ErdoFascism turks In Their Natural Behavior

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Armenpress.am

European Parliament foreign affairs committee urges Turkey to recognize Armenian Genocide, supports normalization

17:00, 18 July 2023

BRUSSELS, JULY 18, ARMENPRESS. The Foreign Affairs Committee of the European Parliament has adopted a report on Turkey which also mentions the latter’s normalization process with Armenia.

The report supports the Armenia-Turkey normalization for reconciliation, regional stability and security. The report welcomes the progress achieved so far and commends the Armenian Prime Minister’s attendance of the Turkish President’s inauguration ceremony.

The report once again calls on Turkey to officially recognize the Armenian Genocide and preserve the Armenian cultural heritage in Turkey.

The MEPs urge the EU and Turkey to break the current deadlock and find “a parallel and realistic framework” for EU-Turkey relations.

Unless there is a drastic change of course by the Turkish government, Turkey’s EU accession process cannot resume under the current circumstances, the MEPs on the Foreign Affairs Committee said in the report adopted on Tuesday (by 47 votes in favour, no votes against and 10 abstentions).

Urging the Turkish government, the European Union and its member states to break the current deadlock and move towards a closer partnership, MEPs recommend starting a reflection process to find a parallel and realistic framework for EU-Turkey relations. They call on the Commission to explore possible formats for a mutually appealing framework.

In the report, MEPs confirm that Turkey remains a candidate for EU accession, a NATO ally and a key partner in security, trade and economic relations, and migration, stressing that Turkey is expected to respect democratic values, rule of law, human rights and abide by EU laws, principles and obligations.

The report urges Turkey to ratify Sweden’s NATO membership without any further delay, and underlines that the NATO accession process of one country can in no way be linked to the EU accession process of another. Each country’s progress on the path towards the EU remains based on its own merits, MEPs stress.
The report welcomes Turkey’s vote in favour of condemning Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine in the UN General Assembly and its commitment to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country, regretting that Turkey does not support sanctions outside the UN framework. Turkey’s alignment rate with the EU’s Common foreign and security policy has slipped to an all-time low of 7 %, making it by far the lowest of all enlargement countries.

MEPs commend Turkey’s efforts to continue hosting the largest refugee population in the world of almost four million people. They welcome the continued provision of EU funding for refugees and host communities in Turkey, and express their strong commitment to sustain this in the future.

Expressing their heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims of the devastating earthquakes of 6 February 2023, MEPs state that the EU should continue to support the people of Turkey in meeting their humanitarian needs and reconstruction efforts. They underline that European solidarity could lead to a tangible improvement in relations between the EU and Turkey.

The rapporteur Nacho Sánchez Amor(S&D, Spain) said : “We have recently seen a renewed interest from the Turkish government in reviving the EU accession process. This will not happen as a result of geopolitical bargaining, but when Turkish authorities show real interest in stopping the continuous backsliding in fundamental freedoms and rule of law. If the Turkish government is sincere in this they should show it with concrete reforms and actions.”

Turkey’s EU accession talks have been in a deadlock since 2018 due to the deteriorating condition of Turkey’s rule of law and democracy. The report will be sent to the European Parliament plenary session for voting.

Lilit Gasparyan

 

 

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Armenpress.am

European Parliament’s call on Turkey to recognize Armenian Genocide has been traditional position – MEP Nacho Sánchez

12:24, 1 August 2023

YEREVAN, AUGUST 1, ARMENPRESS. Member of the European Parliament Nacho Sánchez Amor (Spain) has said that there are positive signals for progress in terms of EU-Turkey and Armenia-Turkey relations, but at the same time he has warned that Turkey is an unpredictable country.

Nacho Sánchez Amor, the rapporteur on Turkey in the European Parliament, gave an interview to ARMENPRESS Brussels correspondent Lilit Gasparyan on the latest report on Turkey, its foreign policy, the probability of Turkey someday recognizing the Armenian Genocide, the Armenia-Turkey normalization process and the possibility of Turkey joining the EU.

ARMENPRESS: Your latest report on Turkey welcomes the process of normalization of Armenia-Turkey relations. How realistic do you think a settlement is, considering Turkey's endless preconditions? And what effect can this have on Armenia-Azerbaijan relations?

Nacho Sánchez Amor: Well, I think it depends on the real political will of both parties. I think it's good that at least they started this conversation. It's good that they appointed two interlocutors, but apparently after this good first impression there was a moment of stagnation. I don't know, I'm not aware of some talks that could have happened more discreetly, but I think it's good in the current moment, when apparently Turkey is sending signals of some kind of openness and is trying to mend ties with every neighbor. I think Armenia is very symbiotic of this policy, this really new policy and for that reason, we encourage both parties to continue dealing with the bilateral issues because this is good for both and this is good for the region.

ARMENPRESS: Like last year, this year as well the report urges Turkey to recognize the Armenian Genocide, how realistic is this?

Nacho Sánchez Amor: I think it depends... It depends... There were some approaches in the past and there were some attempts to try to have a common ground. If there is a good bilateral relation, it could be the moment to try to encounter the way in which both parties could reach some kind of agreement on how to tackle the issue. There were, I remember, some ideas about historians or political moves, but it depends on the mood. If the mood is better, it could be a thing to be put on the agenda, how to tackle the issue, probably not to go fast to an immediate and plain recognition, but at least how to tackle this. Trying to keep the position of both parties. I think it's good. Regarding the Armenian Genocide – this is the traditional position of the European Parliament. We are always trying to send the message and for that reason we use the word again and again, to recognize, because that has been and is a very traditional position.

ARMENPRESS: Now for many years you are following Turkey very closely. How do you assess Turkey’s role in the South Caucasus, what effect does it have on Azerbaijani President Aliyev?

Nacho Sánchez Amor: Well, the problem with Turkey, like in other countries is improvising, you can never know what could happen because things change overnight, because the system is so hyper centralized that everything depends on one person and two or three desks in the palace and for that reason you see, as we are seeing complete shifting, complete delving, complete abandoning positions, exploring other ways. And for that reason, you never know what could happen with Turkey. But what I know is, apparently, Turkey is coming back to the old idea of zero problems with neighbors. And this is a good policy. I think we encourage that kind of policies and if you have a problem, you have to deal with the problem with the normal diplomatic means. No putting pressure on the statement. No, of course not using military means, not threatening but talking. This is the way we have been calling Turkey to come back to a more normalized foreign policy. And for that reason, we encourage these policies. Realistic? I'm not sure, but at least the signals we have received lately are good signals.

ARMENPRESS: After the last elections held in Turkey, many are desperate, many are optimistic. What is your position? Should we expect changes in Turkey's foreign policy or not?

Nacho Sánchez Amor: Yes, of course. I don't have a particular personal opinion on domestic politics in Turkey. We have to deal with Turkey as it is and with the government that the Turkish people choose. But even we know that during the elections there were some problems that were clearly detected by the international electoral observation that was done. We have to deal with Turkey as it is and we try to encourage the moves and the drills and the opinions in Turkey, they are more conducive to good relations with their neighbors and with the European Union. This is our stance. I think yes, it's true. Well, they are having local elections and probably this is again a moment of more tensions. But it's true that President Erdogan has five years ahead to try to compose a more consensual policy and foreign policy, and I think this is also related with the economic direct threat of the country, it is in a very difficult situation from the economic point of view, and probably that could help to try to conduct foreign policy which is more friendly, more open and less assertive, and sometimes we use assertive not to use aggressive, but I think it's good that for whatever reasons Turkey have realized that they need to have different ties with the neighbors, and with the blocks and with the European Union, the United States and China and Russia.

ARMENPRESS: You propose an alternative way of cooperation with Turkey instead of EU membership, what format are we talking about?

Nacho Sánchez Amor: Well, finally we reached an agreement in the Parliament, not to get rid of the accession process immediately, but to try to maintain the accession process as it is, meaning frozen, and try to really, seriously explore other ways. Because the accession process has not been functional. The conduct of reforms has not protected, unluckily, the profile of a democratic society in Turkey, and this is becoming growingly dysfunctional. The idea is let's explore other ways. There are some approaches to come back or to explore deeply or to review. The whole association agreement. It's good to remind that the current customs union is pending under the umbrella of the old association agreement and we have to deal with the agenda as we can deal with custom unions. We always have been open to that. We have to deal with visa with the conditionalities well known in Europe and not so well known in Turkey. Apparently, we have to deal with migration. We have to deal with economic cooperation in our area, we have to resume the higher level talks because it's a little bit cynical than theoretically we don't have an element of that. There are a lot of Commissioners and a High Representative, and the Presidential Commission and the Council dealing with, we took his authority, but theoretically we don't have high level talks. There is a lot of things that we can do to mend the agenda, to regain trust. This is the first step to regain trust and try to fix or try to create another framework in the relations with Turkey.

ARMENPRESS: What is your assessment of Turkey-EU relations from now on?

Nacho Sánchez Amor: With the EU, it's the same. There are no changes because despite what happened in the world, despite the Green Deal, despite the geopolitical earthquakes, the accession to the European Union is about a very clear process, you have to approach the European Union in every field and one field at the core of the accession process is human rights, democracy, rule of law and from this point of view, there is no minor signal of improvement, not even a minor signal. The gestures of the state, the facts are sending a very confusing message. There are prisoners like Osman Kavala and Selahattin Demirtas despite the rulings of the European Court of Human Rights, the prosecution of HDP as the party. There are journalists in prison. There are clashing with LGTB movement activists and feminist activists.

And regarding the European Union accession process, these are the things we have to assess and examine. Is not just, say, the good behavior of Turkey in the Greek island, in Cyprus, in the Black Sea, in the Green Deal or in the prisons. That is we welcome any good move in that question, but the official process is completely different and for that reason se were astonished when the [Turkish] president said OK, I let Sweden to enter the coalition, but we have to get something from the EU. These have nothing to do with each other. I criticized openly the NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg. I know for sure that Mr. Stoltenberg has to fix the issue. But the accession process to the European Union is not a bargain piece inside the NATO.

 

 

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Aug 9 2023

Armenians face genocide in Azerbaijan, former International Criminal Court prosecutor warns

ABBY SEWELL

August 9, 2023 2:22 pm

3 min read

KORNIDZOR, Armenia (AP) — The former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court warned that Azerbaijan is preparing genocide against ethnic Armenians in its Nagorno-Karabakh region and called for the U.N. Security Council to bring the matter before the international tribunal.

A report by Luis Moreno Ocampo issued Tuesday said Azerbaijan’s blockade of the only road leading from Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh seriously impedes food, medical supplies and other essentials to the region of about 120,000 people.

“There is a reasonable basis to believe that a genocide is being committed,” Ocampo’s report said, noting that a U.N. convention defines genocide as including “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction.”

“There are no crematories and there are no machete attacks. Starvation is the invisible genocide weapon. Without immediate dramatic change, this group of Armenians will be destroyed in a few weeks,” the report said.

Nagorno-Karabakh is a region within Azerbaijan that came under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by the Armenian military in separatist fighting that ended in 1994. Armenian forces also took control of substantial territory around the region.

Azerbaijan regained control of the surrounding territory in a six-week war with Armenia in 2020. A Russia-brokered armistice that ended the war left the region’s capital, Stepanakert, connected to Armenia only by a road known as the Lachin Corridor, along which Russian peacekeeping forces were supposed to ensure free movement.

A government representative in Azerbaijan dismissed the report from Ocampo, who was the ICC’s first prosecutor, saying it “contains unsubstantiated allegations and accusations.”

“It is biased and distorts the real situation on the ground and represents serious factual, legal and substantive errors,” Hikmet Hajiyev, an assistant to Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev, told The Associated Press, on Wednesday.

In December, crowds of demonstrators who claimed to be environmental activists blocked the Lachin Corrirdor. Azerbaijan later established a military checkpoint on the road, blocking traffic that it alleged was carrying weapons and other contraband.

In Kornidzor, near the Azerbaijan border, a line of 19 trucks loaded with some 360 tons of medicine and food supplies have been parked for two weeks waiting for permission to cross.

Vardan Sargsyan, a representative of a crisis management working group for Nagorno Karabakh set up by the Armenian government, told The Associated Press the Armenian government had asked for permission for the trucks to cross via Russian peacekeepers and provided details on their contents but so far received no response from Azerbaijan.

“Unfortunately, there have been many attempts from the Azerbaijani side to manipulate this situation,” he said. “We just hope that this humanitarian initiative will be accepted as humanitarian and that it will be possible to transfer the goods.”

Read more: World News

The International Committee of the Red Cross has also complained of being unable to bring aid shipments into the isolated enclave during the blockade, although the organization was permitted to evacuate a limited number of patients to Armenia for medical care.

Ocampo said the U.N. Security Council should refer the situation to the International Criminal Court, a step that would be necessary for the ICC to take it up because Azerbaijan is not a signatory to the statute that created the court.

It is not clear if Russia would use its veto power on the Security Council against such a move. Russia has faced persistent criticism for its peacekeepers’ inaction in the blockade.

“Russia, responsible for peacekeeping in Nagorno-Karabakh, and the US, promoting current negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan, are state parties of the Genocide Convention. … They have a privileged position to prevent this genocide. Their intense confrontation due to the Ukrainian conflict should not transform the Armenians into collateral victims,” Ocampo wrote.

___

Associated Press writers Jim Heintz in Tallinn, Estonia, and Aida Sultanova in London contributed to this report.

https://federalnewsnetwork.com/world-news/2023/08/armenians-face-genocide-in-azerbaijan-former-icc-prosecutor-warns/

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Aug 10 2023

You Can Never Be Complicit Enough for the Turkish Art World

As we consider the rejection of Defne Ayas as the curator of the next Istanbul Biennial, it’s time to examine how genocide denial has long been a staple of the art world in Turkey.

Hrag Vartanian

Today, the Art Newspaper reported that the Istanbul Biennial rejected Defne Ayas as the next curator of their biannual event in favor of a far more autocratic-friendly curator who is currently working with projects in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere, Iwona Blazwick.

Journalist Christina Ruiz reported that critics are suggesting that Ayas’s curation of the 2015 Turkish pavilion of the Venice Biennale featuring Turkish-Armenian artist Sarkis was partly to blame. It’s clearly the reason, even if no one will go on record to state it, and one that I think is probably accurate based on what I’ve seen over the years around this topic. One cannot underestimate the role Armenian Genocide denial has played in Turkish society, how the state has benefited, and how it trickles down to the culture industries, like contemporary art.

As Ruiz outlines, the 2015 Turkish Pavilion was impacted by genocide denial. She writes:

A catalogue accompanying the show included an essay written by Rakel Dink, the widow of the Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink who was assassinated in Istanbul in 2007. In her text, Dink made a passing reference to the “Armenian genocide” to describe the pain of her people. Following a complaint from the Turkish government, which denies that the genocide took place, the catalogue was withdrawn. Ayas and Sarkis then placed all remaining copies into a coffin which Sarkis covered in coloured glass and transformed into a sculpture (Respiro, 2015).

At the time, many of us, particularly in the Armenian diasporan art community, were shocked to learn that the pavilion would remain open during the Venice Biennale. A small but significant act of genocide denial was met with an esoteric artwork rather than a clear, open response. Sarkis, who, to be clear, most diasporan Armenians have never heard of, was part of that decision (I think most people mistakenly think Armenians in Turkey are part of the diaspora, which they are not, as they continue to remain in the country of their ancestral lands.). It was all very disturbing.

The same year, the 2015 Istanbul Biennial was curated by Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, and I, for one, refused to attend the show, seeing from afar how serious topics such as the Armenian Genocide were clearly being obfuscated in a nation that has never been safe for indigenous minorities. Just two months before the show opened, Turkey had entered the third phase of the conflict by the Turkish state to eradicate Kurdish insurgents in the same eastern provinces in which Armenians, Assyrians, and Yazidis were massacred just a century before.

Christov-Bakargiev’s program was clear, since she never tapped into the established and growing networks of Armenian artists, curators, and intellectuals from the diaspora, but chose individual artists with little connection or interest in the Armenian arts community. The choice to essentialize Armenians to artists with Armenian heritage, rather than working with a group of people in the Armenian community doing the memory work related to the genocide and our exile from what is currently the Republic of Turkey during the centennial of the Armenian Genocide, was a definitive political choice. All this is also symptomatic of contemporary art, where minorities are represented by individuals, often with no connection to the community they pretend to speak for, who fail to engage with the current conversations raging inside and outside those same communities and with topics that have real-world political consequences.

A full account of how the Turkish art world continues to benefit from genocide denial is too long to list, but it includes museums, such as the Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum, where Armenian intellectuals were jailed during the infamous April 24, 1915 events that are commemorated every year by Armenians and human rights defenders the world over. In 2015, I was in Istanbul during the Centennial Commemorations for the Armenian Genocide along with hundreds of other Armenians from the diaspora who were descendants of genocide survivors. Our group wasn’t even allowed the right to gather at the museum for fear of attacks from Turkish nationalists. Then there is the topic of Koç Holding, the main sponsor of the Istanbul Biennial. The country’s largest corporation, Koç Holding is still run by the Koç family, who made much of their money a century ago by buying Armenian properties confiscated during the genocide for pennies on the dollar. The wounds of the genocide, which Turkey continues to adamantly deny, are never seriously addressed, and they never seem to heal.

Now, Istanbul Foundation For Culture and the Arts (IKSV) doesn’t appear to think Defne Ayas is complicit enough in their genocide-denying agenda, so they have inserted the far more ethically challenged Blazwick, who is sure to curate a more plutocrat-friendly exhibition.

To emphasize what Turkish curator Vasif Kortun told the Art Newspaper:

“The biennial does not know which geography it is in. There has not been a single curator from the Balkans or the southern Mediterranean. Instead, we’ve seen a succession of white Europeans since 2015. I find the whole thing shocking.”

Why are White Europeans always being tapped for the role? It’s interesting that Kortun mentions 2015, which makes me think perhaps they saw how successfully they were able to tap Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev to create the illusion of dealing with deeper societal issues while doing none of that and, in my opinion, hurting the larger conversations that exiled descendants of the Armenian Genocide are trying to have with the Republic of Turkey in relation to its continued history of denial.

To her credit, Ayas, who can be quite an excellent curator, was very clear with us at Hyperallergic when we asked her about some of the high and low points of 2015:

Most distressing? When our publication for Respiro by Sarkis at the Pavilion of Turkey at the 56th Venice Biennale was censored. The news arrived to us on April 24 — the day of the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. Imagine the double pain and terror of working with the strict codes of the deep state, while trying to imagine a breathing space for all of us.

What I hope Ayas, and other members of the Turkish art world (both inside and outside the Republic), realize is that you can never give in to genocide denial in any form. You might think you’re being political but the reality is you’re emboldening the deniers, who will always demand more.

Blazwick is part of the problem. As a former member of the IKSV board, Blazwick was on the same advisory panel responsible for choosing a biennial curator, and has now rejected the unanimously agreed upon advice to appoint Ayas and has snagged the post herself.

When people say autocrats rot culture, this is what they mean. Blazwick now apes the same autocrats and plutocrats she serves and curates for. Why abide by a vote when you can usurp the position yourself?

Editor’s Note, 08/11/23: The term “Istanbul biennial” was mistakenly used instead of “Turkish pavilion” in one instance and that has been corrected.

https://hyperallergic.com/838873/you-can-never-be-complicit-enough-for-the-turkish-art-world/

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New Indian Express

Sept 10 2023

Turkish president Erdogan says will speak with Armenian PM on Nagorno-Karabakh election

Turkey has previously said it "does not recognise this illegitimate election which constitutes a violation of Azerbaijan's sovereignty and territorial integrity."

Published: 10th September 2023

By AFP

NEW DELHI: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Sunday that he would hold talks with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan as tensions mount between Armenia and Ankara's ally Azerbaijan.

Turkey has already condemned the election of a new president in Azerbaijan's separatist Armenian-populated region of Nagorno-Karabakh on Saturday.

Lawmakers in Nagorno-Karabakh's parliament elected the head of the security council in the separatist government, Samvel Shahramanyan, by 22 votes to one.

Turkey has previously said it "does not recognise this illegitimate election which constitutes a violation of Azerbaijan's sovereignty and territorial integrity."

Speaking after the close of the G20 summit in New Delhi, Erdogan said: "I will have a telephone conversation, probably tomorrow, with Mr Pashinyan. What has been done in Karabakh is not appropriate. We cannot accept this".

Armenia and Azerbaijan have traded accusations of cross-border attacks in recent months, and Armenia has warned of the risk of a fresh conflict, saying Azerbaijan was massing troops on the countries' shared border and near Nagorno-Karabakh.

Azerbaijan's Armenian-populated enclave was at the centre of two wars between the Caucasus neighbours.

Six weeks of fighting in autumn 2020 ended with a Russian-brokered ceasefire that saw Armenia cede swathes of territory it had controlled for decades.

Tensions have risen again, with Yerevan accusing Baku of creating a humanitarian crisis by blocking traffic through the Lachin corridor -- the only road linking Armenia to Armenian-populated Karabakh.

The two sides have been unable to reach a lasting peace settlement despite mediation efforts by the European Union, the United States and Russia.

Next week, Armenia will host joint military drills with US forces, the latest sign of the ex-Soviet republic's drift from its traditional ally Russia.

https://www.newindianexpress.com/world/2023/sep/10/turkish-president-erdogan-says-will-speak-with-armenian-pm-on-nagorno-karabakh-election-2613542.html

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1945

Oct 5 2023

If Turkey Attacks American Troops In Syria, How Should The United States Respond?

Today’s downing of a Turkish drone should be both a shot across the bow and an inspiration for the future. To stop ethnic cleansing, it behooves the United States to help all of its allies defend themselves from the predation of dictatorships wielding drones.

By

Michael Rubin

Just days before Azerbaijan wiped the indigenous Armenian enclave in Nagorno-Karabakh off the map, Acting Assistant Secretary of State Yuri Kim declared to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that “We will not tolerate any attack on the people of Nagorno-Karabakh.”

The genocidal intent was clear. Azerbaijani soldiers wore armbands with the image of Enver *****, mastermind of the 1915 Armenian Genocide, and the slogan “Don’t run Armenian you’ll just die of exhaustion!” Upon capturing Stepanakert, the capital of Nagorno-Karabakh and a city historically almost entirely Armenian, the Azerbaijani government named a street for Enver *****. To Armenians, Azerbaijan’s arrest of the region’s Armenian political leaders has obvious parallels to the 1915 arrests—and subsequent executions—of prominent Armenian leaders, an event that scholars say marked the beginning of the Armenian genocide.

While growing numbers of Congressmen complain or sign letters demanding action, the Biden administration does little to help displaced Armenians or punish Azerbaijan for systematically violating every diplomatic agreement and ceasefire they signed. While realists in the White House view Armenia-Azerbaijan in isolation and may even see opportunity in the loss of Nagorno-Karabakh to enable an elusive peace, they are wrong on both counts. Unilateral action justifies unilateral reaction, even if delayed by decades, while ethnic cleansing unpunished signals its utility to aggressors.

So it is now with Turkey. On October 1, 2023, two suicide bombers affiliated with a militant offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) attacked the front gate of Turkey’s interior ministry, injuring two Turkish soldiers. While there is no excuse for terrorism, the attack came after a year of near daily Turkish cross-border attacks on Kurds. The Turkish Interior Ministry responded by declaring all sites it associates with the PKK and YPG (People’s Defense Units) as well as energy infrastructure as potential targets. Turkish drones and/or aircraft have preceded to bomb a number of sites across northern Iraq and Syria. The threat to bomb civilian and economic infrastructure represents collective punishment illegal under international law.

Given the US partnership with the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), of which the YPG is a member, that raises the stakes that Turkey might target American troops. This is not a theoretical problem. On April 7, 2023, Turkish drones targeted a convoy conveying Iraqi Kurds, SDF, and American Special Forces. The strike was not simply a warning, but lethal in intent. Local officials told me the only reason Americans did not die was that the ground was muddier than usual, allowing the warhead to penetrate into the ground before detonating. On October 5, American forces in Syria downed a Turkish drone that they deemed a threat. Such NATO on NATO action is a rarity.

The Turkish government might seek to compel the United States to abandon their Syrian Kurdish allies, much as the White House abandoned Armenians. That the United States has been silent regarding the Turkish ethnic cleansing of Afrin might encourage Ankara further. That President Donald Trump had after a phone call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed willingness to throw the Kurds under the bus might lead Erdogan to believe American resolve is weak.

He would be foolish to believe so. The United States allied with Syrian Kurds against the Islamic State that Turkey at the time backed. Turkey might be a NATO member, but Kurds have proven themselves on the ground at a time Turkey would not. The Islamic State remains a threat, one that would grow if Turkey overruns the Kurdish administration. Erdogan’s racist hatred of the Kurds also ignores the obvious to those who have visited the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria: while far from perfect, it is nonetheless impressive and has achieved a great deal with few resources. Residents—both Kurdish, Arab, and other—enjoy greater freedoms than their counterparts do in Syria, Turkey, or in areas of Iraqi Kurdistan under the control of the Barzani family.

This will not keep Turkey from trying, however. As Turkey seeks to ethnically cleanse northern Syria, Kurds tell me that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps demands the same right of access and operation along its border. Serbia, meanwhile, uses the Azerbaijan and Turkey precedent to intimidate and target Kosovo. Turkey may hope American forces simply get out of the way, but they should not. Today’s downing of a Turkish drone should be both a shot across the bow and an inspiration for the future. To stop ethnic cleansing, it behooves the United States to help all of its allies defend themselves from the predation of dictatorships wielding drones.

Conversely, American troops across the globe will be in danger unless the White House forcefully conveys to those who would seek to target and intimidate them that to do so will lead to an exponentially higher price visited upon them. Washington should put Ankara on notice: If a Turkish drone, jet, or sniper targets an American, every Turk in Syria and Iraq will have a target on their back.

Now a 19FortyFive Contributing Editor, Dr. Michael Rubin is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Dr. Rubin is the author, coauthor, and coeditor of several books exploring diplomacy, Iranian history, Arab culture, Kurdish studies, and Shi’ite politics, including “Seven Pillars: What Really Causes Instability in the Middle East?” (AEI Press, 2019); “Kurdistan Rising” (AEI Press, 2016); “Dancing with the Devil: The Perils of Engaging Rogue Regimes” (Encounter Books, 2014); and “Eternal Iran: Continuity and Chaos” (Palgrave, 2005).

https://www.19fortyfive.com/2023/10/if-turkey-attacks-american-troops-in-syria-how-should-the-united-states-respond/

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Asbarez.com

Erdogan Calls on Armenia to Quickly Open Route to Nakhichevan

by Asbarez Staff

November 9, 2023

in Armenia, Artsakh, Featured Story, Latest, News, Top Stories

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey

 

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey called on Armenia to act quickly and ensure a route from Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan, referring to the so-called “corridor” project being pushed by Baku that envisions a link to Nakhichevan through Armenia’s sovereign territory.

While Armenia categorically has rejected such a “corridor” and Azerbaijan, last week, claimed that it had abandoned the idea in favor of a route through Iran, the Turkish leader has insisted that Armenia must open that road through its territory.

“Everything will be easier if Armenia fulfills its obligation to Azerbaijan. It is very important to ensure the route between the western regions of Azerbaijan and Nakhchivan in the shortest possible time,” Erdogan told reporters when visiting Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan on Thursday, TRT reported.

He also said that Azerbaijan’s large-scale attack on Artsakh in September that resulted in the forcible displacement of Artsakh residents from their homes, brought the region closer to peace.

Yerevan was vague on the issue of normalizing relations with Ankara when Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanyan told reporters on Thursday that when the top diplomats of the two countries met in Tehran last month they only discussed “regional stability and bilateral issues.”

“We [Armenia] have confirmed that we are ready to quickly implement the already reached agreements. We believe that the Turkish side should respond positively to our willingness to open the border for citizens of third countries and persons holding diplomatic passports,” Kostanyan said.

https://asbarez.com/erdogan-calls-on-armenia-to-quickly-open-route-to-nakhichevan/?fbclid=IwAR0PyVQQgtYD7DRDhJD82-HY24kGpDu1jIJBX6wn1BLDx3zyJyVcm2OozaM

[Yervant1]

Nov 12 2023

Erdogan projects his own genocidal intent onto Netanyahu

by Michael Rubin

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan minced no words. “I repeat my call for the Israeli leadership … to immediately end its operations amounting to genocide,” he declared even before Israel began its ground operations in Gaza. Hamas was “not a terrorist organization but a liberation and mujahedeen group that struggles to protect its land,” he explained. As for Israel, the Jewish state was acting as “a terrorist organization rather than a state.”

“We will tell the whole world that Israel is a war criminal,” he told a pro-Palestinian rally. “We are making preparations for this. We will declare Israel a war criminal.”

If such moral inversion sounds familiar, it is because it is commonplace with Erdogan. The Turkish leader complains bitterly about the United States's alliance with Syrian Kurds but forgets that the U.S. embraced the Kurds only after Erdogan provided assistance first to Syria’s al Qaeda affiliates and then to the Islamic State. As with Hamas, Erdogan and his lieutenants argued that these Syrian radicals were not terrorists. As the Kurds resisted the siege of Kobane, Erdogan allowed Islamic State fighters to transit through Turkey and even attack the Kurds from across the Turkish border.

Erdogan regularly embraces radical religious rhetoric. He has described himself as the “servant of sharia.” While Turkey’s partisans in Washington and Turkey’s diplomats urge a strategic alliance because Turkey is home to the second largest army in NATO, to his domestic audience, Erdogan describes the Turkish military as “the army of Muhammad” waging “holy war” against “enemies of Islam.” After the International Criminal Court indicted Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, Erdogan dismissed the charges. “A Muslim could not commit genocide; he is not capable of it,” he explained.

By Erdogan’s standards, then, anything Islamic extremist groups do is justified, while those who fight Islamism are the true suspects. This inversion is at play in Erdogan’s approach to the Jewish state. Israel’s sin, in Erdogan’s eyes, is it is a Jewish state. There is no scenario in which he could conceive Jews to be right if that meant any Muslim might be wrong.

The hypocrisy goes beyond Israel.

Prior to the formal declaration of the Turkish Republic, the Turkish army slaughtered more than one million Armenians and put to fire centuries-old Greek communities. Such genocide and ethnic cleansing differ from Turkey’s struggle to oust European armies following the 1920 Treaty of Sèvres. These were not battles, but rather the preplanned slaughter of entire Armenian communities across eastern Anatolia.

Likewise, the Turks’ burning of Smyrna (today’s Izmir) was a preplanned ethnic cleansing. Turks killed perhaps 125,000 Greek and Armenian civilians in the city over four days, a figure almost 20 times that which Turkey says Israel killed in Gaza. That the majority of those Israel eliminated in Gaza were Hamas fighters is not a distinction about which Erdogan cares. Those Turks killed inside today’s Turkey were Christians, and so, in Erdogan’s mind, not worthy of concern.

Certainly, Turkey is not the only country guilty of hypocrisy, but it distinguishes itself with its blatancy and continuity. Every accusation Erdogan makes about Israel is a crime that Turkey has committed against Kurds inside Turkey, in Syria, and in Iraq, and against Christians in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Consider Afrin, a Syrian district with a large indigenous Kurdish community that Turkey, both directly and by proxy, has ethnically cleansed. Turkish F-16s and drones continue to bomb Yezidi villages in Iraq. Just last month, the White House declared Turkey’s military action “undermines the campaign to defeat the Islamic State … and continues to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”

Turkey does not differentiate between toddler and terrorist; farmer, or fighter. By Turkey’s own account, it has eliminated thousands of Kurds in Syria since 2016. Some in Washington blindly repeat Turkey’s characterization of Syrian Kurds as Marxist, anti-American terrorists, but anyone who has observed the region firsthand disagrees. Northeastern Syria is not unlike Israel in its feel. For Erdogan, who considers Kurds corrupted Muslims, this is the sin. Erdogan may slam Benjamin Netanyahu. Both are arrogant, unpleasant men, but, when it comes to crimes against humanity, Erdogan sees his own reflection.

Michael Rubin (@mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner's Beltway Confidential blog. He is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/erdogan-projects-his-own-genocidal-intent-onto-netanyahu

[Yervant1]

Nov 15 2023


The Coming War in the Caucasus

Azerbaijan and Turkey set their sights on Armenia.

James W. Carden
Nov 15, 202312:01 AM

YEREVAN—Atop a high hill, just west of Yerevan’s old city, stands a stark, deeply affecting monument marking the Ottoman Empire’s 1915 genocide of 1.5 million Armenians. The world Armenia inhabits is once again taking on a tragic color: Last month, to what might charitably described as a muted international response, Azerbaijan, Turkey’s closest ally in the region, achieved its long-cherished goal of ridding the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave of its ancient Christian community after a 9-month blockade that deprived its 120,000 residents of food, fuel, and medical supplies.

In the aftermath of the Second World War, Raphael Lemkin, a law professor and refugee from Nazi-occupied Europe, through a tremendous force of will, conceived, wrote, and lobbied the United Nations to adopt the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Lemkin, who invented the term genocide, defined it as “a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.”

What happened to the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh is undoubtedly then a case of genocide by the longtime Islamist dictator of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev. And while pushed from the minds of policymakers in Washington thanks to recent events in Gaza, last week GOP hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy was one of the few candidates running for president to acknowledge that what happened in Nagorno-Karabakh is “probably the most under-appreciated atrocity in the world.”

And he’s not wrong: the Biden administration, distracted by its various and sundry overseas projects, including funding and overseeing a war against nuclear-armed Russia in Ukraine and now aiding and abetting the Israeli war on Gaza, met the news with a few strong statements and not much else.

Yet there seems more to come for Armenia—and little interest in the West in doing anything to prevent it.

The next target of Aliyev’s is likely the southern Armenian province of Syunik, which, if taken by force, as seems to be the plan, would create a land corridor (also known as the Zangezur Corridor) that would connect Azerbaijan proper to its western Nakhchivan enclave. Nakhchivan borders Turkey, and thus would create a profitable connection between the two allies.

It isn’t as if Azerbaijan and its powerful Turkish patron are making any secret of their plan to invade and annex sovereign Armenian territory. In December 2022, Aliyev flatly proclaimed that “present-day Armenia is our land.” The months that followed he went on to declare that “we are implementing the Zangezur corridor, whether Armenia likes it or not.” For his part, Aliyev’s patron, the Islamist Erdogan, praised the ethnic cleansing, describing it as “an operation” that was “completed in a short period of time, with utmost sensitivity to the rights of civilians.”

Things are already underway. Riding a wave of oil revenue, Azerbaijan, which has boosted defense spending to $3.1 billion, is steadily and not-so-stealthily advancing across Armenia's eastern border.

In any case, it seems likely they’ll get away with it when the time comes. Why? As Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the first chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, recently explained,

Azerbaijan is an ally with the West against Iran; it provides energy to Europe and it spends millions on sophisticated Israeli weapons. But such exigencies must not get in the way of the world’s responsibility to stop what is happening before its very eyes: the Armenian genocide of 2023.

As if that weren’t enough, Armenia has been cursed with pusillanimous leadership in the form of a Soros-backed politician named Nikol Pashinyan. Pashinyan, who has served as prime minister since 2018, has what might be described as an almost “Anti-Midas” touch. In the space of five years he has managed to alienate his country’s principal great power supporter, Russia, all the while signaling weakness towards Armenia’s revanchist neighbors, resulting in the loss of Nagorno-Karabakh and very likely, more to come. Dr. Pietro Sharakrian, a postdoctoral fellow at the Higher School of Economics in St. Petersburg, put it starkly: “Pashinyan’s premiership has been a disaster for the Armenian people.”

There exists, more worryingly still, the possibility of a wider regional war should Azerbaijan roll into Syunik. For one, Iran has expressed opposition to such a move and if Russia wraps up its war in Ukraine, the possibility exists that they will be freed up to step in as well. So one shouldn’t rule out a collision involving the major players in the region: Russia, Iran and Turkey.

Sadly, the cruel vicissitudes of history and politics are not yet finished with Armenia.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
James W. Carden served as advisor on U.S.-Russian affairs at the State Department during the Obama administration.

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-coming-war-in-the-caucasus/

[Yervant1]

Nov 16 2023

Turkey accused of double standard as Armenian journalist's killer walks free

Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant Dink's murderer walked free in Turkey Wednesday while the government's critics pointed aghast to political prisoners held years beyond the court's authority to keep them.

Amberin Zaman

This is an excerpt from Turkey Briefing, Al-Monitor's weekly newsletter covering the big stories of the week in Turkey. To get Turkey Briefing in your inbox, sign up here.

The assassin of prominent Armenian news editor Hrant Dink was freed late Wednesday for “good conduct” in what critics charge is a further example of the politicization of Turkey’s judiciary under the country’s authoritarian president.

Ogun Samast was released on parole under the terms of an amnesty law passed in July (one that excludes terrorism cases) after spending 16 years and 10 months for the 2007 murder of Dink outside the office of his newspaper, Agos, in Istanbul.

Ozgur Ozel, the newly elected leader of the main opposition Republican People’s Party, blasted the move, saying Samast was “supposed to stay for life.” “We have no words. Any who talks about justice after this is truly heartless,” Ozel noted on X.

“This night is a very bad night. The worst night in recent years,” lamented Alin Ozinian, an Armenian-Turkish journalist. Dink had told Ozinian in an interview, the last prior to his death, “The deep state has put a target on me.”

Samast, who was 17 years old at the time of the murder, was widely believed to be acting in concert with rogue ultranationalists and their allies in the security forces. They viewed Dink as a threat because of his efforts to draw attention to the genocide of more than one million Armenians by the Ottomans in 1915, a taboo topic.

His murder struck a chord and more than 100,000 people, many of whom had not previously heard of Dink, marched at his funeral bearing placards that read “We are all Armenians.”

In truth, Samast was expected to be released earlier — in 2020 — and serve his remaining 1.5 years on parole. However, his discharge was postponed after he was given a separate five-year long sentence for striking a prison warden. The actual miscarriage of justice, legal experts say, stems from the fact that Samast was not prosecuted for Dink’s murder as part of an organized terror network and was sentenced instead for voluntary manslaughter and illegal possession of a weapon.

Erdal Dogan, one of several lawyers who represented the Dink family in the case, commented on the matter to Al-Monitor. “The Turkish justice system that penalizes even the slightest criticism of the government as ‘membership of a terrorist organization’ or ‘terrorist propaganda’ chose to treat the political murder of Hrant Dink that was planned by tens of people, including those serving in state institutions, as an ordinary crime,” he said.

Turkey’s justice system has been repeatedly condemned by international legal bodies, notably the European Court of Human Rights, whose rulings Ankara has considered binding since 1990. Yet in recent years Turkey has repeatedly flouted them, most notably with respect to the court’s demands that Turkish philanthropist Osman Kavala and Kurdish politician Selahattin Demirtas be immediately freed.

Kavala, a dogged proponent of Turkish-Armenian reconciliation, has been in jail since 2017, serving the most severe type of life sentence under Turkish law, on flimsily evidenced charges that he sought to overthrow the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as an alleged instigator of the mass Gezi protests that shook Turkey in 2013.

Demirtas has been convicted on a raft of similarly specious terror charges, with prosecutors demanding life in a case linked to the Kobani riots that erupted in 2014 in the mainly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir over the government’s perceived support for the Islamic State.

In a further twist, Turkey’s Court of Cassation filed a criminal complaint against the Constitutional Court, the highest court in the land, for having ruled in favor of freeing Can Atalay, a human rights activist jailed in the Gezi case, after he was elected to parliament from a left-wing opposition party in the May elections. Under Turkish law, members of parliament are immune to prosecution and Atalay’s continued detention is deemed unlawful under Article 14 of the Turkish constitution.

Erdogan waded into the debate, calling the Constitutional Court’s ruling “a mistake."

In a September interview with PBS’ “Newshour,” Erdogan called Kavala the “financier” of the Gezi protests and Demirtas “a terrorist who caused the death of more than 200 people.” He said that the original ruling was rightfully upheld. When anchor Amna Nawaz reminded him that the European Court of Human Rights disagreed with his assessment, Erdogan erupted. “You're not going to interrupt me. And respect me. And you are going to respect the judgment of the judiciary as well?” Erdogan fumed. Kavala and Demirtas deny all the charges.

'Dark corridors'

Coming only days before a conference on minority rights in Turkey to be hosted by the Hrant Dink Foundation on Nov. 17, Samast’s release has touched a raw nerve among Armenians worldwide.

Khatchig Mouradian is a professor at Columbia University in New York who was written extensively on the Armenian genocide. He told Al-Monitor, “Sunlight, they say, is the best disinfectant. When Ogun Samast walks free and Osman Kavala remains in prison in two cases that have for years been under global spotlight, one can’t even begin to imagine what happens in the darker corridors of Turkey’s justice system.”

Mouradian contended that Samast’s release is further proof of Ankara’s cavalier approach to purported normalization with neighboring Armenia, with which it has yet to establish diplomatic relations or open its land borders.

In 2020, Turkey played a pivotal role in helping Azerbaijan wrest back territories occupied by Armenia in a previous war and sat on its hands in September as Azerbaijan effectively expelled in less than two weeks nearly the entire Armenian population — more than 100,000 people — of the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, which was until then majority Armenian but formally part of Azerbaijan.

“Over the past three years, Ankara has not displayed a shred of concern for how its words and deeds may impact normalization. Why should it care now? It believes Yerevan has no choice but to stay the course,” Mouradian said.

The case of Gultan Kisanak, the former co-mayor of Diyarbakir who was ousted by the government and jailed in 2016 for her alleged role in the Kobani riots, among other supposed crimes, is one such travesty. She remains behind bars even though under Turkey’s penal code defendants who have not been convicted can only be held for a maximum of seven years. “This is, in essence, an automatic violation of my right to a fair trial. You are aware of this,” she told the presiding judge in a Nov. 12 hearing.

Borrow books or else

Such violations abound but are rarely noticed as most victims are not in the public eye. Take Mustafa Okcul, who was jailed and sentenced to death in 1993 for membership in the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) at the height of the rebels’ insurgency. His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 1999 when Turkey scrapped the death penalty in line with its now moribund efforts to join the European Union. Okcul was due to be freed on good conduct six months ago. However, prosecutors deemed that he had not “borrowed enough books from the prison library” and was therefore not fit to “integrate with society.”

Bunyamin Seker, president of the Free Lawyers’ Association, an advocacy group based in Diyarbakir, is dealing with Okcul’s case along with a host of similar ones. He said that the prison set a cap on the number of books inmates are allowed to borrow and that Okcul’s family would send him books on a regular basis. “The claims are laughable,” Seker noted. “Mustafa had fulfilled all the criteria for good conduct. He had not engaged in any violence when he was arrested.”

From his private meetings with Turkish officials, Seker said he had concluded that “the real reason” Okcul was not being freed was because he refused to denounce the PKK and express contrition. Another of his clients, a university student who was jailed for six years for taking part in an anti-government demonstration, saw her release put off by a year. Authorities cited Emine Erol’s refusal to meet with a prison psychiatrist for the delay. She was finally released two weeks ago.

“The system is riddled with double standards,” Seker told Al-Monitor. “Some are more equal than others before the law.”

https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2023/11/turkey-accused-double-standard-armenian-journalists-killer-walks-free

[Yervant1]

1- NYC Mayor Attended 80 Events

In 8 Years Related to Turkey

By Harut Sassounian

Publisher, The California Courier

www.TheCaliforniaCourier.com

 

Three weeks ago, when I first wrote about FBI’s investigation of New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ campaign links to Turkey, I did not realize that this will be the opening of Pandora’s box.

Last week, Adams created a defense fund to raise money to pay the legal expenses for the expanding federal probe into his 2021 election campaign. The law permits Adams to receive donations up to $5,000. However, he must disclose the names and addresses of all donors.

According to the New York Post, “Federal authorities are investigating whether the Turkish government or Turkish citizens illegally funneled donations to Adams’ campaign by using ‘straw donors’—a scheme where contributors listed in official records aren’t the actual source of funding—and whether Adams did quid-pro-quo favors.”

Multiple sources told the New York Post: “the Adams administration staffer who was found to have allegedly ‘acted improperly’ amid the federal corruption probe into his campaign fundraising worked in the city’s Office for International Affairs before abruptly being placed on leave.” The Mayor’s office confirmed the information.

That person is Rana Abbasova who was the Mayor’s Director of Protocol. Originally from Azerbaijan, she performed advanced planning and logistics for mayoral events and traveled with him. Her annual salary is $80,651. The Post was told that she lied to federal investigators.

Abbasova previously served as community coordinator and advisor to Adams when he was Brooklyn borough President. Her biography states that: “She was responsible for international relations and maintaining relationships between the Borough President and stakeholders, including the Middle East and Central Asian countries, Muslim and Russian-speaking communities, and Non-profit organizations. She also worked with Embassies and Consulates to build relationships between countries and the Office of the Brooklyn Borough President to help overcome language barriers and cultural differences. She also organized Turkic Heritage events and assisted with Sister Cities agreements. Abbasova was also an administrative assistant for Adams’ One Brooklyn Fund, Inc. when he was still borough President.”

The City news website reported that in April 2017, Abbasova arranged a meeting between borough President Adams and the Turken Foundation, founded by Pres. Erdogan’s son, Bilal. Three of Turken’s board members contributed a total of $6,000 to the Mayor’s campaign. His schedule shows that he attended four Turken events. Turken is registered as a foreign agent with the Department of Justice.

Abbasova arranged for Adams at least three “meetings and events related to Turkey when he was borough president, a review of his schedule shows. Among them was a 2015 grand opening celebration for a Turkish restaurant in Brooklyn, which she marked as ‘important.’”

POLITICO reported that as Brooklyn borough President, Adams “attended nearly 80 events over eight years celebrating Turkey—including a flag-raising in 2015, a charity ball in 2018 and a Zoom meeting with the Turkish consul in 2020.”

After reviewing thousands of Adams’ public schedules and many social media posts, POLITICO revealed his “unusually strong relationship with Turkey, which has drawn scrutiny from federal investigators.” In 2019, as Adams “was embarking on a run for New York City mayor, he joined Martha Stewart at a gala celebrating Turkish Airlines -- a company now caught up in an ongoing FBI probe into Adams’ campaign finances. At the event, Adams was photographed holding hands with two company officials over a sheet cake; after winning the mayor’s race, he appointed one of those officials -- Cenk Ocal -- to his transition team.” The CNN reported that on Nov. 2, the home of a Turkish Airlines executive was among the locations raided by the FBI.

POLITICO’s analysis of Adams’ Brooklyn Borough schedules turned up three mentions of the Turkish airlines: Two planned banquets celebrating the carrier in 2019 and 2020, and a cryptic entry on Oct. 2, 2015 that simply read: “Reschedule 4 p.m. Turkish airline. Rana [Abbasova] my gifts.”

Daniel Nigro, then New York City Fire Commissioner, was pressured by Adams to permit, despite safety concerns, the opening of a high-rise building that housed the Turkish consulate, just in time for the arrival of Pres. Erdogan. Nigro received a grand jury subpoena and spoke to FBI agents.

After becoming Mayor last year, Adams made virtual remarks at a real estate conference in Istanbul, which was attended by two top city officials. However, the Mayor’s participation was left out of his daily public schedule and not reported.

In addition to the home of the fundraiser for the Mayor’s campaign, the FBI raided or conducted interviews at a dozen locations as part of its investigations of campaign contributions from Turkish sources, CNN reported.

In 2022, “Adams took two trips to Turkey—one in August funded by multiple entities including the Turkish consulate, according to a financial disclosure obtained by POLITICO. Local news outlet THE CITY recently reported Turkish Airlines also chipped in for that trip, but that was omitted from the required annual disclosure. Four months later, the financial disclosure shows, an organization called the Association of Young Tourism Leaders funded another trip to Turkey for Adams. The junkets were among a half-dozen trips the mayor has said he made to the country, including a 2017 sojourn with his son, Jordan,” according to POLITICO.

While visiting Turkey as Brooklyn Borough President, Adams said that he was interested in buying a house in Istanbul, according to the Turkish Sabah newspaper. Adams also said that he is so satisfied with Turkish Airlines that he not only uses that carrier to fly to Turkey, but also to other parts of the world, like India.

[Yervant1]

They want Armenia isolated, they don't like when Armenia gets support! Cunning wolves!

Iran Front Post

Nov 21 2023

Erdogan urges Armenia to work with Turkey, Azerbaijan, warns on relying on west

ByIFP Media Wire

November 21, 2023

Armenia should work with Turkey and Azerbaijan to build peace instead of looking to the West for weapons and training, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said, in thinly veiled criticism of the US and France.

Some Western powers have yet to realize that the Karabakh War has changed the Caucasus and the entire region, Erdogan said in a press conference on Monday after a lengthy cabinet meeting in Ankara. He was referring to last month’s epilogue to the 2020 conflict, which saw Azerbaijan reclaim the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, followed by the exodus of local ethnic Armenians.

“Those who incited Armenia for years and collected profit from the pain, troubles and conflicts of all the people living in this region actually inflicted the greatest damage on the Armenians,” Erdogan stated. While he did not name any names, the most prominent supporters of Yerevan in the West have been Paris and Washington.

“They abused Armenians, used them, and condemned them to insecurity by fueling unrealistic dreams. Armenia now needs to see and accept this fact,” Erdogan added.

“It is better for the Armenian people and rulers to seek security in peace and cooperation with their neighbors, not thousands of kilometers away.”

“No weapons and ammunition sent by Western countries can replace the peace that a permanent peace environment will provide,” Erdogan continued, urging Armenia to “accept the hand of peace extended by our Azerbaijani brothers.”

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has sought to forge closer ties with NATO in the aftermath of the Karabakh conflict, whose outcome he tried to blame on treaty ally Russia. Both Moscow and Yerevan are members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO).

Earlier this month, Armenian deputy defense minister and chief of the general staff, Lieutenant-General Edvard Asryan, visited the US European Command HQ in Stuttgart, Germany. The visit was a “milestone” as the US and Armenia sought to “deliberately and incrementally develop our defense relationship,” EUCOM said in a statement afterward.

Yerevan has also reached out to Paris, making a deal last month to purchase unspecified new weapons systems from France. This has prompted Azerbaijan’s president Ilham Aliyev to declare that France would be responsible for any new conflict in the region. Aliyev also pulled out of the EU-hosted peace summit in Grenada in early October, accusing the bloc of hostility towards Baku.

Moscow has protested Armenia’s “hostile” actions and argued that there was nothing it could do to intervene in Nagorno Karabakh, not after Pashinyan himself explicitly and repeatedly recognized Azeri sovereignty over the disputed region.

https://ifpnews.com/erdogan-armenia-work-turkey-azerbaijan-relying-west/

 

[Yervant1]

 

Greek Reporter

Nov 20 2023

 

US Report Highlights Threats to Religious Sites in Turkey

ByTasos Kokkinidis

November 20, 2023

A US report published last week criticizes Turkey for not doing enough to prevent threats to non-Muslim religious sites in the country.

The report of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) maintains that while the number and severity of violent attacks targeting religious sites—such as bombings and other terrorist methods—have decreased over the last decade, there has not been a similar decline in incidents of vandalism and the destruction of religious properties.

Titled “Examination of Threats to Religious Sites in Turkey,” the study demonstrates denominational differences in the threats and attacks faced by various religious communities, including the Greek Orthodox, in Turkey and evaluates the geographic variation in attitudes towards these communities and their religious sites.

Although efforts by the Turkish government and local authorities to restore select religious heritage sites represent an important positive step, such projects remain limited, it is reported.

It notes that “the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne also provided protection and freedom of worship for the remaining non-Muslim communities” but that this protection and freedom of worship has often been sharply curtailed, not infrequently through action against sacred Christian sites.

 

Attacks against Greek Orthodox in Turkey

The report illustrates that the highest number of attacks on Greek Orthodox and other Orthodox churches occurred in the Marmara region of Istanbul, which is associated with the largest concentration of non-Muslim populations.

In addition, the report states that the seizure of property can be used as a form of retaliation, citing as an example the seizure of the Prince’s Greek Orthodox orphanage.

The particular orphanage was confiscated in 1964 by Turkish authorities, who did not perform the necessary maintenance, thus allowing the building to suffer the wear and tear of time.

As noted, by the time the Ecumenical Patriarchate managed to regain ownership of the building through an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, “after 60 years of abandonment, the building had sustained significant damage and fallen into disrepair.”

“The burden is on the Greek Orthodox community to repair and preserve the site at considerable financial cost,” the report added.

Overall, despite the decrease in bombings and terrorist attacks in the last decade, incidents of vandalism, destruction of religious property through arson, treasure hunting, and the lack of prosecution of such incidents have increasingly affected Greek Orthodox and other Orthodox communities in Turkey, the report notes.

USCIRF will host a virtual event to discuss the findings of the report on Tuesday, November 28, 2023.

https://greekreporter.com/2023/11/20/threats-religious-sites-turkey/

[Yervant1]

AEI - American Enterprise Institute

Dec 8 2023

Erdogan Can’t Complain About Foreign Operations on Turkish Soil

By Michael Rubin

AEIdeas

December 08, 2023

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan reacted with outrage at reports Israel might target Hamas leaders on Turkish soil. On November 3, Israeli public broadcaster Kan aired recordings in which Ronen Bar, the head of Israel’s external security agency Shin Bet said, “The cabinet set a goal for us, to take out Hamas. And we are determined to do it, this is our Munich,” a reference to Israel’s assassination campaign against the terrorists involved in the 1972 massacre of Israeli Olympians.

Erdogan warned of “consequences [that] can be extremely serious.” should Israel conduct any operation on Turkish soil. In another recent speeches, the Turkish leader demanded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu face an international tribunal in The Hague for supposed war crimes. “Beyond being a war criminal, Netanyahu, who is the butcher of Gaza right now, will be tried as the butcher of Gaza, just as [serbian nationalist Slobodan] Milosevic was tried,” Erdogan declared.

On both counts, Erdogan secures the title as the world’s greatest hypocrite.

Under Erdogan’s direction and through the efforts of former intelligence chief (and current Foreign Minister) Hakan Fidan, Turkey dispatched assassins and kidnap squads across the globe. He murdered many Kurds and sought to kill other dissidents. Turkey’s intelligence service even spied upon Kurds and Turkish dissidents in the United States. Turkish agents not only kidnapped dissidents in Kenya, Kosovo, and Kyrgyzstan among many other countries, but also openly bragged about their operations, distributing photographs and videos of the prisoners in handcuffs or chains, or forcing the dissidents to submit to perp walks.

After Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Erdogan has been among Hamas’ greatest cheerleaders and supporters. He has given Hamas leaders Turkish passports to ease travel, worked to undermine international pressure to force them to foreswear terrorism and recognize Israel, and even supplied weapons, explosives, and training. By any objective standard, under Erdogan Turkey has become a state sponsor of terrorism.

When Erdogan refuses to condemn Hamas’ mass rape and mutilation of Jewish women and girls, its torture of Israeli children, or its slaughter of babies, it is not only because Erdogan lionizes Hamas, but also because Turkish forces have acted similarly against Armenians, Greeks, and Kurds.

Put aside the Armenian Genocide from a century ago, or the ethnic cleansing of Cyprus that nears its 50th anniversary. Under Erdogan, Turks have killed far more Kurds than have Israelis killed Palestinians. Whereas Israel targets terrorists and gives civilians fair warning to evacuate, Turkish drones regularly target civilians, especially those who come from ethnic or religious minorities. And while Israel has no desire to govern Gaza, colonialism and racism drive Turkey’s actions against the Kurds. There is simply no other way to explain Turkey’s ethnic cleansing of Afrin, for example, or Turkey’s establishment of Turkish post offices and other elements of the Turkish state into the Turkish-occupied territories.

Erdogan’s bluster may play well among rejectionist Arab states and in Iran, but the West should not be cowed. Rather, the proper response from Washington and Brussels would be to tell Erdogan that he has now acknowledged the criminality of his own policies. If anyone spends his final years in The Hague, it should be Erdogan himself.

https://www.aei.org/foreign-and-defense-policy/erdogan-cant-complain-about-foreign-operations-on-turkish-soil/

[Yervant1]

Dec 21 2023

Cologne bows to Turkish racists, removes Armenian Genocide monument

The Armenian Genocide monument in Cologne was removed under pressure from racist organisations affiliated with the Turkish state.

Having been the target of constant attacks for years, the Armenian Genocide monument in Cologne, Germany, was finally removed. While a small number of Armenians live in Cologne, the city has turned into the headquarters of the National Vision organisation affiliated to the Turkish state.

French journalist Guillaume Perrier wrote on his X account: "The city of Cologne is finally dismantling a monument commemorating the Armenian genocide. Cologne has a small Armenian community, but above all a large Turkish community".

Journalist Perrier added: "This is above all the result of pressure from the Turkish government and concessions from the German right (the CDU used, encouraged and supported the Grey Wolves and Milli Görüs against the influence of the left on Turkish immigrants)."

French senator Valerie Boyer wrote on her X account that "Cologne has bowed to the Turkish National Visionists who impose the denial of the 1915 Armenian genocide". Boyer said, "This is a direct consequence of Turkish immigration to Germany... It is a harbinger of bitter days in Europe".

The monument in Cologne symbolising the Armenian genocide, which Turkey does not recognise, has been erected and dismantled several times over the years following protests by Turkish nationalists.

The city had the statue removed, sometimes on the grounds of the construction of a cycle path and sometimes out of fear of "social unrest".

After a march in late October by Turkish nationalists, including supporters of the racist, far-right “Ülkü Ocakları” and DITIB associations, the city's final decision was "the monument must be removed".

https://anfenglish.com/news/cologne-bows-to-turkish-racists-removes-armenian-genocide-monument-70888

[Yervant1]

Hypocrisy comes to mind, talk about Armenian Genocide when it helps you. Otherwise what genocide? Your governments weapons killed countless Armenians, do you remember that?

The Times of Israel

Jan 12 2024

‘You’re the real genocide perpetrators,’ Katz tells Erdogan, referencing Armenian genocide, which Israel never recognized

Foreign Minister Israel Katz hits back at Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who boasted earlier today of having submitted materials to help boost South Africa’s International Court of Justice case accusing Israel of genocide.

“The president of Turkey, the country that carried out the Armenian genocide and thought the world would shut up about it, is ‘proud’ today that he handed over to The Hague tribunal materials that accuse Israel of genocide,” Katz tweets.

“We heard you. We have not forgotten the Armenian holocaust and [Turkey’s] massacres of the Kurds. You are the real genocide perpetrators. We are defending ourselves from your barbarian friends,” he adds.

Israel for decades has bucked Armenian pleas for Jerusalem to formally recognize the genocide perpetrated during the Ottoman Empire, not wanting to sour its ties with Turkey and Azerbaijan, which deny one took place.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/youre-the-real-genocide-perpetrators-katz-tells-erdogan-referencing-armenian-genocide-which-israel-never-recognized/

 

[Yervant1]

Reuters

Jan 25 2024

Exclusive: Biden urges US Congress to approve F-16 sale to Turkey 'without delay'

By Humeyra Pamuk, Patricia Zengerle and Mike Stone

WASHINGTON, Jan 24 (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden sent a letter to leaders of key Capitol Hill committees on Wednesday informing them of his intention to begin the formal notification process for the sale of Lockheed Martin (LMT.N), opens new tab F-16 aircraft to Turkey once Ankara completes Sweden’s NATO accession process.

In the letter to the top Republican and Democratic members of the Senate Foreign Relations and House of Representatives Foreign Affairs committees, Biden urged Congress to approve the sale "without delay," a U.S. official said.

Earlier on Wednesday the White House sent a letter to members of Congress urging approval of the $20 billion sale of F-16 aircraft and modernization kits to Turkey, four sources familiar with the letter told Reuters.

Turkey's parliament ratified Sweden's NATO membership bid on Tuesday, clearing a major hurdle to expanding the Western military alliance after 20 months of delay. The sources said the letter was sent on Wednesday, and that the Biden administration has not yet formally notified Congress of plans for the sale.

Turkey's delay in approving the ratification had been a major obstacle to winning congressional approval for the fighter jet deal. Lawmakers had said they were awaiting Turkey's approval of Sweden's NATO membership- including President Tayyip Erdogan's signature - before deciding whether to approve the sale.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

The U.S. State Department also urged Ankara on Wednesday to formally finalize Sweden's NATO ratification. To do that, Erdogan needs to sign the legislation, which then would be published in Turkey's Official Gazette. The instrument of accession for Sweden also needs to be sent to Washington.

The State Department declined to provide an exact timeline on the formal notification process for the F-16 sale.

"President Biden, Secretary Blinken have been very clear of our support for modernizing Turkey's F-16 fleet, which we view as a key investment in NATO interoperability. But beyond that ... I'm just not going to confirm or get ahead of proposed defense sales or transfers until they are formally notified to Congress," State Department Deputy Spokesperson Vedant Patel told a news briefing, referring to Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

Turkey in October 2021 asked to purchase $20 billion of Lockheed Martin F-16 fighters and nearly 80 modernization kits for its existing warplanes.

Leaders of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations and House Foreign Affairs committees review every major foreign arms sale. They regularly ask questions or raise concerns over human rights or diplomatic issues that can delay or stop such deals.Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, cast some doubt on a speedy approval, saying lawmakers need assurances from the Biden administration and Turkey first.

“For much of the time President Erdogan has been in office, Turkey has been an unfaithful NATO ally — so this is welcome news," Van Hollen said.

"That said, I still have questions about Erdogan’s ongoing attacks against our Syrian Kurdish allies, his aggressive actions in the Eastern Mediterranean, and the role he played in supporting Azerbaijan’s military assaults against Nagorno-Karabakh," Van Hollen told Reuters.

Sweden and Finland applied to enter NATO after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. While Finnish membership was sealed last year, Sweden's bid had been held up by Turkey and Hungary.

All NATO members need to approve applications from countries seeking to join the alliance. When Sweden and Finland asked to join, Turkey raised objections over what it said was the two countries' protection of groups it deems terrorists.

Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk, Patricia Zengerle and Mike Stone; Editing by Leslie Adler, Ros Russell and Jonathan Oatis

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/biden-administration-urges-us-congress-approve-f-16-sale-turkey-sources-2024-01-24/

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

US advances fighter jet sale to Turkey, Greece; Congress likely to approve – Reuters

12:13, 27 January 2024

YEREVAN, JANUARY 27, ARMENPRESS. U.S. President Joe Biden's administration on Friday formally informed Congress of its intention to proceed with the $23 billion sale of F-16 fighter jets to Turkey, Reuters reports.

The State Department sent the notification to advance the sale of 40 Lockheed Martin F-16s and nearly 80 modernization kits to Turkey, a day after Ankara fully completed ratification of the NATO membership of Sweden, a move that became directly linked to the jet sales.

The Biden administration simultaneously advanced the sale of 20 Lockheed F-35 stealth fighter jets to fellow NATO ally Greece, an $8.6-billion deal that Washington advanced as it tries to strike a balance between two alliance members with a history of tense relations.

Turkey first made the request for the jets in October 2021, but Ankara's delay in approving the ratification of Sweden's NATO bid had been a major obstacle to winning congressional approval for the sale, according to Reuters.

Following 20 months of delay, the Turkish parliament earlier this week ratified Sweden's NATO bid, and subsequently U.S. President Joe Biden wrote a letter to key congressional committee leaders, urging them to approve the F-16 sale "without delay."

The State Department's Friday night notification came only a day after Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan gave his final sign-off on Sweden's ratification, and hours after the instrument of accession was delivered to Washington.

"My approval of Turkey’s request to purchase F-16 aircrafts has been contingent on Turkish approval of Sweden’s NATO membership. But make no mistake: This was not a decision I came to lightly," said Democratic Senator Ben Cardin, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, one of four key committees that needs to approve arms transfers.

Turkey needs to urgently improve its human rights record, cooperate better on holding Russia accountable for its invasion in Ukraine and help lower the temperature in the Middle East, Cardin listed.

"My concerns have been strongly and consistently conveyed to the Biden administration as part of our ongoing engagement, and I am encouraged by the productive direction of their discussions with Turkish officials to address these issues," he said.

Leaders of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House of Representatives Foreign Affairs committees review every major foreign arms sale. They regularly ask questions or raise concerns over human rights or diplomatic issues that can delay or stop such deals.

Following the transfer of the formal notification by the State Department, the Congress has 15 days to object to the sale, after which it is considered final.

U.S. officials do not expect the Congress to block either sale, despite criticism of Turkey by some members.

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1128993.html?fbclid=IwAR2tlSd6__1kt7Wqbr2BUNSNuMRbUh4L0osejsEIsCDZIjHETC2wESJmnso

[Yervant1]

This Canadian government as usual, is on both sides of the fence on everything. Trying to please everybody, pleasing no one!

Al-Arabiya, UAE

Jan 30 2024

Canada revokes ban on military exports to Turkey, Armenian community condemns move

AFP - Canada announced Monday it would no longer bar certain arms exports to Turkey, a move that comes approximately a week after Ankara ratified Sweden’s NATO membership.

Permits for military items and certain types of weapons destined for Turkey “will now be reviewed on a case-by-case basis,” the Canadian government said in a notice to exporters.

For all the latest headlines follow our Google News channel online or via the app.

It declared that the denial policy on exports was “no longer in place.”

Canada officially blocked military arms exports to Turkey in April 2021 after a probe found Canadian drone technology exported to Turkey had been used by Azerbaijan in clashes with Armenia.

The export ban affected some 30 permits, and applied to a wide variety of military goods and technologies including components for the production of aircraft, software and technical data for flight simulators, satellite equipment and firearm components.

Canada will now require that Turkish importers provide assurances about the weapons’ use as well as a government statement “clearly indicating whether the items will be re-exported or transferred to a non-NATO country.”

Canada additionally “has broad authority to suspend or cancel permits,” the notice said.

The move comes less than a week after Turkey’s parliament ratified Sweden’s membership in the NATO defense alliance, following initial objections and more than a year of delays.

After Ankara’s ratification, the US government approved a $23 billion deal to sell F-16 warplanes to Turkey.

However, the Armenian National Committee of Canada on Monday condemned the move in a statement.

“This decision has raised alarming concerns within the Armenian-Canadian community, as it compromises Canada’s commitment to human rights, international security, and justice,” it said.

https://english.alarabiya.net/News/middle-east/2024/01/30/Canada-revokes-ban-on-military-exports-to-Turkey-Armenian-community-condemns-move

 

Edited January 31 by Yervant1

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

Turkey's ambitions exceed its actual capabilities: Turkologist comments on Ankara's foreign policy

08:55, 30 January 2024

YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Turkologist Ruben Safrastyan, commenting on Turkey's foreign policy, believes that the country's ambitions exceed its actual capabilities. In an interview with "Armenpress," the turkologist noted that Ankara, however, is taking steps to align its ambitions with real opportunities.

According to him, while Turkey remains a middle power, it aspires to position itself as one of the most powerful states in the world.

"By giving the green light to Sweden on NATO membership, Turkey essentially struck a deal with the US and was able to get what it had been pursuing for about three years. The approval of Sweden's membership served as a pretext in that deal, but it fundamentally concerned the ratification of the supply of forty American F-16 fighter jets.

The Turkish army already has about eighty such fighters, and the American side should also modify them. It is important for the US that Turkey continues to be its faithful ally in the Middle East because its geographical position and the presence of a combat-ready army are of great importance from the point of view of implementing NATO's plans in that region," said the expert.

According to Safrastyan, Turkey has also achieved its goals with Sweden, as official Stockholm has started to impose stricter conditions and restrictions on public speeches by Kurdish exile figures in Sweden, thereby abandoning its policy of allowing people the opportunity to freely express themselves and carry out actions.

"Turkey's decision was not a surprise for Russia, which is in conflict with the North Atlantic Alliance. From the beginning, it was clear to everyone, including Moscow, that Ankara would sooner or later take that step, and, by and large, could not prevent new members from joining the alliance. Turkey was just trying to address its problems during that entire period. It is no coincidence that the official reaction of the Russian side was quite calm," said Safrastyan.

Referring to the question of whether the Turkish side's political maneuvers in the South Caucasus are not excluded, considering the frequent mention of the so-called "Zangezur Corridor," which is opposed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, the turkologist noted that although Ebrahim Raisi, during his visit to Turkey, spoke against the inadmissibility of red lines and border changes in the region, official Ankara will continue to pursue its policy. The goal is for Turkey and Azerbaijan, by violating the territorial integrity of Armenia, to establish a direct land connection between each other.

"Turkey's pressure on this matter will persist, and Iran is unlikely to engage in confrontation or a military clash with Turkey at this stage, as it seeks to avoid conflicts and potential attacks outside its territory. Rather, one can anticipate adventurous actions from Azerbaijan, given its alliance with Turkey and shared interests. The 'Zangezur Corridor' is primarily strategically vital for Turkey because it establishes a connection to the Turkish-speaking countries of Central Asia, significantly increasing its political influence all over the world.

The annual GDP of Turkish-speaking countries amounts to more than one trillion dollars, which is equally significant. On the other hand, Turkey strives to play a significant role in the London-Beijing logistics axis, connecting a substantial part of the world economy in the future," Safrastyan explained.

Nevertheless, according to him, there is a simple reality that should not be overlooked. As much as Turkey is trying to participate in the implementation of logistics mega-projects, it has not been able to complete the construction of the 200 km section of the railway that should connect Kars with Azerbaijan through Nakhichevan.

"They have been talking about it for years, but it is not being built. Turkey is now attempting to address the issue with the assistance of Azerbaijan, with which it signed an agreement for joint financing last year, actually involving the funds generated from the sale of oil and gas by Azerbaijan. According to Safrastyan, the winners of the tenders are already known, and preparations will commence soon.

Turkey sometimes harbors rather great ambitions, but sometimes they do not have enough resources for their implementation; in other words, Turkey's ambitions exceed its actual capabilities," Ruben Safrastyan concluded.

Manvel Margaryan

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1129074.html?fbclid=IwAR3UJtHQoZUrhM8V0UpFzd3PNHnuPUDpEqkYKXtopkEZ7KGDI0YjvuCUE78

[Yervant1]

Jan 31 2024

Turkey warns Armenia to accept ‘hand of peace’

31 January 2024

ByArshaluys BarseghyanandIsmi Aghayev

Turkey has warned Armenia that it would suffer ‘serious damages’ if it failed to secure a peace treaty with Azerbaijan.

The comments came from the chair of the Turkish Parliament’s Defence Committee, Hulusi Akar, during a visit to Baku on Monday. ‘[Armenia] should accept the hand of peace extended by Azerbaijan, otherwise it will suffer serious damages just like in the 2020 war’, he said. Akar previously served as minister of defence and the chief of staff of the Turkish armed forces.

In response, Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanyan told Armenian Public TV that Turkey could play a more constructive role by implementing an agreement to open the land border between the two countries for citizens of third countries and diplomatic passport holders.

The comments came as tension between Armenia and Azerbaijan continue to ratchet, with the peace process that began following the end of the 2020 Second Nagorno-Karabakh war dragging on.

On Saturday, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov told local journalists that Azerbaijan had received Armenia’s latest peace proposals at the beginning of January, and was still preparing a response.

On Sunday, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan suggested the countries sign a non-aggression pact ‘if it turns out that signing a peace treaty will take longer than expected’.

He also repeated an offer to create a mutual arms control mechanism, in response to criticism from Azerbaijan of Armenia purchasing weaponry from France and India.

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During his visit to Baku, Akar repeated such criticisms, claiming that certain countries were trying to equip Armenia as a ‘proxy state’.

On 29 January, Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesperson Aykhan Hajizade dismissed Pashinyan’s latest proposals as a distraction.

‘It is political manipulation to claim that Armenia takes a serious approach to the peace process’, he said, ‘taking into account that his country is pursuing a policy of serious militarisation, several billion-dollar arms supply contracts have been signed in recent years, and it has developed its military industry’.

‘Azerbaijan, in its turn, will continue its peace and construction efforts and expects Armenia to take adequate steps, not only in words but also in deeds’, he said.

‘Not a humanitarian move’

As peace talks have appeared to have stalled, diplomatic spats between the two countries have continued to appear.

On 25 January, Armenia’s National Security Service (NSS) announced that Armenia would be transferring eight landmine logbooks to Azerbaijan as a confidence-building measure. They said these were discovered as part of their interviews with former military personnel from Nagorno-Karabakh.

The NSS stated that Armenia had transferred around 972 maps containing the locations of landmines throughout 2021 ‘without preconditions’ and that ‘there are simply no better quality maps at Armenia’s disposal’.

Later that day, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry stated Armenia’s intention was ‘not a humanitarian one and this step could not be considered a confidence-building measure’.

They added that the maps they had received from Armenia in the past were only 25% accurate and ‘incomplete’.

‘We have frequently pointed out that the provided maps are ineffective, incomplete, and do not accurately portray the reality on the ground’, read the ministry’s statement.

They called on Yerevan to ‘submit accurate maps’ and to provide information on the ‘fate of nearly 4,000 Azerbaijanis who have disappeared over the past 30 years, as well as the places of mass graves where Azerbaijanis are buried’.

In response, Armenia’s Foreign Ministry accused Azerbaijan of ‘continuing to manipulate the topic’, and ‘turning Armenia’s positive move into an occasion for escalation and negative rhetoric’.

The NSS also said they had previously provided information on Azerbaijanis who remain missing and said they were willing to cooperate on this matter further.

https://oc-media.org/turkey-warns-armenia-to-accept-hand-of-peace/

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

Turkey's annual inflation soars to 64.86 percent in January

19:48, 5 February 2024

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 5, ARMENPRESS. The Turkish economy continues struggling with sky-high inflation. The year-on-year headline inflation rate touched 64.86% in January, up from December's 64.77% and more than analyst estimates of 64.52%. It was also the highest figure since November 2022, reports Euronews.

Month-on-month inflation came in at 6.7%, a large step up from December's 2.93%, as well as slightly above market consensus of 6.49%.

It is noted that, however, core inflation for the month of January, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, clocked in at 70.48%, down from 70.64% in December.

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1129607.html?fbclid=IwAR1b0VxdjVNoB7R0pdNpLpSFS9qW_HuTyF1iC6G4anhKDmThYpXPAUq1bL8

[Yervant1]

Feb 14 2024

Pan-Turkism and Islamism Drive Azerbaijani and Turkish Aggression against Armenians

by Uzay Bulut
Middle East Forum Observer

On February 13, 2024, less than a month after both Turkey and Azerbaijan threatened Armenia with renewed war, Azerbaijan killed four Armenian soldiers in Armenia's Syunik province. It was not an isolated incident. With Turkish backing, Azerbaijan attacked southern Armenia in September 2022 and has since occupied several dozen square miles of Armenian territory. Between 2020 and 2023, Azerbaijan also conducted an ethnic cleansing campaign in Nagorno-Karabakh to drive out the indigenous Armenian Christian population. While both Turkey and Azerbaijan have long cited the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute to explain their hostility to and rejection of Armenia, Azerbaijan's capture of the entire territory has not brought peace. Rather, in the months since, Azerbaijan's probing attacks on Armenia's frontier have continued.

What then motivates Azerbaijan and Turkey's hostility toward and rejection of Armenia?

Their efforts are doomed to fail, however, because they ignore the two ideologies driving the conflict: Pan-Turkism and Islamism.

While National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and Secretary of State Antony Blinken negotiate with their Armenian and Azerbaijani counterparts to win peace between the two former Soviet republics, they focus on supposed grievances: Resolving Armenia's requests for the return of prisoners of war, addressing increasingly fanciful Azerbaijani territorial claims, or encouraging economic and trade integration. Their efforts are doomed to fail, however, because they ignore the two ideologies driving the conflict: Pan-Turkism and Islamism.

Pan-Turkism (or pan-Turanism) promotes the superiority of a supposed Turkish race and seeks to unite Turks from the Balkans across Turkey and Central Asia to portions of China and Siberia. In 2021, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan enthusiastically received a map of "Grand Turan" from coalition partner Devlet Bahçeli, leader of Turkey's National Movement Party (MHP). The Azerbaijani leadership, meanwhile, embraces the same ideology. Heydar Aliyev, president of Azerbaijan from 1993 to 2003, often described the relationship between Turkey and Azerbaijan "as one nation, two states," a mantra his son and successor Ilham also embraces.

For both Erdoğan and Aliyev, Armenia's independence is the main impediment to realization of Greater Turan for a simple reason: Armenia blocks Turkic territorial continuity. This is the main reason why Azerbaijan rejects any recognition of Armenia despite the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute in Azerbaijan's favor. Increasingly, both Aliyev and Azerbaijan's media refer to Armenia as "western Azerbaijan," indicating a rejection of its very legitimacy.

Erdoğan's Islamism imbues pan-Turanism as religious mandate. During Azerbaijan's 2020 war on Armenians, Erdoğan declared, "We support Azerbaijan until victory ... I tell my Azerbaijani brothers: May your ghazwa be blessed." His reference to ghazwa refers to battles in which Muslims engaged non-Muslims to expand Muslim territory. Azerbaijan's systematic destruction of Armenia's religious heritage further demonstrates this aspect, as do Islamic State-like beheadings and mutilations of Armenian prisoners by Azerbaijani soldiers. Often, Aliyev rewards such atrocities, as when he personally awarded the Azerbaijani officer who beheaded a captured Yezidi in 2016. Turkey also transported Syrian and Libyan Islamic State veterans from the Islamic State to supplement Azerbaijani forces during the Nagorno-Karabakh War. What the United States sees as a land and legal dispute, Ankara and Baku see as jihad.

Against this backdrop, it is imperative that neither the United States nor Europe view the death of four Armenian soldiers yesterday on Armenian soil as an accident to overlook as Washington seeks a broader peace deal.

For too long, wishful thinking hampered U.S. policy toward Turkey. Successive administrations and a generation of diplomats saw in Erdoğan what they wished he would be rather than what he was: a populist and Islamist who prioritized his Muslim Brotherhood exegesis and personal wealth above the constitution and the welfare of the Turkish people. Today, the same pattern repeats with Aliyev, who presents himself as a secularist but, behind-the-scenes, pursues an irredentist and Islamist agenda in concert with Erdoğan.

The two countries today act in concert against Armenia. Both blockade Armenia. Neither has diplomatic relations, and both deny its legitimacy and historical legacy as the first Christian country. The Turkish Army continues to train and often command its Azerbaijani counterpart.

Against this backdrop, it is imperative that neither the United States nor Europe view the death of four Armenian soldiers yesterday on Armenian soil as an accident to overlook as Washington seeks a broader peace deal. Rather, they are a sign Erdoğan and Aliyev will never sacrifice their core ideology nor honor any piece of paper in which naïve Western officials demand they affix their signatures.

Uzay Bulut is a Turkish journalist formerly based in Ankara.

https://www.meforum.org/65563/pan-turkism-and-islamism-drive-azerbaijani

[Yervant1]

 

AEI - The American Enterprise Institute

Feb 12 2024

 

Turkey Threatens to Invade Greece and Armenia

By Michael Rubin

Middle East Forum Observer

February 12, 2024

On January 27, 2024, two days after the Biden administration again urged Congress to greenlight F-16 sales to Turkey, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said at a public meeting of his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), “Our struggle did not end with expelling the enemy [Greeks] from our lands and throwing them into the sea from Izmir.” It was a provocative statement given the massacre at Smyrna, today’s Izmir, killed up to 100,000 and, according to scholars, amounted to genocide against Anatolia’s Greek Christians.

On cue, just over a week later, Turkish analysts on CNN Türk discussed the prospects of Turkey launching Tayfuns, Turkey’s first indigenous ballistic missile, at Greece. “If we fire it from Edirne or Izmir, we can hit Athens,” they concluded.

Pride in “throwing Greeks into the sea” is mainstream among Erdoğan’s government. It is also a popular slogan in Turkey. There are Turkish nationalist songs as well as annual public ceremonies that celebrate the massacre of Smyrna’s centuries-old Christian population as “Izmir’s liberation from enemy forces.” To mark the 100^th anniversary of the massacre in 2022, for example, one of Turkey’s biggest pop stars gave a concert in the city center in Izmir, celebrating the slaughter. Hundreds of thousands attended.

The threat to launch missiles at Athens comes against a backdrop of Turkish revanchism. Turkey’s media repeatedly claim ownership over 152 islands and islets in the Aegean Sea awarded to Greece in the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne, 1932 Convention between Turkey and Italy, and 1947 Treaty of Paris.

Greece is not alone as the target of Turkey’s territorial demands. Hulusi Akar, a former defense minister who today chairs the parliament’s National Defense Commission, threatened Armenia during a January 29, 2024 visit to Azerbaijan, suggesting Turkey could repeat its and Azerbaijan’s ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh’s indigenous Armenian population against Armenia proper. With Turkish backing, Azerbaijan continues to occupy several dozen square kilometers of Armenian territory.

As Turkey lobbied for F-16s as part of a quid pro quo to lift its hold on Sweden’s NATO accession, it stopped overflights and harassment of Greek islands. That Erdoğan so quickly violated his agreement after receiving Biden administration endorsement of the F-16 sale suggests tremendous bad faith.

The Biden administration may celebrate Turkey’s agreement to allow Sweden’s NATO accession as a diplomatic win, but the growing risk of an intra-NATO war offset any benefit Sweden might bring. Addressing Erdoğan grievances or augmenting his military will not bring Turkey back into the community of responsible nations. Rather, the problem remains Erdoğan ideology. Ignoring that reality will not bring stability or security, but could rather destroy NATO and force the United States to confront yet another unexpected war in Europe.

https://www.aei.org/op-eds/turkey-threatens-to-invade-greece-and-armenia/

[Yervant1]

Feb 23 2024

Turkey Pursues and Seizes Critics Abroad: Human Rights Watch

Hamdi Firat Buyuk

Sarajevo

BIRN

February 23, 2024

International watchdog Human Rights Watch said in a report that Turkey is one of the leading countries involved in “transnational repression” - targeting government critics abroad.

Human Rights Watch, HRW said in its latest report, ‘‘We Will Find You’: A Global Look at How Governments Repress Nationals Abroad’, that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government is one of the leading states involved in targeting and pursuing critics outside the country.

“Governments across the globe are reaching beyond their borders and committing human rights abuses against their own nationals or former nationals to silence or deter dissent,” the HRW report said.

The report said that the Turkish government has openly stated that it is pursuing government critics abroad, particularly those who are allegedly linked to US-based Muslin preacher Fethullah Gulen, accused of masterminding a coup attempt in 2016 against Erdogan’s government.

Since then, the Ankara government has been calling Gulen’s network the “Fethullahist Terrorist Organisation” or “FETO”. Gulen denies any involvement in the failed coup attempt.

HRW gave the example of Turkish national Selahaddin Gulen, nephew of Fethullah Gulen, saying that he “went missing in May 2021 while travelling to Kenya to marry his fiancé, a Kenyan national”.

“Despite being a registered asylum-seeker in Kenya, he was under a deportation order from the Kenyan authorities, based on an Interpol Red Notice from Türkiye, which required him to report weekly to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations headquarters in Nairobi. On one of these visits, he vanished. Photographs were released several weeks later of him in handcuffs in Ankara,” HRW explained.

In November 2022, Turkey’s then vice-president Fuat Oktay said that more than 100 alleged Gulenists have brought to Turkey.

“The [Turkish Intelligence Agency] … ensured the extradition of more than 100 FETO terrorists from various countries to our country,” Oktay told parliament.

Erdogan’s government has strongly urged Balkan states to hand over alleged Gulenists and to close down any institution related to the Muslim cleric’s movement.

Most have resisted the Erdogan government’s call for extraditions, but the Turkish intelligence agency has been involved in several controversial operations to send back Gulenist suspects from Kosovo, Albania and Moldova, which sparked political rows in countries.

According to HRW, methods used by various countries to target their citizens abroad include killings, abductions, unlawful removals, abuse of consular services, the targeting and collective punishment of relatives, and digital attacks.

HRW called on countries that host government critics from other states to protect them.

“Governments should identify transnational repression as a specific threat to human rights, offer protection for victims, and take steps to ensure they are not complicit,” HRW said.

The report includes over 75 cases previously documented by Human Rights Watch, involving over two dozen governments including Algeria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belarus, Cambodia, China, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, South Sudan, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkey, Turkmenistan and the United Arab Emirates.

https://balkaninsight.com/2024/02/23/turkey-pursues-and-seizes-critics-abroad-human-rights-watch/