Tag: banks of the Bosphorus

  • Istanbul Treats Its Famous and Beautiful Bosphorus Strait Like a Trash Can, Turkish NGO Says

    Istanbul Treats Its Famous and Beautiful Bosphorus Strait Like a Trash Can, Turkish NGO Says

    From the deck of a boat bobbing on its surface, Istanbul’s Bosphorus Strait seems to flow fresh and strong, breathing air and energy into the city it divides into two continents. When anchored in a secluded cove near the Black Sea end of the strait, it even feels clean enough to swim in. But what lies underneath the waves is apparently another matter altogether.

    istanbul bosphorus strait boats

    “Everywhere there are people, there is pollution,” Hakan Tiryaki, the head of the Underwater Cleaning Movement (STH), which works to raise awareness about aquatic pollution, told the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet. Members of the group have dived down to the seabed 250 times since 2005 and say the strait is full of garbage — from old furniture to boat parts, cleaning supplies to restaurant trash. And, of course, plenty of plastic bags. STH divers have removed more than 16,000 pieces of solid waste from just one part of the waterway.

    Deliberately Dumped Garbage

    Tiryaki believes much of the trash in the Bosphorus is deliberately dumped there. “A truck battery can only be carried by two or three people. Something that heavy cannot fall into the sea accidentally. A 12-square-meter piece of flooring cannot accidentally fall into the sea,” he said. The retrieval of 22 electronic bus passes from one spot on the seabed also raised Tiryaki’s suspicions that an unscrupulous official had treated the strait as a trash can.

    Garbage being removed from the Bosphorus. Photo: STH.

    The trash problem in Turkey, which we’ve written about before, is not limited to Istanbul. STH divers noted similar conditions in Aegean and Mediterranean coastal areas, findings echoed by readers commenting on the Hürriyet article, who noted seeing “people throwing cigarette butts from ferry boats [and] waiters at coastal restaurants throwing dirty buckets of water straight into the [water]” in Istanbul and a “disgusting” amount of trash — and “depressingly low” levels of marine flora and fauna — in the resort town of Marmaris and its surrounding bays.

    Anti-Littering Education, Legislation Needed

    Both Turks and tourists contribute to the problem, Hürriyet Daily News columnist John Laughland wrote earlier this month, asking Turkey to please “tidy up a little.” Citing lack of awareness and limited public dumping grounds, Laughland called for televised educational campaigns and effective legislation against both illegal dumping and littering. Creating a culture of shared responsibility is important too, one commenter wrote in response to the column, explaining that people see “public spheres as ‘property of [the] government,’ not their own property they should care about. Have you ever seen Turkish homes having any dust on the floors or tables? I haven’t.”

    Another reader agreed, writing: “We need to encourage a sense of belonging, ownership — something very different from nationalism. It can be done but like all these things will take time and energy, particularly teaching schoolchildren, who can in turn help their parents respect their countryside and towns.”

    via Istanbul Treats Its Famous and Beautiful Bosphorus Strait Like a Trash Can, Turkish NGO Says : TreeHugger.

  • ‘Iran is our friend,’ says Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan

    ‘Iran is our friend,’ says Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan

    • We have no difficulty with Ahmadinejad – Erdogan
    • Warning to Europe not to ignore Turkey’s strengths

    A13With its stunning vistas and former Ottoman palaces, the banks of the Bosphorus – the strategic waterway that cuts Istanbul in half and divides Europe from Asia – may be the perfect place to distinguish friend from foe and establish where your country’s interests lie.

    And sitting in his grandiose headquarters beside the strait, long the symbol of Turkey‘s supposed role as bridge between east and west, Recep Tayyip Erdogan had little doubt about who was a friend and who wasn’t.

    Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran‘s radical president whose fiery rhetoric has made him a bête noire of the west? “There is no doubt he is our friend,” said Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister for the last six years. “As a friend so far we have very good relations and have had no difficulty at all.”

    What about Nicolas Sarkozy, president of France, who has led European opposition to Turkey’s bid to join the EU and, coincidentally, adopted a belligerent tone towards Iran’s nuclear programme? Not a friend?

    “Among leaders in Europe there are those who have prejudices against Turkey, like France and Germany. Previously under Mr Chirac, we had excellent relations [with France] and he was very positive towards Turkey. But during the time of Mr Sarkozy, this is not the case. It is an unfair attitude. The European Union is violating its own rules.

    “Being in the European Union we would be building bridges between the 1.5bn people of Muslim world to the non-Muslim world. They have to see this. If they ignore it, it brings weakness to the EU.”

    Friendly towards a religious theocratic Iran, covetous and increasingly resentful of a secular but maddeningly dismissive Europe: it seems the perfect summary of Turkey’s east-west dichotomy.

    Erdogan’s partiality towards Ahmadinejad may surprise some in the west who see Turkey as a western-oriented democracy firmly grounded inside Nato. It has been a member of the alliance since 1952. It will be less surprising to Erdogan’s secular domestic critics, who believe the prime minister’s heart lies in the east and have long suspected his Islamist-rooted Justice and Development party (AKP) government of plotting to transform Turkey into a religious state resembling Iran.

    Erdogan vigorously denies the latter charge, but to his critics he and Ahmadinejad are birds of a feather: devout religious conservatives from humble backgrounds who court popular support by talking the language of the street. After Ahmadinejad’s disputed presidential election in June, Erdogan and his ally, the Turkish president, Abdullah Gul, were among the first foreign leaders to make congratulatory phone calls, ignoring the mass demonstrations and concerns of western leaders over the result’s legitimacy.

    Talking to the Guardian, Erdogan called the move a “necessity of bilateral relations”. “Mr Ahmadinejad was declared to be the winner, not officially, but with a large vote difference, and since he is someone we have met before, we called to congratulate him,” he said.

    “Later it was officially declared that he was elected, he got a vote of confidence and we pay special attention to something like this. It is a basic principle of our foreign policy.”

    The gesture will be remembered when Erdogan arrives in Tehran this week for talks with Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, that will focus on commercial ties, including Turkey’s need for Iranian natural gas. Ahmadinejad has voiced his admiration for Erdogan, praising Turkey’s recent decision to ban Israel from a planned Nato manoeuvre in protest at last winter’s bombardment of Gaza.

    Since the election, Iran has witnessed a fierce crackdown on opposition figures that has resulted in activists, students and journalists being imprisoned and publicly tried. Detainees have died in prison, and there have been allegations of torture and rape. Some of those alleging mistreatment have sought refuge in Turkey.

    But Erdogan said he would not raise the post-election crackdown with his hosts, saying it would represent “interference” in Iranian domestic affairs.

    He poured cold water on western accusations that Iran is seeking a nuclear weapon, saying: “Iran does not accept it is building a weapon. They are working on nuclear power for the purposes of energy only.”

    Erdogan has overseen a dramatic improvement in the previously frigid relations between Turkey and Iran, which was viewed with suspicion by the pro-secularist high command of the powerful Turkish military. Trade between the two countries last year was worth an estimated £5.5bn as Iran has developed into a major market for Turkish exports.

    Erdogan’s views will interest US foreign policy makers, who have long seen his AKP government as a model of a pro-western “moderate Islam” that could be adopted in other Muslim countries. They will also find an audience with President Barack Obama, who signalled Turkey’s strategic importance in a visit last April and has invited the prime minister to visit Washington. They are unlikely to impress Israel, which has warned that Erdogan’s criticisms risk harming Turkey’s relations with the US.

    Erdogan dismissed the notion, saying: “I don’t think there is any possibility of that. America’s policy in this region is not dictated by Israel.”

    He insisted that the Turkey-Israel strategic alliance – which some AKP insiders have said privately is over – remains alive but chided the Israeli foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, who he said had threatened to use nuclear weapons against Gaza.

    The Guardian