Tag: Turkey-Iran

  • Turkey Vs. Iran

    Turkey Vs. Iran

    The Regional Battle for Hearts and Minds

    Mustafa Akyol

    Akyol 411

    Near the Turkey-Iran border. (flickr/mr.beutel)

    In a speech last August, Ayatollah Hashemi Shahroudi, who was Iran’s chief justice from 1999 to 2009 and is now a member of the Guardian Council, argued that “arrogant Western powers are afraid of regional countries’ relations with [Iran].” He went on to assert that, in their fear, those same powers were backing “innovative models of Islam, such as liberal Islam in Turkey,” in order to “replace the true Islam” as practiced by Iran.

    Leaving aside his conspiratorial tone, recent developments in the Middle East have somewhat confirmed Shahroudi’s concerns. The Arab Spring has heightened the ideological tension between Ankara and Tehran, and Turkey’s model seems to be winning. Last spring, Iran often claimed that the Arab revolutions were akin to the Iranian one decades before and would usher in similar governments. Yet in Tunisia and Egypt, for the first time, leading figures in mainstream Islamist parties have won elections by explicitly appealing to the “the Turkish model” rather than to an Iranian-style theocracy. What’s more, in December 2011, the Palestinian movement Hamas salted the wound when a spokesman announced the organization’s shift toward “a policy of nonviolent resistance,” which reflected its decision to distance itself from Syria and Iran and to move closer to Egypt, Turkey, and Qatar.

    The clash between Turkey and Iran has been more than just rhetorical. Tehran has been Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s biggest supporter, whereas Ankara has come to condemn the regime’s “barbarism” and put its weight behind the opposition, hosting the Syrian National Council and the Free Syrian Army, the rebel government and army in exile. In Iraq, Iran is a patron of the Shias; Turkey is, at least in the eyes of many in the Middle East, the political and economic benefactor of the Sunnis and the Kurds. And the two countries have had tensions over the missile shield that NATO deployed in Turkey in September 2011. The Turkish government insists that the missile shield was not developed as a protection against Iran. Nevertheless, in December, an Iranian political official warned that his country would attack Turkey if the United States or Israel attacked Iran.

    Although it would be wrong to say that Turkish policy has Islamist overtones, it certainly does have Muslim overtones.

    The falling-out between Iran and Turkey discredits those political commentators in the West who, since the Justice and Development Party (AKP) rose to power in Turkey in 2002, have lamented Turkey’s shift from the West to the East. After Turkey brokered a nuclear fuel swap deal with Iran and Brazil in May 2010, the West appeared even more concerned. Dozens of columns, including one in The New York Times by Thomas Friedman, a columnist for the paper, decried Turkey’s new outlook as “shameful.” And when Turkey voted against new sanctions on Iran at the UN Security Council a month later, Con Coughlin, the executive foreign editor of The Telegraph, saw it as a sign of an emerging and dangerous Turkish-Iranian alliance, asking “Does Turkey really want to be the country responsible for launching a war between Iran and the West?

    In fact, over the past decade, Turkey’s foreign policy has been nothing so simple as a crude choice between East and West, or between Iran and the United States. Instead, Turkey’s foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, has pursued a third way, by strengthening Turkey’s economic and political ties to all of its neighbors. In doing so, he has attempted to walk between the region’s “radicals,” such as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, and its “moderates,” such as former President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt.

    The West, of course, preferred the moderates, but often failed to see that empowering them only spurred on the radicals. The West’s favorite Arab rulers, such as Mubarak and Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, the former president of Tunisia, received praise for being not just moderate but also secular, but were brutal and corrupt dictators who lacked legitimacy in the eyes of their people. They were not elected, and, since they often appeared to be Western puppets, they actually served the agenda of the radicals, who looked genuine and noble in comparison.

    The AKP’s third way stakes its claim to moderation and modernism not on good relations with the West (although it tries to keep on decent terms) but on its democratic system and its pragmatism. Although the cadre at the top of the party is generally pious, it has not imposed sharia rule in Turkey, as some secularist Turks have feared, and has not geared its foreign policy toward spreading Islamism. Instead, it has focused on soft power and economic interests. For example, although Islamist parties often call for an “Islamic economy,” free of interest, the AKP has chosen to integrate into the global economy and follow fairly liberal economic policy. The government has avoided any actions that would dampen trade and investment, striving to have “zero problems with neighbors.”

    Further evidence of Turkey’s pragmatism can be seen in its behavior toward Iraqi Kurdistan, a region that the country’s former secular establishment used to see as a lethal threat because of its fears that Turkey’s own Kurds could agitate to form a Greater Unified Kurdistan with Kurds in Iraq. The AKP has viewed the region more as a zone of economic opportunity. In the past decade, Turkish companies flooded Iraqi Kurdistan, and the Turkish government gradually befriended Iraqi Kurds. In 2011, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan opened a Turkish-built international airport and a government consulate in Arbil, the Kurdish capital. Radicals and would probably have wanted to destabilize Iraq, in order to stress American loss.

    However, although it would be wrong to say that Turkish policy has Islamist overtones, it certainly does have Muslim overtones. Ankara cares about what happens in Egypt, Gaza, and Tunisia partly because people there have deep religious and historical ties to Turkey. Even then, the AKP has tried to be as pragmatic as possible, and generally avoided taking sides in sectarian splits in the Gulf, Lebanon, Syria, and especially in Iraq. “I am neither a Shiite nor a Sunni; I am a Muslim,” Erdogan said in his July 2008 visit to Iraq. Accordingly, in March 2011, he visited Iraq’s Shia shrines — apparently a first for a Sunni statesman — and even the modest residence of the Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the spiritual leader of Iraq’s Shia community. To put it differently, Iran envisions itself as the patron of the Shia and Saudi Arabia sees itself as the patron of the Sunnis, but Turkey has tried to engage with both of these camps — and with the Christians and the secular, besides.

    Yet the realities of the region challenge Turkey’s mix of pragmatism and ecumenical idealism. First, for now, the country has not been able to bridge the gap between Iran and the West on the nuclear issue. Second, despite its attempts to avoid being perceived as a Sunni power, it has failed to build lasting ties with Shia in the region, who look up to Tehran rather than Ankara. In Iraq, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite and an ally of Iran, repeatedly spoke against “Turkish interference” in the politics of Baghdad. And in Syria, where Assad’s Alawi regime is violently oppressing a Sunni majority, the dichotomy became even clearer: Turkey stands on the side of the opposition, whose dominant component is the Sunni community, including the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood.

    Despite these problems, and its shortcomings at home, Turkey is still a source of inspiration for the region, particularly for Islamist parties that want to participate in democratic politics and form governments that will deliver to their people. This is because the AKP’s third way, while having clear Muslim cultural tones, also enshrines values that are more universal: democracy, human rights, and the market economy. The way Erdogan defines these concepts is not as liberal as the West might like — especially when it comes to freedom of speech — but neither is it unhelpful. In a recent survey, TESEV, a liberal Turkish think tank, found that the majority of Arabs see Turkey as “a model country,” because “it is at once Muslim, democratic, open, and prosperous.”

    Understanding the value of these aspects of his country’s policies, Erdogan has placed more emphasis on them since the beginning of the Arab Spring. In visits to Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya last year, to the surprise of some Arab Islamists, he defended the secular state as a state “at an equal distance to all religious groups, including Muslim, Christian, Jewish, and atheist people.” And last week, Turkish President Abdullah Gül, reaffirmed the sentiment in a visit to Tunisia. In his address to the Tunisian parliament, he emphasized the need for a regional synthesis of Islam and “democracy, the market economy and modernity.”

    Meanwhile, in Syria, Ankara has taken a stand against the Assad regime, with which Turkey had developed a good and profitable relationship before the Arab Spring. Through close cooperation with the Obama administration on the Syrian matter, Erdogan has also shown that a pious and independent Muslim leader can work with the West on common goals. And finally, within Turkey, Erdogan’s AKP has demonstrated that a political movement inspired by Islamic values need not impose those values.

    So, the Iranians seem right to be concerned about “liberal Islam in Turkey” and its appeal in the region. To be sure, Iran’s own destiny is a matter that Turkey cannot affect. However, the Islamic Republic’s regional influence, which sprang from its image as an Islamic hero in a world of Western puppets, is now overshadowed by that of AKP-led Turkey. And for all those who wish to see a more peaceful, democratic, and free Middle East, this should be good news.

  • Turkey and Iran: Amidst the Smiles, A Rivalry Intensifies

    Turkey and Iran: Amidst the Smiles, A Rivalry Intensifies

    Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party appears to be recalibrating its Iran policy and increasingly distancing itself from the more vocal support it previously gave the Iranian regime. As the two powers tussle over Syria, Iraq and other issues, analysts warn that their rivalry for leadership in the Middle East is only likely to sharpen.

    022312 0But, for now, at least officially, Turkey maintains that it is still committed to maintaining its outreach to Iran and moving beyond the mutual suspicions that characterized the two countries’ relations in decades past.

    “We are doing our best to create the atmosphere for dialogue,” one senior Turkish diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, told EurasiaNet.org. “Yes, we don’t agree about all issues with Iran — about what’s happening in Iraq, in Syria — but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t talk with them. We are expressing our concerns and reactions with them about everything face-to-face.”

    Some recent statements from Turkish officials, though, suggest a more complex picture.

    At a February 5 meeting of the Justice and Development Party, Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc delivered a blistering critique of Iran’s policy of support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad despite the Syrian government’s bloody crackdown on opposition strongholds.

    “I am addressing the Islamic Republic of Iran: I do not know if you are worthy of being called Islamic,” Arinc said, according to the Anatolia state news agency. “Have you said a single thing about what is happening in Syria?”

    This tone represents quite a change from 2009, when Turkish President Abdullah Gül was among the first world leaders to congratulate Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad on his contested reelection, or in 2010, when Ankara put its relationship with Washington on the line by voting against Iran sanctions in the United Nations Security Council.

    News coverage also comes with a sharper edge. The Turkish press has increasingly started running articles that cast suspicions on Iran’s intentions in the region and in Turkey, with some recent reports and columns suggesting that the Revolutionary Guards were planning attacks inside Turkey and that Iran is smuggling weapons through the country to Syria.

    Hugh Pope, Turkey project director for the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, and one of the authors of a report on Iran and Turkey to be released on February 23, believes that Ankara’s more critical stance toward Iran indicates that “[t]he more hawkish faction in Ankara, the kind that thinks Iran is crossing the line in Syria and Iraq, is becoming more pronounced . . .”

    Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan “feels personally burned by the Iranians . . . ” Pope commented. “Erdoğan likes to have wins and the risks he took for Iran did not pay off, either in the US or Iran.”

    But the two sides’ mutual wariness is not always consistent. An Iranian general earlier threatened a retaliatory strike if Turkey hosted a North Atlantic Treaty Organization missile radar, but, nonetheless, Tehran has also proposed Istanbul as a possible site for another round of talks about Iran’s nuclear research program.

    Much of the Turkish-Iranian sparring is done instead via proxies. In Iraq, Turkey’s neighbor to the south, Ankara’s support for the Sunni Iraqiya alliance resulted in a falling out with Iranian-backed Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who has since gone on to accuse Ankara of “interfering” in Iraq’s internal affairs.

    “There is quite a strong and growing rivalry between the two countries inside of Iraq, and it stems from having genuinely different interests,” said Sean Kane, a former UN official in Iraq and the author of a 2011 report on Turkish-Iranian competition in Iraq for the United States Institute of Peace.

    “For Turkey, having a strong Iraq has historically been a bulwark against Kurdish separatism and Iranian adventurism. Iran looks at all of this very differently. A strong Iraq is a rival, and historically has been a hard security threat.”

    Trade between Iran and Turkey, long a buffer against bad relations, also appears to offer little room for cooperation.

    While trade between Turkey and Iran shot up from $1 billion in 2000 to $16 billion last year, most of that consists of Turkish imports of natural gas and oil. Joint ventures between Turkish and Iranian companies have failed to materialize and several large projects that were given to Turkish concerns ended up being taken away with little warning or explanation.

    “I don’t see Turkey’s outreach to Iran working,” said an executive at a large Turkish trade organization. “There’s no transparency or accountability in Iran. Turkish companies have had a very hard time penetrating the Iranian market.”

    Despite Prime Minister Erdoğan’s multiple trips to the country, “Turkey didn’t get any deals out of Iran,” added the executive, who declined to be named. “Recent developments . . . will only make it harder.”

    Still, despite the numerous points of friction and the growing rivalry, few observers expect outright conflict between Ankara and Tehran.

    “I don’t think Turkey has any intent to fight Iran. In fact, it would like to avoid that at any cost,” said Turkish political analyst Soli Ozel, a professor of international relations at Istanbul’s Kadir Has University. “There are too many common interests between the two countries, although that’s never stopped them from competing fiercely in the region.”

    What is most likely, Ozel said, is that Turkey and Iran will revert to the elaborate kind of diplomatic gamesmanship that has characterized the relations between these two regional powers and rivals for centuries.

    “It’s all smiles between Turkey and Iran, but that’s very typical of the relationship between these two countries, which is competition and cooperation wrapped up in a total lack of trust.”

    Editor’s note:

    Yigal Schleifer is a freelance journalist who focuses on Turkey. He is the editor of Eurasianet’s Turkofile and Kebabistan blogs.

  • Next Up: Turkey vs. Iran

    Next Up: Turkey vs. Iran

    OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR

    By SONER CAGAPTAY
    Published: February 14, 2012
    Hardly a day goes by that an Iranian official doesn’t threaten Turkey. Take for instance Maj. Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi’s recent warning to Ankara: “Turkey must radically rethink its policies on Syria, the NATO missile shield and promoting Muslim secularism in the Arab world, or face trouble from its own people and neighbors.”e

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    • Op-Ed Contributor: Iran’s Achilles’ Heel (February 8, 2012)
    This is no surprise. Turkish-Iranian rivalry goes back centuries, to the Ottoman sultans and the Safavid shahs. It briefly subsided in the 20th century, when Turkey became an inward-looking nation-state, leaving a vacuum in the Middle East. In the past decade, though, Turkey’s economic growth and emergence as a regional giant under the Justice and Development Party, or A.K.P., have revived its standing. From the Syrian uprising to Iraq’s sectarian convulsions to Iran’s push for nuclear power, Ankara is the main challenger to Tehran’s desire to dominate the region.
    Following the A.K.P.’s ascent to power in 2002, the Turks were, initially, not interested in competition with the Iranians and relations between Ankara and Tehran seemed quite warm. Both countries defended the Palestinian cause. Ankara did not appear threatened by Iran’s nuclear project. High-level visits between the two governments became routine and trade boomed.
    Meanwhile, shared objections to the Iraq War appeared to bind the Turks and the Iranians. Iran even stopped harboring rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or P.K.K., which it had encouraged to attack Turkey because of Ankara’s pro-Western stance. After the Iraq War, Tehran began bombing the very P.K.K. camps it had earlier permitted on its territory, winning points with the Turks.
    Then came the Arab Spring. The uprising in Syria put Ankara and Tehran at polar opposite ends of the regional and political spectrum. Given its democratic traditions, Turkey supported the revolution and sided with the protesters; authoritarian Iran continued its support for the Assad regime and backed his brutal crackdown on civilians.
    The Syrian uprising has become a zero-sum game: Either Bashar al-Assad will win, or the demonstrators will triumph. Likewise, it has become a proxy war between Tehran and Ankara, in which there will be only one winner.
    Hence, all is fair game now between Ankara and Tehran. Encouraged by Iran, Assad ignored Turkish advice to reform. Turkey is now supporting, hosting, and reportedly arming the Syrian opposition. Iran’s response has been to strike at Turkey by once again supporting the P.K.K., which has launched dozens of deadly attacks, killing more than 150 Turks since the summer of 2011.
    Competition over Syria has also mobilized fault lines in Iraq, where Turkey and Iran have been supporting opposing camps. Since Iraq’s first democratic elections in 2005, Iran has supported the Shiite-backed Dawa party of Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, while Turkey has backed the secular pan-Iraqi movement of Ayad Allawi. Following months of contention after the 2010 elections, Maliki formed a government in Baghdad, scoring a victory for Tehran.
    Maliki has cracked down on Ankara-backed factions, issuing an arrest warrant for Tariq al-Hashimi, Iraq’s vice president and leader of the country’s Sunni community. Hashimi has taken refuge in the Kurdish-controlled part of Iraq. The Kurds, who have until recently despised the Sunni Arabs for their persecution of the Kurds under Saddam Hussein, are now making amends. They are also closely aligning with Turkey to balance Iranian influence inside Iraq.
    Turkish-Iranian rivalry in the Fertile Crescent has opened up a can of worms: Iranian leaders attack Turkey’s “secular Islam” and threaten to “strike Turkey” should Ankara act on its commitment to support NATO’s missile defense project by placing radars on its territory.
    Turkey, anchored in NATO and oriented toward the Middle East, is a greater threat to Iranian interests than the merely pro-Western Turkey of a decade ago. There is a chance that Iran might become even more aggressive: Some analysts suggest that the Iranian Quds Force, the special-operations unit of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, might be connecting with the P.K.K. in northern Iraq to target both Turkey and the Iraqi Kurds.
    Both countries are slowly showing their hands in the region’s oldest power game. In the Middle East, there is room for one shah or one sultan, but not both a shah and a sultan.
    Soner Cagaptay is a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
    A version of this op-ed appeared in print on February 15, 2012, in The International Herald Tribune.
  • Salehi: Iran, Turkey enjoy brotherly relations

    Salehi: Iran, Turkey enjoy brotherly relations

    Salehi: Iran, Turkey enjoy brotherly relations

    T30712338 2053331Ankara, Dec 14, IRNA – Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said on Wednesday that Iran and Turkey are the two friendly nations which are complementary to each other.

    Salehi: Iran, Turkey enjoy brotherly relations

    He told Anatolia news agency that the Islamic Republic of Iran regards Turkey as a brotherly nation with deep rooted friendship.

    Salehi said that Iran’s stance on international issues and its formal diplomacy are declared by the Supreme Leader, the President or the foreign minister and that other views being declared by different individuals are their personal opinion.

    He drew attention of the Turkish media to make distinction between Iran’s formal diplomacy vis-a-vis Turkey and the personal views of different individuals.

    The foreign minister said that certain individuals in Turkey are highlighting misunderstanding between the two nations.

    ‘I advise certain individuals in Turkey not to give opportunity to the enemies of the two nations to magnify disagreements.’

    Salehi said that several journalists writing commentaries in the Turkish press are reflecting exactly the views of the western governments and some others embark on commenting on Tehran-Ankara relations without having full knowledge about historical amity between the two nations.

    He said that the western governments are making every endeavor to sow discord between the two nations and they introduce Iran and Turkey as rivals, whereas, the two governments have common objectives in the international affairs.

    Salehi acknowledged that certain individuals in Iran who are outside the governing system express critical views about Turkey and said that the Foreign Ministry has protested to them over their irresponsible remarks.

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    via Salehi: Iran, Turkey enjoy brotherly relations.

  • Turkey and Iran ‘unlikely’ to unite to fight rebels

    Turkey and Iran ‘unlikely’ to unite to fight rebels

    Thomas Seibert

    Oct 29, 2011

    ISTANBUL // Turkey and Iran were not likely to mount joint military operations against Kurdish rebels despite the two countries’ agreement to do so, analysts have said.

    Tehran was more concerned about Turkey’s policy choices in key regional issues than about the rebels, they claimed.

    Both countries have had to deal with Kurdish rebels operating from a mountain hideout in northern Iraq but the problem is much larger in Turkey, where tens of thousands of people have died in the 27 years since the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) took up arms for Kurdish self-rule in 1984.

    The PKK’s Iranian wing, the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (Pjak), has been the target of Iranian military action in the past but declared a ceasefire last month.

    Last week, Turkey and Iran vowed to collaborate in their fight against the rebels.

    The announcement came as the Turkish military staged a broad offensive against the PKK in south-eastern Turkey and in northern Iraq after PKK fighters killed 24 soldiers in south-eastern Turkey earlier this month.

    About 250 PKK fighters have been killed in the operation that ended on Thursday, according to the Turkish general staff.

    After a meeting with his Iranian counterpart, Ali Akbar Salehi, last week, Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkey’s foreign minister, said that Turkey and Iran would cooperate “in a joint action plan until this terrorist threat is totally eliminated”.

    Mr Salehi said the PKK and Pjak were “common problems” for both countries. “We need to cooperate more seriously against them,” he added.

    No details of the cooperation agreement were made public.

    Oytun Orhan, a specialist on Iran at the Centre for Middle Eastern Strategic Studies (Orsam), a think tank in Ankara, said Turkey’s long-standing wish to stage joint military operations with Iran to tackle the PKK and the Pjak was unlikely to be fulfilled.

    “We do not know what the agreement says,” Mr Orhan said on Thursday. But given Iran’s grievances with Turkey’s policies in the region, it was hard to see any readiness in Tehran to do Ankara a favour by vigorously tackling the PKK and the Pjak, he added. “It is unlikely that Iran will undertake practical steps. Why should it?”

    General Necdet Ozel, Turkey’s chief of general staff, confirmed that joint Turkish-Iranian action against the PKK and the Pjak were not on the agenda.

    The rebel leadership had been hiding in northern Iraq’s Qandil Mountains, near the Iran border and about 100 kilometres south of the border with Turkey.

    Gen Ozel played down the significance of military cooperation between Ankara and Tehran.

    He told the Turkish news channel NTV this week that Turkey was sharing intelligence with Iran “because this country is our neighbour”. But “at the moment, a joint operation is out of the question”.

    Gen Ozel praised Turkey’s intelligence cooperation with the US in the fight against the PKK as an exercise of “joint interests and sensitivities”.

    Both countries were trying to increase that cooperation to make it more efficient and to produce “more tangible results”.

    The US provides Turkey with intelligence data about the movement of suspected PKK militants in northern Iraq.

    Mr Orhan, the Orsam analyst, said relations between Iran and Turkey were at their lowest point for years.

    Iran criticised Turkey’s decision to have parts of the Nato missile shield installed on Turkish territory. Tehran also voiced concern about Turkey’s support for the opposition of the regime in Syria, a key Iranian ally, and about Ankara’s promotion of the Turkish version of a secular republic as a model for Arab Spring countries, Mr Orhan added.

    “The most Turkey can hope for is that Iran stays passive when it comes to the PKK,” he said.

    Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, last week accused outside forces of supporting the PKK, in remarks widely interpreted to be aimed at Syria and possibly Iran.

    Mr Orhan said Pjak was not a big priority for Iran but the situation in Syria was “an existential issue” for Tehran.

    A possible fall of the regime of Bashar Al Assad, the Syrian president, would increase Iran’s isolation in the region and cut direct links between Tehran and its ally in Lebanon, Hizbollah.

    Besides reaching out to Iran and strengthened its cooperation with the US, Turkey has increased cooperation with the Iraqi government and the Kurds ruling northern Iraq in a bid to weaken the PKK.

    Turkey’s cooperation with the US irked Tehran. After his meeting with Mr Davutoglu last week, Mr Salehi accused Washington of withholding information from the Turks. He said the PKK attack that killed the 24 Turkish soldiers might have been avoided if the US had told Turkey the rebels were infiltrating with heavy weaponry.

    tseibert@thenational.ae

    via Turkey and Iran ‘unlikely’ to unite to fight rebels – The National.

  • Turkey Looks to Iran for Support in Crackdown on Kurdish Rebels

    Dorian Jones | Istanbul

    Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, right, and his Iranian counterpart Ali Akbar Salehi leave after a news conference in Ankara, Turkey, October 21, 2011.

    Photo: AP

    Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, right, and his Iranian counterpart Ali Akbar Salehi leave after a news conference in Ankara, Turkey, October 21, 2011.

    Iran’s foreign minister visited Turkey Friday as Turkish armed forces continue their military incursion against the Kurdish rebel group, the PKK, in northern Iraq, after the rebels killed 24 Turkish soldiers Wednesday. Ankara is looking for support from its neighbors, but regional tensions are complicating Turkey’s battle against the Kurdish militants.

    Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi’s visit to Ankara comes as Turkish armed forces continue their offensive against the PKK in neighboring northern Iraq. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, in a press conference with his Iranian counterpart, said the two countries have agreed to collaborate in fighting the PKK and its Iranian wing, the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan, or PJAK.

    He says Turkey and Iran declared their joint determination to combat the two groups. Davutoglu says from now on, the two countries will work together in a joint action plan until this terrorist threat is totally eliminated.

    Iran also has a large Kurdish minority among whom are members of the PJAK. Despite both Turkey and Iran sharing a common threat, the Iranian foreign minister’s visit to Ankara is more about finding out what the Turkish government’s intentions are in its ongoing military incursion into northern Iraq.

    According to Murat Bilhan, a former Turkish diplomat in Iran. “It shows that the Iranians are anxious about what exactly goes on there. And they would not like to be left in the cold, so they would like [to] see what they can do together with the Turks, or they cannot do,” said Bilhan.

    Iran and Turkey are increasingly competing for influence in Iraq, a competition that is intensifying with the imminent withdrawal of U.S. forces. Bilateral tensions are already on the rise following Ankara’s decision to allow NATO anti-missile radar systems to be placed on Turkish territory, aimed primarily at Iran. But it is Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s robust support of the opposition in Syria – a key ally of Iran – that Tehran is most concerned about, according to political scientist Nuray Mert of Istanbul University.

    “Turkey supports some sort of regime change. Iran takes it directly against itself. If there is going to be a regime change in Syria, the whole power balance will change. Because if Iran loses Syria, they will lose an important base of power in the Middle East. So it will be a major defeat for Iran,” he said.

    Arab Spring and Turkish foreign policy

    The Arab Spring has seen a major change in Turkish foreign policy, with Ankara dropping what it called its “zero problems with neighbors” strategy, to embracing the struggle for democracy. Iran was one of the main beneficiaries of the “zero problems” policy, developing close political and economic ties with Ankara despite Turkey’s Western allies, who are pushing for Tehran’s isolation over its controversial nuclear program. Sinan Ulgen, visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe, says difficulties now lie ahead for Turkish-Iranian relations.

    “I think we can talk about a new phase,” said Ulgen. “So indeed we are entering a period of more realistic assessment. So obviously there are now increasing risks of heightened tension between Ankara and Tehran. There is inherent tension in the relationship of Turkey and Iran. It’s inherent because of the historical legacy because of the influence that these countries are trying to have in the region, which pits one against the other.”

    But Turkey is one of the few countries prepared to ignore European Union and U.S. sanctions against Iran in connection with its nuclear program. Increasing trade and financial relations mean Ankara will continue to have powerful leverage over Tehran, according to Iran expert Jamsid Assadi of France’s Burgundy Business School.

    “Iran is isolated, Iran needs much more Turkey than they need Iran, and Iranian press are going to criticize Turkey,” said Assadi. “However, they are going [to] accept whatever Turkey says. They don’t have any option.”

    With Ankara increasingly flexing its diplomatic muscle across the volatile region, that leverage over Tehran, observers say, may prove crucial in any competition between these two regional powers.

    via Turkey Looks to Iran for Support in Crackdown on Kurdish Rebels | Europe | English.