National Public Radio (NPR)
October 18, 2007 Thursday
SHOW: Tell Me More 9:00 AM EST

Turkish-U.S. Relations Tense Following Resolution

ANCHORS: MICHEL MARTIN

I’m Michel Martin. This is TELL ME MORE from NPR News.

In a few minutes, a musician’s voice helps explain why a century-old
ethnic conflict raises raw emotion today.

But first, a talk with one of our Anchor Buddies – reporters who help
us understand news from around the world.

Today, we go to Turkey, where our correspondent is closely tracking
two stories that are also important to us here in the U.S. Turkey, of
course, is a U.S. ally in the region. It borders Iraq and serves as a
key supply route for American forces there and in Afghanistan.

On Wednesday, Turkey’s parliament overwhelmingly agreed to allow
troops to cross into northern Iraq to fight against Kurdish rebels
believed to be hiding there. Those rebels, known as the PKK or
Kurdistan Workers Party, are considered a terrorist group by the
Turkish government and the U.S. State Department.

President Bush is pleading with Turkish leaders not to launch such an
attack, and at the same time, Mr. Bush is fighting with a group of
American lawmakers over a proposal to label the century-old killing
of Armenians by Ottoman Turks as genocide.

We’ll talk about both of these stories with our guest, who’s speaking
to us from Ankara. Lale Sariibrahimoglu is a columnist for Zaman
newspaper.

Welcome, Lale. Thanks for speaking with us.

Ms. LALE SARIIBRAHIMOGLU (Columnist, Today’s Zaman): You’re welcome.

MARTIN: Now that this potential operation has been approved, is this
considered eminent?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: No. Not really. The Turkish prime minister said
yesterday during his address to his party, the fact that the motion
is passed yesterday, it didn’t necessarily mean it was eminent. In
other words, Turkey has given time for the parties concerned – i.e.,
the Iraqi government, Iraqi Kurds, as well as the U.S. – to take
concrete action against the PKK rebels active in northern Iraq. For
this reason, Turkey has given time to diplomacy rather than using the
right given itself by the Turkish parliament to invade northern Iraq.

MARTIN: So as I understand it, the precipitating event here is that
the PKK, they’re believed to be basing in northern Iraq. Now, they’ve
crossed over and killed over 30 Turkish soldiers in the past two
weeks. Why are they crossing over into Turkish territory?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: The PKK – the birth of PKK was to set up an
independent Kurdish state in the Middle East region as a whole. But
this aim of the PKK has been narrowed with the emergence of the new
situation in northern Iraq, where the Iraqi Kurds are quite
autonomous at the moment. But the final aim is to set up an
independent Kurdish state with – inside Turkey.

MARTIN: Now, President Bush, as I mentioned, has strongly urged
Turkey not to go forward with an operation into Iraqi territory. Does
the American government’s opinion have any weight here?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: Well, I think at this stage, as far as we can
see, the U.S. administration’s opinion doesn’t seem to have much
weight anymore at this stage because Turkey has – for a long time,
since its invasion of Iraq in 2003 – Turkey has been asking and
urging Americans – U.S. administration – to take action against the
PKK in northern Iraq. If you may guess, they have got camps there,
and also they’re getting – receiving their logistic support, i.e.,
arms, food and other stuff so that they could survive in northern
Iraq.

But we noticed that Americans haven’t been responsive enough to the
Turkish calls to stop a lifeline of the PKK in northern Iraq. For
that reason, at this stage, since Turkey hasn’t received any response
from the Americans, also from the Iraqi Kurds and the Iraqi
government, for its urge to restrain and to stop PKK being active in
northern Iraq so that it could give an end to their infiltration into
Turkey. So I think Turkey’s patience has worn thin.

MARTIN: Mm-hmm. So Turkey’s saying if you’re not going to protect our
border, we’re going to do it for ourselves. I don’t know if the
American government’s – obviously, I don’t speak for them, but I
think the U.S. government’s position is that they’re doing the best
they can, and that they’re kind of tied down in the south. Do people
not buy that?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: Well, Turkish people doesn’t buy it because the
Turkish state actors, decision-makers – both the military and the
politicians – are not in the opinion that the U.S. has done enough.
Turkish public is influenced by the Turkish decision-makers.

MARTIN: Actually, I was going to ask you that. What is public opinion
on this? Do you think that…

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: Yes.

MARTIN: …there would be support for this kind of military
operation?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: I mean, I should say, unfortunately, yes. There
is an overwhelming support for the Turkish military to invade
northern Iraq, and that this is – as I said, I describe as
unfortunate, because, on the other hand, the Turkish public is
mislead that the cost for the operation will be a remedy to the PKK
problem. Whereas, Turkey should urgently address its own Kurdish
problem, mainly in the southeast. The social economic problems in
this region and the almost 23 years old war against the PKK has
really turned mainly the southeast into a mess, where in many
provinces there is a serious poverty that people are suffering out of
it.

So for that reason, it has been wrong that this Turkish public has
came to a point – has come to a point that if Turkey enters into
northern Iraq, the PKK problem will be finished. But this wrong
perception has unfortunately being injected in the minds of the
people.

MARTIN: Mm-hmm. And I’m sure that having these killings over the last
couple weeks probably has inflamed opinions.

I want to turn to another issue. As you know, of course, a U.S.
congressional committee passed a resolution officially calling the
mass killings of Armenians in 1915 as genocide over the period – a
two-year period – as genocide. This issue has caused a major uproar
in Turkey. Why is this such a sensitive issue?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: It is sensitive because Turkish people do not
accept that the World War I events, they’re actually genocide. But,
one, this is a fact, on the one hand, which makes the Turkish public
extremely sensitive about the adoption of such resolutions by the
parliaments because once you adapt them in the parliaments, in the
foreign parliaments, it becomes a political issue.

MARTIN: But what’s the fear? Is the fear that people, perhaps people
who were survivors of the killings would ask for reparations or some
sort? What it is it? Or is it just that it’s considered a stain on
the honor of the country?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: For the public, the concern is not the
reparations, because this is not an issue that is widely discussed in
Turkey, but this is a matter of honor. And unfortunately, this has
been a problem for Turkey for almost 90 years. And in the meantime,
we haven’t seen Turkish governments addressing those allegations in a
scientific manner and opening its archives.

This decision of Turkey to open these Armenian archives and allow the
scientists to come and examine the files came a bit – a late
decision. We shouldn’t come to a point of accepting that the Turkish
government’s neglected to display and to explain to the world opinion
that those events were not actually genocide but an act of massacre,
perhaps ordering killings of the people during the mass migrations.

MARTIN: What’s the difference?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: Genocide is something what the Nazi Germany has
done – I mean, extermination or mass extermination of the peoples.
But in our case, we deeply believe that during the 1915, during the
World War I, there has been nasty events and…

MARTIN: But no one suggested these people died by accident.

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: No. No. No. Those people didn’t die by accident,
but at the same time, we – as Turkey – we haven’t been able to come
up with the scientific proof of the events.

MARTIN: You’re saying that the public doesn’t accept it. You’re
saying the Turkish public does not accept that this was intentional,
an intentional act by the leaders of the government and the country
to kill these people en masse. You’re saying…

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: Yes. Yes.

MARTIN: …people don’t accept that that’s happened.

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: These are not perceived as something
intentional, and the majority of the Turkish public believe that
during those incidents, Turks also lost their lives.

MARTIN: Is it registering that the U.S. government is divided on this
resolution, that seven former secretaries of state, for example,
signed a letter urging Congress not to go forward with this
resolution, even though it has some strong support by the Democratic
leadership? Is there – is it registering with the Turkish public that
there’s a division here in the U.S. on this?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: Not perhaps by the Turkish public, because this
is quite a new event. But at the government level, it is – also, at
the establishment level, the fact that U.S. administration has been
working hard is accepted and is appreciated.

MARTIN: All right. What do you see happening in the next few weeks?
It’s terrible to ask a reporter to make predictions but I’m asking.
Do you – what do you think is going to happen in the next two weeks
especially with this issue involving the military – piece on military
maneuvering?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: Military maneuvering, the cross border, the
Turkish side definitely expecting Iraqi side to come up with concrete
steps against the PKK. Even less than in the coming weeks, perhaps in
a week or so, such as apprehension of the senior PKK leaders and
their extradition to Turkey. Secondly, to ban all the PKK officers
operating in Iraq and currently stop aiding logistic support to the
PKK so that their room for maneuver will be extremely narrowed. And
if this doesn’t happen in a week or so, Turkey seems to be determined
that they will stage a cross border operation. But Turkish government
also appears to give time to diplomacy.

MARTIN: And on this question of the resolution – the Armenia
resolution – that’s been reported in a major American newspapers that
support for this resolution seems to be waning because of the
opposition both overseas and from our key people in the U.S. Do you
feel that if the resolution doesn’t go forward will this whole
episode, kind of fade from consciousness or do you feel that there’s
kind of a permanent strain here as a result of it?

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: This will have the Turkish government to explain
to the public that this is what the American administration did. This
uproar at the moment will slightly go away – fade away. And also it
may have a positive repercussions detected if the House of
Representatives doesn’t adopt the resolution, then it will have some
positive impact on deterring Turkey from a cross-border operation.
Though I linked the two issues, I should also underline that Turkish
government seems to be very much determined in seeing concrete steps
to be taken by the Iraqi government, by the U.S. and Iraqi Kurds
rendering the PKK ineffective. But as a whole, if the Armenian
resolution is not adopted by the House of Representative, the
currency uproar will go down.

MARTIN: Lale Sariibrahimoglu is a columnist for Zaman newspaper. She
joined us from a phone from her office in Ankara.

Lale, thank you so much for speaking with us.

Ms. SARIIBRAHIMOGLU: You’re welcome. Thank you.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress