Turkey’s Defense Minister Ismet Yilmaz has submitted the country’s 18.2-billion-lira (USD 10-billion) military budget for 2012 to the Turkish parliament, Press TV reports.
Attending the parliament’s planning and budget commission on Friday, Yilmaz also announced ambitious defense projects including the production of national military aircraft.
The minister noted that Turkey will begin producing a domestically-made helicopter within five years and its own fighter jets in 10 years.
He added that the country has also launched a project to set up a home-made missile defense system.
In October, Turkey announced that it will begin the mass production of its first domestically-made cruise missile, named SOM, in 2012, as part of Ankara’s plans to reduce defense reliance on foreign countries.
Meanwhile, Turkey has boosted the budget of its National Intelligence Organization (MIT) in response to public anger over the death of two dozen Turkish soldiers in a recent battle with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) terrorist group.
Turkey’s MIT and the security forces will receive an additional USD 6 billion from the defense industry support fund, provided by the government.
DB/AS/AZ/HJL
via PressTV – Turkey unveils $10bn military budget.
over new constitution BDP leader Selahattin Demirtaş (L) speaks to Serkan Demirtaş (C) and Göksal Bozkurt of the Hürriyet Daily News. DAILY NEWS photo, Selahattin SÖNMEZ
GÖKSEL BOZKURT / SERKAN DERMİRTAŞ
ANKARA – Hürriyet Daily News
Selahattin Demirtaş, BDP co-chair, says he warned President Gül and Foreign Minister Davutoğlu against a spillover from Syria
Syria is looking to stir up ethnic and sectarian unrest in Turkey, Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) co-chair Selahattin Demirtaş has warned, urging Ankara to reconcile with Turkey’s Kurdish population or face the risk of plunging deeper into conflict.
“Syria is about to explode. The unrest is continuing. The threats of [President Bashar] al-Assad’s regime to Turkey should not be underestimated. He has given a message: ‘We have religious and ethnic differences, so does Turkey. If we have domestic disturbances, then so will Turkey,’” Demirtaş said in an interview with the Hürriyet Daily News on Oct. 13.
To prevent a spill-over effect in Turkey from turmoil in the Middle East, the government and the Kurds must immediately reconcile, said Demirtaş, whose party is mainly focused on the Kurdish issue.
The BDP leader said he had shared his concerns with both President Abdullah Gül and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu. “I told them they have no time to lose, but they are making the problem worse with their complacency and lethargy. Ground operations, KCK operations, the isolation of [outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Öcalan at] İmrali is an eclipse of reason. This is the time for dialogue and negotiations. I don’t think the upcoming days will be this comfortable.”
Police have launched a number of raids to detain people accused of membership in the Kurdistan Communities’ Union (KCK), which is accused of being the urban wing of the PKK. The latter is listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.
“If someone ignites a clash between Arabs and Kurds in Syria, the powers behind it will want to spread the unrest to Turkey. I don’t know if it will be an ethnic or sectarian conflict. I cannot say how it will happen, but they will try. We already have wounds, and they will try to rub salt in them,” the BDP leader said.
Ratcheting up tensions
Commenting on the recent assassination of Syrian Kurdish leader Meshaal Tamo, Demirtaş said the Kurds had not been involved in domestic insurrection, or revolted against al-Assad, and were balanced in their politics. He added that he was not directly in contact with Syrian Kurds and received information indirectly.
“They might be trying to incite the Kurdish people with such assassinations. This could turn into a Kurdish-Arab, Sunni-Shiite conflict. Maybe that’s what they’re planning,” Demirtaş said. “The whole thing is heading toward a dangerous point.”
The Turkish government has overstretched itself to the point of interfering with Syria, said Demirtaş, urging the ruling party to provide an explanation as to what the Turkish and Kurdish people should expect for the future of the region.
“In such a period, the Justice and Development Party [AKP] and the Republican People’s Party [CHP] need to think about the next 100 years of the country,” Demirtaş said, also noting the threat posed by Iran to Turkey’s domestic stability.
New constitution
The BDP places great importance on the new constitution and will actively participate in its preparation, said Demirtaş.
“The constitution cannot be made only by 12 deputies from four parties,” said Demirtaş, proposing the establishment of another commission that will bring together representatives of women’s, environmental and human rights organizations and minority communities. The new constitution must be approved by the public in a referendum no matter how many deputies approve it in Parliament, he added.
“The constitutional commission must also solve the issue of jailed deputies,” the BDP leader said. “They can’t say it is not their job. If you’re making a new constitution, you also need to clear the path of mines. Eight deputies are behind bars, and Parliament cannot vote on the Constitution without them.”
Demirtaş said Ankara was looking to South Africa and the dissolution of the Apartheid regime for inspiration to solve problems, adding that for this to work, the government had to end clashes with the PKK because “the new constitution cannot be prepared without peace. The commission can’t work while funerals take place every day.”
Both the PKK and the government have the will to restart negotiations, said Demirtaş. For this to happen, Öcalan’s “terms must be met. The government must give this man, who has the power to bring the PKK militants down from the mountains, his freedom. Only Öcalan has the power to do this.”
Demirtaş also called on the government to reveal the content of the protocols drafted between the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) and the PKK. “Those protocols contain the PKK’s disarmament. From what we understand, it is reasonable. Turkey could get rid of this problem for good. But the government’s approach has not been serious.”
via Assad ‘eyes sectarian, ethnic fight’ in Turkey – Hurriyet Daily News.
Prof. Selma Soysal has achieved worldwide fame with her doctorate thesis.
Dr. Selma Soysal, Turkey’s first female math professor, was laid to rest in an Istanbul cemetery yesterday following a commemoration ceremony held in her honor at Istanbul Technical University’s (İTÜ) Taşkışla campus.
“As far as I am concerned, work that is conducted in İTÜ in the field of mathematics also bears Selma’s contributions. As a woman of science and a modern Turkish woman, Selma has represented our country abroad with pride. I learned about what a human being, a teacher, an academic [and] a university ought to be like by watching her,” Professor Mümtaz Soysal, a legal expert, politician and Dr. Soysal’s brother, told the Hürriyet Daily News.
Selma Soysal was born in the Black Sea province of Zonguldak in 1924. She entered Istanbul University’s Math and Astronomy Department in 1941 and was taught by world-renowned mathematician Cahit Arf. Her doctorate thesis titled “Infinite Dimensional Hilbert Space” achieved worldwide fame.
She also attended specialty programs at universities in Paris and London, at Boston University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). She trained thousands of scientists throughout her 47-year career at İTÜ.
Soysal’s funeral was held at Şişli Mosque yesterday, after which her body was buried in the Zincirlikuyu Cemetery.
İTÜ’s Deputy Rector Derin Ural also expressed the deep grief felt by the university in its loss, while retired İTÜ faculty member Professor Hande Suher said Soysal’s mentorship qualities were exceptional.
The ceremony was attended by a host of academics and university administrators from İTÜ, as well as Soysal’s family, students and acquaintances.
via Turkey’s first female math professor laid to rest – Hurriyet Daily News.
Militants from the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party patrol the area around a PKK base in northern Iraq.
ERCAN YAVUZ, ANKARA
An intelligence report prepared by the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) and presented at a National Security Council (MGK) meeting on Feb. 24 suggests that the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has been forging new ties with the state of Israel. The report also notes that the PKK has plans for a serhildan, the Kurdish word for uprising, in the spring in an attempt to manipulate the June 12 general elections. A senior security official, who asked not to be named, shared information about the intelligence gathered on the PKK with Today’s Zaman. According to the information, the group earlier this month ended a cease-fire it had announced late last summer.
It also says some countries in the region seem to have convinced the PKK to re-launch its attacks ahead of the elections. The same official says that intelligence reports indicate Israel has intensified its contact with the PKK in retaliation for a meeting Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had with Hezbollah during a visit to Lebanon. Intelligence reports say the PKK is concerned about a drop in the votes of the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), whose candidates will run as independents. For this reason, the decision to end the cease-fire came easily for the PKK, which is trying to stop Kurdish votes from slipping to the Justice and Development Party (AK Party). The terrorist group has plans to hold constant demonstrations and clashes in the Southeast and in eastern provinces with a significant Kurdish population.
PKK-Israel links The MİT report presented during the MGK meeting in late February chaired by President Abdullah Gül also includes interviews with various PKK militants on the terrorist group’s action strategy for this spring. In these interviews, the militants confessed to having received training from Mossad officials.
MİT also has footage from an interview in which PKK second-in-command Murat Karayılan says the PKK attacked the İskenderun naval base during the May 2010 flotilla crisis, in which Israel killed nine Turks on board a Gaza-bound civilian aid ship sailing in international waters. In the video, Karayılan says the PKK and Israel worked together during the Mavi Marmara incident. Experts say this video is evidence that the PKK and Israel work in coordination in some of the terrorist group’s attacks. The interview has already been aired on an Israeli television station.
PKK action strategy
The report also says the PKK plans to put pressure on Kurdish voters. It is planning a dramatic attack to make it clear that it has ended its cease-fire. The group was also inspired by the recent uprisings rocking the Arab world. Today, International Women’s Day, and the three-day-long spring festival of Nevruz, celebrated around March 20, will be the dates the PKK will focus on to start its campaign of agitation and chaos. It also has plans to sabotage the election rallies of political parties in the region other than those of the BDP.
The PKK’s real concern is weakened support for the BDP in the region, but it will use as an argument for its attacks and demonstrations the slowdown in the government’s democratic initiative process.
The plan includes nighttime demonstrations, press statements, illegal protests and passing out declarations. They will also engage in demonstrations that they will call “acts of civil disobedience” during visits from Prime Minister Erdoğan and officials of other political parties.
The PKK also seeks to carry its demonstrations to cities with sizable Kurdish populations, such as İstanbul, Mersin, Adana, İzmir and Ankara. As has happened in the past, they are expected to use children in the front line during demonstrations in these cities. Intelligence information also suggests that the PKK will seek to manipulate the Kurds in the Southeast by passing out anti-Kurdish declarations. In fact, such fliers, referring to those participating in pro-Kurdish demonstrations as “anarchical punks and lowlifes” were passed around in Yüksekova, Hakkari province, on Feb. 19, 2011. It included other expressions likely to provoke the Kurdish people.
Hakan Fidan was chosen to lead Turkey's National Intelligence Organization.
Turkish newspaper reports agencies stopped exchanging intelligence and conducting joint operations following Turkish government decision.
By Zvi Bar’el and Barak Ravid
Amid the strained relations between Ankara and Jerusalem, Turkish intelligence has severed its working relations with the Mossad, the Turkish newspaper Sabah reported on Monday.
The report stated that the two agencies, which once enjoyed tight cooperation, had stopped exchanging intelligence and conducting joint operations following a Turkish government decision on the matter.
The report’s credibility remains unclear, but high-ranking Israeli officials privy to the matter neither confirmed nor denied it on Monday, and the prime minister’s bureau declined to comment.
In June, Amir Oren reported in Haaretz that Israeli security officials were deeply concerned by the appointment of Hakan Fidan to lead Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization. Fidan, a close associate of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is viewed as a proponent of closer relations between Turkey and Iran.
Meanwhile, Turkey has conditioned its consent to stationing a NATO missile-defense system on its territory on a guarantee that no information collected by the system be transferred to Israel.
Since the American-sponsored plan’s original purpose was to defend NATO countries against the possibility of an Iranian attack, this means Turkey is essentially demanding that Israel not be given vital information about Iranian missiles.
The previous U.S. administration had planned to station the system in eastern Europe. But due to fierce opposition from Russia, the Obama administration decided to relocate and scale back the system, which will now focus mainly on deterrence and on monitoring Iran’s missile program.
Turkey was initially reluctant to host the system at all, lest it damage Ankara’s relationship with Tehran. But since it is a NATO member, and since it faces growing criticism in the United States for its seeming turn away from the West, it said it would agree under certain conditions.
One was that the system officially be designated as aimed not against threats from Iran (or from Syria or Russia ), but against missile threats to Turkey and Europe in general. Another was direct Turkish access to any information gathered by the system. A third was full Turkish participation in any and all decisions stemming from information gathered by the system – which would enable it to work against any NATO move to attack Iran. And the fourth was that information gathered by the system not be given to any non-NATO member, and especially not to Israel.
Turkish sources said Washington has agreed to the demand that Iran not be designated as one of the system’s targets. They said it has also agreed that no information from the system will be shared with Israel, on the grounds that Israel has its own advanced missile-detection systems for tracking Iranian threats.
Washington, they noted, has little choice but to agree, since Turkey’s opposition would kill the plan: Aside from the fact that Washington needs Ankara’s consent to put the system on Turkish soil, the decision to establish the system requires unanimous consent by all NATO members. Moreover, Washington is under severe time pressure, as it hopes to get the project approved at the upcoming NATO summit on November 19.
Appointed in May, Fidan was previously a foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.
Turkey’s foreign ministry summoned Israeli ambassador to Turkey on Monday to express uneasiness over Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s remarks about Turkish intelligence chief, diplomats said on Tuesday.
Ehud Barak, according to leaked media reports, at a meeting of his Labor Party expressed concerns over Hakan Fidan, the new chief of Turkish National Intelligence Organization (MIT), saying Turkey could share Israeli intelligence secrets with Iran.
In his “leaked” comments, Barak described Turkey as a “friend and major strategic ally”, however, he called Hakan Fidan a “friend of Iran”.
“There are quite a few secrets of ours (entrusted to Turkey) and the thought that they could become open to the Iranians over the next several months, let’s say, is quite disturbing,” Barak said in his speech broadcast by the Israeli Army Radio.
Turkish Foreign Ministry diplomats voiced Turkey’s displeasure of Barak’s remarks at a meeting with Israeli Ambassador to Turkey Gaby Levy, sources said, Anadolu news agency reported.
Appointed in May, Fidan was previously a foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.
According to Reuters news agency, political sources in Ankara said that Fidan, a former envoy to the U.N. nuclear watchdog, was also involved in a Turkish- and Brazilian-brokered deal on Iran nuclear programme.
Israel attacked Syria in its 2007 air raid during which Israeli warplanes briefly flew over Turkish territory.
The Erdogan government was angered by that illegal incursion and has pointed to Israel’s own nuclear arsenal.
Israel, most experts estimate that it has at least between 100 and 200 nuclear warheads, often threatens the Islamic republic with an attack.
Turkey often calls for “fair” stance from global powers over nuclear activities in the region.
Ali Nihat Ozcan of the Ankara-based TEPAV think tank saw in Barak’s remarks an effort at “psychological pressure” on Turkey.
Ankara has not commented publicly on the state of its intelligence ties with Israel. But some Turkish commentators questioned Israeli suspected ties with PKK militants in Iraq.
