Turkish Forum

Tag: Bashar al-Assad

President of Syria
  • Damascus letter accuses Turkey of harboring al-Qaeda terrorists

    Damascus letter accuses Turkey of harboring al-Qaeda terrorists

    By Al Arabiya with agencies

    Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad (L) meets with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu in Damascus August 9, 2011. Assad had said his forces would continue to pursue “terrorist groups” (Reuters)

    A letter attacking Turkey’s “destructive” role in the Syrian conflict has been sent from President Bashar al-Assad’s regime to the United Nations on Friday, according to Syrian state media.

    The Syrian foreign ministry’s letter accuses Turkey of harboring “terrorists from Al-Qaeda’s network”, the SANA news agency said.

    The ministry also accused Ankara of taking “increasingly hostile stances towards Syria, by blockin. measures taken by Damascus for a political solution to the crisis” that the U.N. says has left some 70,000 people dead.

    The letter, published by SANA, also criticizes Turkey for “pressuring Syrian opposition members to refuse a political plan” proposed in a speech Assad on January 9.

    Assad in the rare speech offered negotiations to end the conflict but only to opposition groups with no links to rebels the regime considers to be “terrorists.”

    The proposal was rejected by Western and Arab countries, as well as by Turkey and the Syrian opposition, including dissident groups tolerated by Assad’s regime.

    “Turkey supports and publicly justifies terrorist, destructive acts” against Syria, said the ministry in letters addressed to the U.N. Security Council and to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

    “Turkey has turned its territory into camps used to house, train, finance and infiltrate armed terrorist groups, chief among them the Al-Qaeda network and the Al-Nusra Front,” said the letter.

    Strike back

    Earlier on Friday, Turkish artillery struck back after a shell fired from neighboring Syria ploughed into Turkish territory without causing any casualties, the state-run news agency reported.

    The shell fell near the town of Yayladag in Hatay province near the border with Syria and Turkish forces retaliated immediately, Anatolia said.

    Since Syrian fire killed five Turks on October 3, Turkey has systematically retaliated to every cross-border shelling.

    Key opposition backer Turkey early in the revolt against Assad broke ties with Damascus and has led international calls for his ouster.

    Some 200,000 Syrian refugees have fled the conflict in their country for Turkey, many of them living in insalubrious camps.

    Assad’s regime views dissidents and insurgents as foreign-backed “terrorists” whose aim is to destroy Syria.

    Al-Nusra Front, which the United States says has links to Al-Qaeda, has been listed by Washington as a “terrorist” organization.

    Its jihadists have claimed responsibility for most suicide bombings that have shaken Syria in the spiraling conflict.

    Violence continues

    Syria’s rebels captured a military airbase in the northern province of Aleppo on Friday and geared for a major battle against loyalist forces for control of two nearby strategic airports, a watchdog said.

    The rebels, from the Islamist Al-Nusra Front and the Muhajireen battalion, overran the base in Sfeira, east of Aleppo international airport, and captured a large stockpile of ammunition, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

    The Britain-based watchdog also reported intermittent clashes around Aleppo international airport itself as well as around Nayrab airbase and another military complex, as the two sides squared up for a major fight.

    “The army shelled the area around Aleppo international airport and Nayrab air base on Friday morning, while rebels used home-made rockets to shell Nayrab,” Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said.

    “The army is preparing a large-scale operation to take back control of Base 80,” he added of a military complex tasked with managing both Nayrab and Aleppo airports.

    Rebels seized the base on Wednesday after a battle that left at least 150 dead from both sides, among them senior army officers, said the Observatory.

    Insurgents fighting President Bashar al-Assad’s regime “are trying to take control of Nayrab and to destroy the runways at Aleppo international airport, which the army is using for military purposes,” Abdel Rahman said.

    Activists in Aleppo have said the rebel Free Syrian Army shifted its focus weeks ago from the city to airbases in the province.

    Insurgents see the capture of airports such as Al-Jarrah, also in Aleppo province, on Tuesday as a way of seizing large amounts of ammunition and to put out of action warplanes used by the regime to bombard rebel-held areas.

    Regime tanks, meanwhile, shelled the town of Khan Sheikhun in the province of Idlib, killing at least 11 civilians, said the Observatory.

    In Damascus, the army shelled the eastern district of Jobar, where rebels have set up enclaves, the Britain-based group said.

    See here what is left of Assad’s regime: The Lion’s Den

    via Damascus letter accuses Turkey of harboring al-Qaeda terrorists.

  • U.S. troops arrive in Turkey to help protect border with Syria, prompting some skepticism

    U.S. troops arrive in Turkey to help protect border with Syria, prompting some skepticism

    Mideast_Syria_000161357499354

    By Jenna Johnson, Published: January 7

    ANTAKYA, Turkey — As U.S. troops arrive in Turkey and prepare to man Patriot antimissile batteries along the Syrian border, some of the people who will be under such protection say that the extra line of defense is not needed and that the presence of foreign forces could pull their country into the war next door.

    “We don’t need this thing between us and our neighbors,” said Ali Yilmaz, 49, who works in a cellphone shop in this town, whose population is heavily Alawite, members of the same religious sect as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. “It’s wrong. It’s only going to cause problems.”

    Other Turks expect the missile-blasting defense system — organized and overseen by NATO after a request from the Turkish government last year — to protect them from projectiles that occasionally stray across the border or from a direct attack. But they question why the same level of protection isn’t being extended to those living inside Syria.

    “A lot of children and women are getting killed,” said Mehmet Kamil Dervisoglu, 37, who works at a hotel in Reyhanli, a heavily Sunni town that is closer to the border and has become a “Little Syria” in recent months. “If we got involved, it would be an army against an army. But an army against women and children? What did these women and children do wrong?”

    For now, about 400 U.S. troops are being airlifted from Oklahoma to Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey. The first wave of troops and supplies arrived Friday, with more scheduled to come in the following days, according to the U.S. European Command.

    Eventually, the troops will man two Patriot batteries in Gaziantep, a Turkish town about 30 miles from the border. Germany and the Netherlands also will supply two batteries each, to be stationed in other towns along the border.

    The batteries are designed to spot and intercept incoming missiles. Once in place this month, all six will operate under NATO command. The mission is “defensive only” and aims to deter threats to Turkey and de-escalate the fighting along the border, NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said last month. It is not known how long the batteries will remain.

    ‘It’s a strong shield’

    For Turks living close to the border, the sounds of war have become part of life. Those living in Hacipasa — a village of about 3,000 people that shares its olive-grove-dotted valley with Syria — frequently hear the heavy whirl of aircraft and whiz of mortar shells and missiles. Sometimes they feel the faint reverberations from the impacts. After heavy attacks, some residents venture to the river along the border to help wounded Syrians escaping to Turkey for medical treatment.

    One morning in October, a stray missile landed in a field where villagers had just finished picking cotton, said Abdulaziz Olmez, a grocery shop owner with a bushy mustache who has lived here his whole life.

    “We are afraid that they might come closer,” he said. “You might have a pilot who doesn’t know where he’s going or a strong wind.”

    Olmez, 46, said he has become more relaxed since hearing that the Patriot batteries were on their way. He said he hopes their presence will result in fewer attacks on Syrian towns just across the river.

    “It’s a strong shield,” he said.

    Business has dried up since the uprising began nearly 22 months ago, Olmez said, and hundreds of longtime residents were forced to move. They were replaced by hundreds of Syrian refugees in need of shelter, winter clothing and food.

    Two Syrian men who moved to Hacipasa two months ago stopped by Olmez’s shop on Saturday afternoon to buy flour and olive oil. The potential danger in Turkey is nothing compared with what Syrians face, they said.

    “The Americans, by doing this, they are protecting the Turkish villages,” said one of the men, who did not want to be identified. “But for the Syrian villages, they are doing nothing.”

    ‘I don’t see a need for it’

    Farther from the border, in Antakya, there is widespread criticism of the Patriot batteries. The town has a large Alawite population, and there are frequent rallies in support of the Syrian government. On Sunday afternoon, many residents said they wanted peace and stability in Syria, not a revolution. Some worry that planting foreign troops on the border is a step toward a broader war, and they question why the Turkish military needs help.

    “They’re claiming it’s for defense reasons, but I don’t see a need for it,” said Cemil Yuce, 60, at his restaurant. “I don’t think anything will happen, that any missiles will come over from Syria. Nothing will happen.”

    Ihsan Birim, who owns a shop that sells CDs, said the economic consequences of the Syrian uprising have hurt Turkey more than stray missiles. His business is half what it was before the revolt began in 2011, he said. Money is tight, especially with two sons in college, and the family eats chicken instead of red meat. Birim, 53, said he wants this to be over.

    As for the Patriot batteries, he said: “If it’s for defense purposes, that’s okay. But if it is to attack Syria, we don’t want it. We don’t want war. People are very afraid of war.”

  • Turkey Will Pay a High Price After Assad

    Turkey Will Pay a High Price After Assad

    Syrian children from the northern Syrian town of Ras al-Ain are pictured near the Turkish border fence during gunfire is heard between Free Syrian Army and armed Kurds of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party in the Ceylanpinar
    Syrian children from the northern Syrian town of Ras al-Ain are pictured near the Turkish border fence as gunfire is heard between the Free Syrian Army and the armed Kurds of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) in the northern Syrian town of Ceylanpinar, Nov. 25, 2012. (photo by REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh)
    By: Kadri Gursel. posted on Wed, Dec 26.

    If we have to explain Turkey’s fundamental mistake in the Syria crisis, there is no better way than “putting all the eggs in one basket.” This is exactly what Turkey did by putting all its eggs in the basket of the Muslim Brotherhood and locked itself into the parameters of a zero-sum game.

    About This Article

    Summary :

    By throwing its lot completely with Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood, Turkey will sustain costs whether Syrian President Bashar al-Assad stays or goes, writes Kadri Gursel.

    Author: Kadri Gursel
    posted on: Wed, Dec 26, 2012

    But a zero-sum game couldn’t be played in Syria. For Turkey to emerge from the Syrian conflict as a country collecting all the bonuses, the Muslim Brotherhood has to fully and absolutely dominate the entirety of Syria. The likelihood of this is close to zero.

    Foreign-policy makers in Ankara, while putting all Turkish eggs into the Muslim Brotherhood basket, acted recklessly with extreme self-confidence, confident that the Baath regime will be toppled in a short time.

    One reason why the neo-Islamist elite ruling Turkey today adopted an attitude that was far removed from realities was their underestimation of the institutional resistance capacity of the Baath regime against an uprising. This was a gross misjudgment.

    But that wasn’t the only reason: There were also emotional instincts in play.

    The AKP elite was in an unprecedented euphoria after seeing the Arab uprisings bring the Muslim Brotherhood to power in Egypt, and Islamists in two other Maghreb countries, while Sunnis were marching toward power in Syria. Here we have to take note that the AKP represents the Muslim Brotherhood traditions in Turkey.

    The hope that solidarity among countries dominated by Sunni-based Islam could lead to a new Middle East order in the eastern Mediterranean basin created that euphoria within the AKP elite who lost track of reality. Emotional factors played a significant role in the emergence of Sunni, Islamic and Ottoman elements in Turkey’s foreign policy.

    Now, the general expectation is for Assad to be ousted in near future, one way or the other.

    For the rulers of Turkey, the criterion for the success of their Syrian policy is Assad’s departure. We are expected to applaud the success of their policy once Assad goes. But if we apply concrete assessment criteria, a positive reaction to their wish won’t be possible.

    Before answering the question “What problems await Turkey once Assad goes?” we must ask ourselves “What will be the price of Assad staying in power longer than expected?”

    Turkey has already paid a heavy political and economic price for Assad clinging to power for 21 months despite all overt and covert policies and measures we employed to topple him.

    As an example, we can cite the almost total disruption of our land trade with the Middle East and costs accrued to transport, production and agricultural sectors. Naturally there will be a price AKP has to pay in domestic politics for this situation. The masses of Syrian refugees more or less invited with the hope that they may facilitate setting up a buffer zone did not work. Today, Turkey is carrying alone the financial burden of more than 140,000 refugees.

    As long as Assad remains in Damascus, efforts of the Syrian Kurds to achieve autonomy, seen as a threat by Ankara, will gain momentum. The longer Assad stays in power higher the cost will be for Turkey.

    But don’t think that Turkey’s problems will ease once Assad departs. On the contrary, the problems will be more diverse, more complicated and confusing, the vast majority of which can be attributed to Turkey’s faulty policies.

    Let’s begin with Turkey’s Kurdish issue: Emergence of Syrian Kurds under the leadership of the PYD — seen as Syrian offshoot of the PKK — affixed regional context to Turkey’s Kurdish issue. In this context Iran, Baath, Baghdad, Kurdistan regional government of Iraq and many other elements entered Turkey’s Kurdish equation. A possible intervention by Turkey in this region will bring with it the risk of internationalizing the issue.

    If Syria’s Kurdish issue is solved through peaceful means and Kurds achieve their aspiration of autonomy, Turkey will be exposed as a country with the largest Kurdish population but also a country that has given the minimum political rights to its own Kurds.

    Meanwhile, the PKK, with weapons it will acquire from the army of the Baath regime, will be even a greater threat to Turkey’s security.

    Ankara’s entry to the Syrian conflict as a party supporting the Sunni majority will cause serious problems of confidence in its relations with other minorities of that country. After every massacre and act of brutality against those minorities, there will be attempts to determine Turkey’s part in it. The fact that weapons to Sunni opposition and Jihadist groups were sent via Turkey will burden Turkey with ethical and political responsibility.

    Turkey will also suffer headaches because of the activities of Al Nusra Front and other al-Qaeda-linked groups in Syria.

    And finally we might see the small Syrian Turkmen minority being designated a target of retaliation against Turkey.

    Since Assad’s departure doesn’t automatically mean stability, the problems of Turkey’s Middle East trade because of the Syrian crisis will continue during the transition period.

    Read more: https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2012/al-monitor/turkey-syria-muslim-brother.html#ixzz2GG6ryWIj
  • In Turkey, Syria poses a new test for Erdogan’s authority – The Washington Post

    In Turkey, Syria poses a new test for Erdogan’s authority – The Washington Post

    By Anthony Faiola, Sunday, November 4, 12:12 AM

    Adam Berry/Getty Images - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a news conference in Berlin. His plans to transform Turkey into a model of Muslim democracy face increased threats, both internal and external.
    Adam Berry/Getty Images – Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a news conference in Berlin. His plans to transform Turkey into a model of Muslim democracy face increased threats, both internal and external.

    ANKARA, Turkey — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has emerged during the past decade as a transformative leader of Turkey, pledging to make his country a model of Muslim democracy while presidingover an economic miracle of China-like growth and building a new brand of neo-Ottoman clout in the Middle East.

    A convergence of challenges are rocking this nation that straddles two continents, with the escalating crisis in neighboring Syria leaving the Islamist leader struggling among foreign allies and within his own electorate to muster support for a more forceful international response.

    Many observers still see Turkey as a model for the budding democracies in the Muslim world. But thousands from the secular opposition here faced water cannons and tear gas last week during a protest against what they decry as Erdogan’s increasingly religious and autocratic bent in a nation where the separation of church and state were once a jealously guarded nationalist ideal.

    Meanwhile, Turkey’s once-roaring economy is slowing, and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party is staging its most audacious attacks since the 1990s.

    And though Erdogan’s backers in the ruling Justice and Development Party routinely unfurl banners saying, “welcome, great master” when he lands in town, that same term is being co-opted by his field of critics, who are wielding the words against him with sarcastic derision.

    “He is now experiencing the most difficult time of his premiership, with a number of things happening at once,” said Suat Kiniklioglu, head of the Ankara-based think tank Center for Strategic Communication and a former national legislator from Erdogan’s ruling party.

    Once imprisoned for reciting an Islamic poem in an institutionally secular nation, Erdogan is now in the midst of his maximum third term as premier after a decade that saw him tame an activist military establishment, including scores of acting and retired soldiers and brass jailed as coup plotters.

    Having come to power during the onset of the Iraq war, he is now facing his greatest strategic test because of the 20-month-old conflict in neighboring Syria, particularly in the days since stray Syrian shells crossed the border and killed five Turks last month.

    In the immediate aftermath, Erdogan appeared to put this nation on war footing. Turkish forces returned fire and intercepted a Damascus-bound Russian transport plane, seizing its cargo. Parliament has granted Erdogan the authority to deploy troops and stage airstrikes on Syrian soil.

    Turkish tanks are still trained on the Syrian frontier, and the military is on standing orders to respond with two rounds of mortar fire for every one Syrian shell that lands on Turkish territory. But the specter of any serious Turkish intervention is ebbing with Erdogan toning down rhetoric and refraining from steps that could morph Syria’s civil war into a full-blown regional conflict.

    More tempered response

    Political insiders here say Erdogan’s call for more aggressive action to bring Syrian President Bashar al-Assad down has backfired, in part because of a lack of support from Washington, which is now calling on the Turks to offer a more tempered response.

    via In Turkey, Syria poses a new test for Erdogan’s authority – The Washington Post.

    more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/in-turkey-syria-poses-a-new-test-for-erdogans-authority/2012/11/03/12c5cfce-2445-11e2-92f8-7f9c4daf276a_story.html

  • Turkey says Syria’s al-Assad can stay

    Editor’s Note: The following report is excerpted from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium online newsletter published by the founder of WND. Subscriptions are $99 a year or, for monthly trials, just $9.95 per month for credit card users, and provide instant access for the complete reports.

    WASHINGTON – Turkey has signaled that it wants to continue discussions with Iran over the future of Syria without the removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as a prerequisite, according to a report in Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.

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    Such a development appears to have emerged in discussions Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently held with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Tehran.

    Turkish officials are quick to point out, however, that this does not signal any support Erdogan may have for al-Assad.

    In recent weeks, Erdogan has backed off from recent hard positions he has taken toward Syria such as demanding the North Atlantic Treaty Organization – of which Turkey is a member – respond militarily first to the shoot-down of a Turkish jet fighter over Syria and then the mortar attack from Syria on a border village.

    While Turkey seeks to assert its influence throughout the Middle East in view of the major political changes taking place there, Erdogan has had to tread carefully out of concern that it will resurrect the claim that he is attempting to reestablish the Ottoman Empire. The Arab countries in the region still have vivid memories of living under the Ottoman that often was harsh and deadly.

    For some time, Turkey has sought to extend its influence under a policy of “zero problems with neighbors” from the Middle East to Central Asia where the Ottoman influence was predominant for centuries.

    This has become apparent in handling the prickly issue of its neighbor Syria, where a virtual civil war is under way while Syrian refugees continue to flow into Turkey, which has decided to host the Syrian opposition in wanting to oust al-Assad.

    While allied with Sunni Saudi Arabia, Sunni Turkey has sought to reach out to Shi’ite Iran, which also exerts considerable influence in the region and is allied with the Shi’ite Alawite regime of al-Assad. The Saudi kingdom along with Sunni Qatar has sought the removal of al-Assad and has been working through Turkey to try and make that happen.

    Erdogan’s latest offer to Iran then forces Erdogan to walk a thin line between negotiating with Iran and placating Saudi Arabia, say analysts, and reflects a major departure from Turkey’s previous position. Yet, there are additional considerations Erdogan must take into account.

    Turkey has to cope with growing internal problems given its previous effort to oust al-Assad, who has threatened to unleash the large Kurdish and Alawite minorities that populate Turkey. This development could create considerable unrest in Turkey.

    And Turkey sees the region succumbing to the rise of Islamist movements and the “discrediting of Arab secularist police states,” according to the open source intelligence group Stratfor.

    “The transition from secular autocracy will be tumultuous, but the more leverage Turkey has with this Pan-Arab Islamist movement, the better prepared it will be to manage its neighborhood,” a Stratfor report said.

    “An opportunity is thus developing for Turkey in which it can assert its Islamist credentials alongside its ability to compete effectively with Iran and to deal with the West,” it said.

    “Turkey is uniquely positioned to steer the Islamist movement while the Arab street still requires a regional backer in its challenge to the old regimes and to keep Iran at bay,” the report added. “But Arab attitudes toward Turkey will shift with time as Turkey’s expectations of a growing sphere of influence in the Arab world inevitably clash with the Muslim Brotherhood’s vision of a Pan-Arab Islamist movement following its own course, as opposed to one set by Ankara.”

    Turkey’s latest overture with Iran underscores what analysts have been suggesting about its outlook toward Syria: Ankara wants to avoid regime change in Syria, because of the serious consequences of the alternatives.

    Syria could be plunged further into a civil war, prompting massive humanitarian movements that would be catastrophic for the region and bring about further instability in already fragile countries such as Lebanon and Iraq.

    Keep in touch with the most important breaking news stories about critical developments around the globe with Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium, online intelligence news source edited and published by the founder of WND.

    via Turkey says Syria’s al-Assad can stay.

  • Turkey’s ‘inkblot’ test

    Turkey’s ‘inkblot’ test

    Turkey’s ‘inkblot’ test

    By Soner Cagaptay, Special to CNN

    Editor’s note: Soner Cagaptay is a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a GPS contributor. You can find his other posts here. The views expressed are solely those of the author.

    121002103633 turkey syria refugees story top

    Ankara is struggling to accommodate the tide of Syrian refugees looking to enter Turkey. As of this month, there were more than 100,000 Syrian refugees in the country, a number that Turkey has already declared as the “psychological limit” in terms of the number it can host. Ankara can also be expected to try to accommodate many refugees on the Syrian side of the border. Indeed, without apparent interference from the Syrian government, temporary zones are already forming like inkblots across the national boundary from Turkey into Syria. But can Turkey cope?

    The refugee influx poses potential security concerns for Turkey, not least because of the potential for armed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) members in Syria to use this as an opportunity to cross into Turkey. As a result, Ankara has already temporarily closed some of its border crossings and increased security controls for refugees fleeing across the border. This has translated to increased waiting times for entry, which has in turn only added to the back-log of refugees on the Syrian side of the border.

    As the Sunni Arab exodus from Syria continues, areas with favorable geography and nearby border crossings have been confronted with the greatest numbers of refugees, leading to the formation of what could be described as “inkblot” zones, where refugees on both sides of the border live under Turkish care. The Syrian government has all but abandoned such areas.

    Since August, Turkey’s official humanitarian relief agency, the Disaster and Emergency Management Directorate (AFAD), has been dispensing aid at key crossings, including to camps inside Syria. Meanwhile, signaling a defensive posture over the “inkblots,” Turkish military forces equipped with anti-aircraft installations have been positioned within range of the camps. According to some reports, helicopters used by forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad have periodically been chased from these areas by Turkish fighter jets.

    But as they grow in size and number, these “inkblots” will further erode the integrity of the Turkish-Syrian border, a border that seems to be merging into the terrain itself, especially in areas where large Sunni Arab communities live on both sides of the border crossings.

    These areas also have the potential to place genuine strains on ties between Ankara and Washington. After all, there are already policy differences between the two countries on Syria: Ankara appears to want to move fast and potentially with force vis-à-vis Damascus, whereas Washington is exercising caution. So far, Turkey has managed the relationship well, publicly at least. But last month, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan chided U.S. President Barack Obama for “lacking initiative” on Syria.

    An expansion in the number of “inkblots” could put pressure on Ankara to press publicly for U.S. assistance against the al-Assad regime, including asking for U.S. backing to convert the refugee settlements into internationally sanctioned safe havens.

    Ultimately, these settlements might best be seen as something of a Rorschach test of U.S.-Turkish, with Ankara viewing them as the stepping stone to the next stage of the push against al-Assad, and Washington seeing them as merely a temporary fix in the ongoing Syria crisis.

    via Turkey’s ‘inkblot’ test – Global Public Square – CNN.com Blogs.