AZG Armenian Daily #110, 16/06/2005
Turkey-USA
DISAGREEMENT IN TURKISH-AMERICAN RELATIONS DEEPENS
America’s Pressure on Turkey Intensifies as a Result
The meeting of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan with US
President George Bush contrary to Turkish television and press’s
optimistic evaluation did not help restore Turkish-American strategic
partnership but rather raised more questions in the relations of
two allies.
Zeyno Baran, the Nixon Center director for International Security
and Energy Programs, emphasized in an interview to Turkish Jihan TV
that the Turkish Prime Minister failed to get the signal President
Bush sent in his words or misunderstood him and added, “The US is
not Turkey’s strategic partner”.
Zeyno Baran’s conclusion is apparently the answer to the statement
about “restoring Turkey’s strategic partnership with the US”. Despite
the aggravating tension in Turkish-American relations, it seemed not
real that the US will intensify pressure on Turkey to make it improve
relations with Armenia.
But it is not the laws of logic that regulate politics. Turkish
television affirmed this point on June 14 informing about the new
resolution on Armenian Genocide that the House of Representatives
will submit to “democrat Adam Schiff, influential representative of
the Armenian lobby at the US Congress, senator from California”.
The resolution, as a rule, is to pass discussion at commission of
International Relations of the House of Representatives. Turkish
television quoted political observers as saying that the resolution
will be adopted once the commission discusses it.
At one point during the Turkish-American discords US deputy defense
secretary Paul Wolfowitz threatened Turkey with “recognizing
the Armenian Genocide at the Congress”. His threats produced no
result. It’s evident that once the Congress adopts the resolution,
the Bush administration will lose another lever of influence on Turkey.
It must be noted that Washington’s task is to take Turkey in its
projects of Middle East policy. It will settle discords securing
restoration of Turkish-American strategic alliance. Turkey, restoring
its position of the US representative in the Middle East, will lose
the opportunity to improve relations with Syria and Iran and to oppose
US regional projects, including the ones concerning Kurdish issue.
By Hakob Chakrian