Tag: NATO

  • Turkey pushing for NATO attack on Syria

    Justification could put Soros-tied New World Order initiative on the march

    TEL AVIV – Turkey, a member of NATO, is pushing for a larger NATO meeting to decide whether to launch an international military campaign against Syria, according to a senior Syrian official speaking to WND.

    Earlier this month, NATO stepped up its support for Turkey when NATO allies decided to deploy Patriot missiles in Turkey to augment the country’s air defenses against Syria.

    The move followed the reported use by Syria of more advanced missiles to target the so-called rebels fighting the embattled regime of Bashar al-Assad.

    Any NATO deployment would likely come under the banner of Responsibility to Protect.

    Responsibility to Protect, or Responsibility to Act, as cited by President Obama, is a set of principles, now backed by the United Nations, based on the idea that sovereignty is not a privilege but a responsibility that can be revoked if a country is accused of “war crimes,” “genocide,” “crimes against humanity” or “ethnic cleansing.”

    The term “war crimes” has at times been indiscriminately used by various U.N.-backed international bodies, including the International Criminal Court, or ICC, which applied it to Israeli anti-terror operations in the Gaza Strip. There has been fear the ICC could be used to prosecute U.S. troops.

    Billionaire activist George Soros’ Open Society Institute is also one of only three nongovernmental funders of the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, the group that devised the doctrine.

    Obama’s national security adviser, Samantha Power, helped to found Responsibility to Protect, which was also devised by several controversial characters, including Palestinian legislator Hanan Ashrawi, a staunch denier of the Holocaust who long served as the deputy of late Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat.

    Power, in April, was named the head of the new White House Atrocities Prevention Board.

    The Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, founded by Power, had a seat on the advisory board of the 2001 commission that original founded Responsibility to Protect.

    The commission is called the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty. It invented the term “responsibility to protect” while defining its guidelines.
    The Carr Center is a research center concerned with human rights located at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

    Power was Carr’s founding executive director and headed the institute at the time it advised in the founding of Responsibility to Protect. With Power’s Carr Center on the advisory board, the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty first defined the Responsibility to Protect doctrine.

    Soros-funded

    The Global Centre for Responsibility to Protect is the world’s leading champion of the military doctrine.

    Soros’ Open Society Institute is a primary funder and key proponent of the Global Centre for Responsibility to Protect. Several of the doctrine’s main founders sit on boards with Soros.

    Activists Ramesh Thakur and Gareth Evans, for example, are the original founders. The two sit on multiple boards with Soros.

    Board members of the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect include former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, former Ireland President Mary Robinson and South African activist Desmond Tutu.

    Robinson and Tutu have made solidarity visits to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip as members of a group called The Elders, which includes former President Jimmy Carter.

    Annan once famously stated: “State sovereignty, in its most basic sense, is being redefined – not least by the forces of globalization and international cooperation. States are … instruments at the service of their peoples and not vice versa.”

    Right to ‘penetrate nation-states’ borders’

    Soros himself outlined the fundamentals of Responsibility to Protect in a 2004 Foreign Policy magazine article titled “The People’s Sovereignty: How a New Twist on an Old Idea Can Protect the World’s Most Vulnerable Populations.”

    In the article, Soros asserted, “True sovereignty belongs to the people, who in turn delegate it to their governments.

    “If governments abuse the authority entrusted to them and citizens have no opportunity to correct such abuses, outside interference is justified,” Soros wrote. “By specifying that sovereignty is based on the people, the international community can penetrate nation-states’ borders to protect the rights of citizens.

    “In particular, the principle of the people’s sovereignty can help solve two modern challenges: the obstacles to delivering aid effectively to sovereign states, and the obstacles to global collective action dealing with states experiencing internal conflict.”

    More Soros ties

    “Responsibility” founders Evans and Thakur served as co-chairmen on the advisory board of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, which invented the term “responsibility to protect.”

    In his capacity as co-chairman, Evans also played a pivotal role in initiating the fundamental shift from sovereignty as a right to “sovereignty as responsibility.”

    Evans presented Responsibility to Protect at the July 23, 2009, United Nations General Assembly, which was convened to consider the principle.

    Thakur is a fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation, which is in partnership with an economic institute founded by Soros.

    Soros is on the executive board of the International Crisis Group, a “crisis management organization” for which Evans serves as president-emeritus.

    New world order

    Doctrine founder Thakur has advocated a “global rebalancing” and “international redistribution” to create a “New World Order.”

    In a piece in March 2011 in the Ottawa Citizen newspaper, “Toward a New World Order,” Thakur wrote, “Westerners must change lifestyles and support international redistribution.”

    He was referring to a United Nations-brokered international climate treaty in which it was argued, “Developing countries must reorient growth in cleaner and greener directions.”

    In the opinion piece, Thakur then discussed recent military engagements and how the financial crisis has impacted the U.S.

    “The West’s bullying approach to developing nations won’t work anymore – global power is shifting to Asia,” he wrote. “A much-needed global moral rebalancing is in train.”

    Thakur continued: “Westerners have lost their previous capacity to set standards and rules of behavior for the world. Unless they recognize this reality, there is little prospect of making significant progress in deadlocked international negotiations.”

    Thakur contended “the demonstration of the limits to U.S. and NATO power in Iraq and Afghanistan has left many less fearful of ‘superior’ Western power.”

    With additional research by Brenda J. Elliott

    Read more at https://www.wnd.com/2012/12/turkey-pushing-for-nato-attack-on-syria/#K9HMX17L1vzCgvjP.99
  • Turkey to allow Israeli participation in non-military NATO activities

    Turkey to allow Israeli participation in non-military NATO activities

    JERUSALEM (JTA) — Turkey has agreed to allow Israel to participate in non-military NATO activities in the coming year.

    The country still objects to Israel taking part in joint military exercises, however, a Turkish official told Reuters Monday.

    Turkey has prevented Israel from participating in such NATO activities since May 31, 2010, when nine Turkish citizens died when Israeli Navy commandos boarded the Mavi Marmara, which was trying to break Israel’s naval blockade of the Gaza Strip.

    Israel is part of the Mediterranean Dialogue, along with six other non-NATO countries, which allows them to participate in summits and training exercises. Any NATO member can prevent another country from participating.

    A Turkish court last month began a trial in absentia of four Israeli military commanders responsible for the raid, including former IDF Chief of Staff Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi. The Israelis could be sentenced in absentia to life in prison.

    Israel’s government-appointed Turkel Commission found in its investigation that the government and the military behaved appropriately, and that the blockade of Gaza was legal. The United Nations’ Palmer Committee also found the blockade to be legal but said Israel used excessive force while boarding the vessel.

    Turkey’s inquiry deemed the Gaza blockade and the Israeli raid to be illegal.

    via Turkey to allow Israeli participation in non-military NATO activities | JTA – Jewish & Israel News.

  • Why Nato is deploying missiles in Turkey

    Why Nato is deploying missiles in Turkey

    Wang Hui,

    China Daily December 9, 2012 1:00 am

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    Nato’s decision to accede to Turkey’s request that the alliance deploy Patriot missiles along the Turkish-Syrian border will have profound implications on the security scenario in the Middle East. Since there is no guarantee that Nato’s defensive measure will not be used against others, the move will complicate an already tricky situation and prevent the Syrian crisis from being resolved diplomatically.

    Western countries have thrown their weight behind Syrian rebels, providing them with support during the 21-month Syrian crisis. Nato officials have until now ruled out military intervention in Syria mainly because member states are wary of consequences that would follow. In other words, Nato is not really opposed to a forcible regime change in Syria – like the one it brought about in Libya. It’s just waiting for an opportune moment.

    Under such circumstances, the deployment of Patriot missiles along Turkey’s border could be seen as preparations for military intervention in Syria.

    In his talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday, Nato secretary-general Anders Fogh Rasmussen tried to reassure Moscow that the Patriot missiles would not be used to impose a no-fly zone in Syria and instead were aimed at defending Turkey.

    History tells us that any show of force in a strategically sensitive place cannot be a sign of goodwill. For one thing, Nato’s military manoeuvrings at the doorsteps of Syria could embolden the Syrian opposition forces to intensify their fight against government forces, which would only cause more bloodshed in the turbulent country.

    Given Nato’s record, its pledges that the missile deployment is defensive in nature sound hollow. In March 2011, Nato usurped a UN resolution that mandated the implementation of a no-fly zone in Libya to launch airstrikes, which led to the fall of Mu’ammar Gadhafi. There is no guarantee that Nato would not use the Patriot missiles’ cover to do the same in Syria.

    Moreover, Nato’s claim that the missiles are intended to defend Turkey against an attack from Syria does not sound convincing at all.

    It’s true that in October, firing from inside the Syrian border triggered an exchange of shelling with Turkey, which is believed to have fuelled Ankara’s fears of the crisis spilling into Turkish land. But Turkey’s military is far superior to Syria’s, and it has the advantage of being home to an American military base. Turkey does not lack the resources to defend its borders.

    So, what is Nato’s true intention then? A look at the timing of the hullabaloo around Syria’s chemical weapons issue may shed some light on the question.

    Interestingly, while Nato was mulling Turkey’s proposal of missile deployment, news of Syria supposedly moving chemical weapons hit the papers. As Western leaders warned Syria of the consequences if it ever used the weapons, Nato accepted Turkey’s demand.

    The fear of chemical weapons, though not for the first time, prompted Nato to play the moral card and agree to deploy the missiles.

    With the chemical weapons issue continuing to brew, Nato could get another excuse to intervene in Syria in more indirect ways.

    But Nato should stop assuming the vanguard’s role in the internal affairs of other countries, because trampling the UN Charter will only aggravate the crisis and plunge the region deeper into instability.

    via Why Nato is deploying missiles in Turkey – The Nation.

  • NATO Visits Southeast Turkey for Patriot Missiles

    NATO Visits Southeast Turkey for Patriot Missiles

    By By SUZAN FRASER Associated Press

    ANKARA, Turkey November 28, 2012 (AP)

    A NATO team assessing possible sites for Patriot missiles to protect Turkey’s border with Syria inspected military installations Wednesday in southeast Turkey, the state-run news agency reported.

    NATO member Turkey asked allies to deploy the missiles as a defense against any aerial attack from Syria after mortar rounds and shells from Syria struck Turkish territory, killing five people.

    Syria is believed to have several hundred ballistic surface-to-surface missiles capable of carrying chemical warheads.

    The NATO team visited military facilities in Malatya province, some 200 kilometers (124 miles) from the Syrian border, the Anadolu Agency reported. The province is already home to an early warning radar that is part of NATO’s missile defense system, which is capable of countering ballistic missile threats from Iran.

    The visit came as the alliance said it would “favorably examine” Turkey’s request for the air defense missiles but was awaiting the team’s report on where to base them.

    NATO spokeswoman Carmen Romero said the NATO team was expected to finish its work in the next few days and would feed its proposals to NATO’s military authorities.

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    AP

    In this photo released by the Syrian official… View Full Caption

    “This recommendation is a key element in the Council’s decision-making process,” she said, in reference to the North Atlantic Council, the alliance’s governing body that is made up of the ambassadors of all its 28 members.

    Romero said “allies with available Patriots have also made clear their intention to augment Turkey’s defenses, subject to national processes.”

    Germany, the Netherlands and the U.S. have the advanced PAC-3 model Patriots that Turkey wants to intercept ballistic missiles.

    Once NATO and the national parliaments in Germany and the Netherlands approve the deployment of the Patriots, it will probably take at least another month before they become operational. Due to the complexity and size of the Patriot batteries — including their radars, command-and-control centers, communications and support facilities — they cannot be flown quickly by air to Turkey and will probably have to travel by sea, officials said.

    The deployment of the Patriots is also likely to be discussed at a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels next Tuesday and Wednesday.

    Russia, meanwhile, has come out against the Patriot missile deployment, saying that basing the missiles so close to the border could worsen the bloodshed in Syria.

    Syria is reported to have an array of artillery rockets, as well as short- and medium-range missiles — including Soviet-built SS-21 Scarabs and Scud-B missiles — in its arsenal. The latter are capable of carrying chemical warheads.

    Syria’s conflict started 20 months ago as an uprising against President Bashar Assad, whose family has ruled the country for four decades. It quickly morphed into a civil war, with rebels taking up arms to fight back against a bloody crackdown by the government. According to activists, at least 40,000 people have been killed in Syria since March 2011.

    ———

    Associated Press writer Slobodan Lekic in Brussels contributed.

    via NATO Visits Southeast Turkey for Patriot Missiles – ABC News.

  • Iran opposes NATO’s missile deployment in Turkey

    • Turkey Wednesday asked NATO to deploy the missile on its border with Syria.

    • Pressure exerted on Syrian government is central concerns of Iranian officials.

    • Deployment of NATO’s Patriot missiles on the border is a source of “tension.”

    TEHRAN, Nov. 26 (Xinhua) — Iranian authorities have strongly opposed Turkey’s move to deploy NATO’s Patriot missiles in its bordering region with Syria.

    The pressure exerted on the Syrian government, a main ally of Iran in the region, is the central concerns of the Iranian officials.

    Turkey on Wednesday formally asked NATO to deploy the missile on its border with Syria.

    An Iranian lawmaker said Monday that Iran’s Majlis (parliament) National Security and Foreign Policy Commission will have a meeting next week to discuss NATO’s probable missile deployment in Turkey, the official IRNA news agency reported.

    Deployment of NATO’s Patriot missiles on Turkey-Syria’s border is a source of “tension” and can “escalate regional conflicts,” Mohammad-Hassan Asfari, deputy chairman of the Majlis commission, was quoted as saying.

    Such measures by neighboring countries will lead to militarization of the region and may have adverse effect on its stability and peace, he said, adding that the Islamic republic is against any moves which could escalate regional tensions.

    On Saturday, Iran’s Majlis (parliament) Speaker Ali Larijani met with the Turkish officials in Ankara and voiced Iran’s opposition to the missile deployment.

    The Iranian speaker’s visit followed a meeting in Tehran which aimed at strengthening Iran’s agenda to support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s political reforms and to counter the pushes to oust him from the power.

    Upon his return to Tehran, Larijani said that the deployment of NATO missiles in Turkey will further put the regional stability at risk, Press TV reported on Sunday.

    “In meetings with Turkey’s top officials, we warned that the deployment of such systems will have adverse consequences and will exacerbate problems in the region,” he was quoted as saying.

    Also, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said Friday that deployment of NATO’s Patriot missiles near the Syrian border in Turkey will only aggravate the crisis in Syria.

    Mehmanparast denounced any move for militarizing the Syrian issue and stressed that it will be better for influential countries to look for political solutions for regional issues.

    In a reaction to Iran’s position, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Sunday dismissed Iranian concerns that the possible deployment of NATO missiles along Turkey’s southern border with Syria would make the crisis more complicated.

    “We cannot see any point that would justify these concerns. The missile system has a defensive purpose only. This system will not be operational unless there is a risk to our security. And it is our government’s obligation to take any measure when there is even the slightest chance of risk,” Davutoglu told a televised interview on private news channel CNN Turk.

    In the meantime, a Turkish military statement said Monday that the deployment of NATO’s Patriot missile system on the Turkish border with Syria is merely a defensive measure against threats from Syria.

    The system was not for “no-fly zone or offensive operation,” but “solely against possible air or missile threats from Syria,” said the statement.

    via Iran opposes NATO’s missile deployment in Turkey – Xinhua | English.news.cn.

  • Turkey request for missiles “new act of provocation”

    Turkey request for missiles “new act of provocation”

    DAMASCUS: Syria said on Friday plans by Turkey to site Patriot missiles along its border was “a new act of provocation,” while allies Iran and Russia warned the move would complicate the situation and could spark a regional conflagration.

    s1.reutersmedia.net

    NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen reacted by reassuring Moscow that any such deployment would be a “defensive only” measure.

    Turkey turned to its NATO partners earlier this week to request the deployment of the surface-to-air Patriot missiles to protect its troubled border with Syria, which is engulfed in a war that has cost some 40,000 lives.

    Syria’s foreign ministry accused Ankara of causing “tension and destruction,” with state television quoted an official as calling it “a new act of provocation.”

    “Syria holds (Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip) Erdogan responsible for the militarisation of the situation at the border between Syria and Turkey, and the increase of tension,” the unidentified official said.

    Syria has long accused Turkey of harbouring, financing and arming rebels fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad.

    In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned that any deployment of Patriots by Turkey may create a temptation to use the weapons and spark a “very serious armed conflict” involving NATO.

    “I understand that no one has any intention to see NATO get sucked into the Syrian crisis,” Lavrov said. But “the more arms are being accumulated, the greater the risk that they will be used.”

    NATO spokesman Carmen Romero later said Rasmussen had told Lavrov by telephone that such a deployment “would in no way support a no-fly zone or any offensive operations.”

    “Such a deployment would augment Turkey’s air defence capabilities to defend the population and territory of Turkey,” Rasmussen told Lavrov.

    But Iran’s foreign ministry accused Turkey of aggravating the situation.

    “Not only does it not help resolve the situation in Syria but it will also aggravate and complicate the situation,” spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said, quoted on state television.

    “The insistence (of certain countries) to resolve the Syrian crisis through military means is the main cause of tensions and threats in the region,” he said.

    Iran parliament speaker in Damascus

    Meanwhile, Iran’s influential parliament speaker Ali Larijani was in Damascus at the start of a three-nation tour billed at trying to find a solution to the conflict roiling Syria.

    Larijani accused regional powers he did not name of causing “problems” in Syria, in an allusion to the principal champions of arming the rebels fighting to overthrow Assad’s regime — Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

    “Syria has played an important role in supporting the resistance (against Israel and the United States) but some in the region want to carry out actions with negative consequences, to cause problems in Syria,” he told journalists.

    On his second stop in Beirut later on Friday, Larijani reiterated Iran’s opposition to the arming of rebels and foreign military intervention.

    “Some are sending arms to bring democracy to Syria. I believe you cannot set up democracy with RPGs,” he told reporters on the eve of a visit to Turkey. Iran “supports a political dialogue for a political solution.”

    On the ground, violence erupted in flashpoints across the country, while tensions spiked in the northeast near Turkey, where Kurdish militia are engaged in a standoff with rebels.

    Following several days of combat against a rebel advance into Kurdish areas, two main Kurdish groups have agreed to join forces, an activist said.

    Hundreds of fighters loyal to the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) — which has close ties to Turkey’s rebel Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) — have been locked in fierce battles with fighters of the jihadist Al-Nusra Front and allied Ghuraba al-Sham group in Ras al-Ain on the border with Turkey.

    The activist said agreement had now been reached in Iraq “to create a united military force, bringing together PYD forces and other Kurdish dissidents” in Syria.

    The agreement sets the stage for an expanded conflict in the area between Islamist rebels opposed to Assad and Syrian Kurdish forces.

    At least 46 people were killed in violence across the country on Friday, including 18 rebels, 15 civilians and 13 soldiers, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

    -AFP/ac

    via Turkey request for missiles “new act of provocation”: Syria – Channel NewsAsia.