killed more some 115 people, signaling that the three-year-old rift between the countries is deepening.
International Crisis Group Arab-Israeli Project Director Rob Blecher joins the News Hub to discuss what all the fighting means for both sides of the Gaza-Israel conflict. Photo: AP Images.
Speaking in Istanbul shortly after returning from Cairo, where he held emergency talks on Gaza with Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, Mr. Erdogan railed against what he called Western powers’ failure to take concerted action to stop bloodshed in Syria. But harsher words were aimed at one-time ally Israel.
European Pressphoto Agency
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, seen here in Cairo on Sunday.
“Those who speak of Muslims and terror side by side are turning a blind eye when Muslims are massacred en masse,” he told a gathering of the Eurasian Islamic Council. “Those who turn a blind eye to discrimination toward Muslims in their own countries, are also closing their eyes to the savage massacre of innocent children in Gaza. … Therefore, I say Israel is a terrorist state.”
The comments mark a recent low in relations between Turkey and Israel, which have been strained since Israel’s 2008 offensive in Hamas-controlled Gaza.
Mr. Erdogan’s latest comments appear to pour cold water on the prospect of a thaw in relations between Washington’s two top allies in the region. Recent reports in the Turkish media suggested that the two sides were making headway on repairing ties, although these reports were denied by Turkey’s cabinet ministers.
Turkey, a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, stepped up its diplomatic involvement in the Gaza conflict over the weekend, when Mr. Erdogan visited Cairo to help Egypt’s Mr. Morsi push negotiations for a cease-fire. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu plans to travel to Gaza on Tuesday with a group of foreign ministers from the Arab League, Turkey’s state news agency Anadolu reported on Sunday.
In a veiled criticism of U.S. President Barack Obama—who on Sunday reiterated his support for Israel’s right to defend itself against Palestinian rocket fire—Mr. Erdogan said it was unfair to cite Israel’s right to defend itself to justify Israeli attacks, arguing that Israel is the aggressor.
On Sunday, President Obama reiterated his support for Israel’s right to defend itself against Palestinian rocket fire.
Israel says its military action against Gaza is a response to Hamas-fired rockets, which in recent days have been fired as far as Tel Aviv. One of these was struck down by Israel’s Iron Dome defense system, with parts falling into the city and setting a car ablaze, in the first such damage on Israel’s largest metropolitan area since the 1991 Gulf War.
Turkey’s prime minister also criticized the United Nations, which called on Israel and Hamas to work with Egypt to achieve a cease-fire in the conflict. “I’m asked how much I trust the U.N. I don’t trust it,” Mr. Erdogan said, urging once again to reform the world body to make the Security Council more inclusive and effective in stopping bloodshed world-wide.
—Laurence Norman in Brussels contributed to this article.
via Turkey’s Erdogan Labels Israel a ‘Terrorist State’ – WSJ.com.
WASHINGTON – Pro-Palestinian activists protested Friday in several world capitals against Israel’s Operation Pillar of Defense in Gaza under the banner, “Free Palestine.”
Hundreds demonstrated in Istanbul and Ankara, in Australia, outside the parliament in Rome, and opposite Israeli embassies in South Korea, Istanbul and Madrid. Protest rallies were also held in the Arab world – in Tunisia, Yemen, Egypt and Algeria.
Ali Golin, who protested in Istanbul, said: “I believe that all Muslims should show solidarity. Factions and differences destroy our goal. If we want to answer Israel we must do it together. We won’t achieve anything by condemning Israel. We must take real action.”
A South Korean human rights activist who took part in the protest outside the Israeli Embassy in Seoul said, “You must not force the Palestinians to sacrifice. You must not kill children anywhere. Children are precious whether in Palestine or in Israel. They must not die in a massacre. We are calling on the Israeli government to come back to its senses.”
Sylvia Hale, a former parliament member on behalf of Australia’s Greens protested in Sydney. “The Israelis are adopting a policy of slaughtering the people in Gaza,” she said.
via Protests held worldwide against IDF op – Israel News, Ynetnews.
İsrail propagandası yapan video için Danışma Kurulu üyemiz Sn. Rafael Sadi’ye gönderilen enteresan bir yorum :
Armagan YilmazRafael abi bunları neden paylaşıyorsun ki ne anlamı var. Hamas benim için bir teröristtir ama Filistin’de seçim kazanarak iktidara gelmiştir. dolayısıyla seçim yapan bir yerin yani bir ülkenin silahı olmasından daha doğal bir şey yoktur. Artık birşeye karar verin bence. Ya filistinin bir devlet olduğunu kabul edip iki devlet arasındaki savaştan bahsedin. Ya fa kabul etmiyorsanız size atılan roketlere kızmayın. Zira terör örgütlerinin amacı budur zaten. Nasıl PKK’yı Türkiye’nin derin devleti yarattıysa haması da İsrail’in derin devleti yaratmıştır. Düşmanın olacak ki halkını uyutabilesin.
One of the main ways that Hamas acquires weapons is via an extensive network of tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border. Since Hamas seized power in the Gaza Strip in 2007, the terrorist group’s smuggling efforts have increased. With funding from Iran, Hamas has improved its stockpile of weapons.
via How Does Hamas Acquire Its Weapons? – YouTube.
The CEO of Iran’s Institute for Cultural Exhibitions announced Iran’s decision to attend the 31st Istanbul International Book Fair which began on Saturday.
IBNA: Near 600 exhibitors from 30 countries of the world run stances at the book fair, said Mohammad Azimi in an interview with IBNA.
As he said, the institute showcases 400 titles at the book fair this year. The titles cover various issues like Iranology, poetry, fiction, calligraphy, arts, Persian language, children and adolescents, the Prophet, philosophy, history and Sacred Defense.
He went on to say that building cultural interactions and introducing the Islamic Iran’s rich culture and civilization to the world are two of the chief goals of the institute to attend the book fair in Istanbul.
Elsewhere in his interview, Azimi underscored the mutual talk sessions with Turkish figures given the vast cultural commonalities between Iran and Turkey.
He further expressed hope that the institute would move towards materialization of Iran’s cultural goals by attending at international book fairs and cultural exhibitions.
The opens on Saturday, November 17, 2012 and will wrap up next Sunday November 25.
via Iran Book News Agency (IBNA) – Iran runs pavilion at Istanbul Book Fair.
