ANKARA, WASHINGTON CAP STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP IN PRESIDENTIAL TALKS
Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Jan 9 2008
Turkish and US presidents yesterday confirmed the two NATO allies’
strategic partnership over a wide range of issues after a period
of turmoil in ties over Iraq and US inaction on the presence of the
outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in northern Iraq.
Speaking after a meeting with President Abdullah Gul at the White
House, US President George W. Bush called Turkey a major "strategic
partner" and said relations with Turkey are stronger now. The US
president also reiterated that the PKK was a common enemy for the
United States and Turkey as well as for the people who want to live in
peace and added that Washington was ready to work with Turkey against
the group to promote peace. "We are long-standing allies and we share
common values," said Gul for his part, noting that Turkish-US relations
have an impact not only on the two countries but also on the region
and on global politics. Gul also said he and Bush confirmed that the
cooperation against the PKK would continue.
Positive comments from the two leaders were no surprise as the visit,
the first by a Turkish president to the White House in nearly 12
years, came amid a spring mood in Turkish-US relations that followed
successful efforts to win US cooperation in the fight against the
PKK. Bush said the outcome of the talks was in line with expectations,
explaining that this is the natural result when two friends sit down
in a room and talk.
The two leaders also discussed energy and the situation in the Middle
East in their meeting, which came just before Bush departed for a
tour of the Middle East. Bush also supported Turkey’s troubled bid
to join the European Union, saying the EU will benefit if Turkey joins.
Gul met Bush for a meeting and lunch, attended also by Foreign Minister
Ali Babacan, Energy Minister Hilmi Guler and Economy Minister Mehmet
Þimþek. Prior to the meeting with Bush, he met Vice President Dick
Cheney at the White House and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
over breakfast.
The visit came after landmark talks between Bush and Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdoðan on Turkish-US cooperation against the PKK in
early November, which Gul said opened a new era in relations and ended
a period of turmoil between the two countries. Bush then offered
Turkey a commitment to cooperate in the fight against the PKK and
since then, the US has assisted a series of air strikes against PKK
targets in northern Iraq by providing intelligence about the group
and not objecting to strikes by Turkish jet fighters.
"It is a fact that there has been some turmoil in relations in past
years. But today this has been overcome and a climate of confidence has
emerged," Gul told journalists aboard his plane en route to Washington.
The extensive agenda of Gul’s talks with Bush, analysts comment, is
the sign of a sharp improvement in relations, which, over the past
five years, have been mostly confined to disagreements over Iraq and
the PKK. Having mostly left aside the acrimony over the PKK dispute,
the two countries are now able to discuss cooperation on a wider
range of issues, said analysts.
Gul said in his Monday comments that on almost all of the major
regional issues, Turkey and the United States were on the same page and
that he would clearly express Ankara’s stance on regional issues, since
Turkey is one of the countries that best understands the Middle East.
Tension in ties with the US goes back to 2003, during the buildup to
the Iraq war. The Turkish Parliament then rejected US requests to send
troops into Iraq through Turkish territory. In the following years,
the US Congress also did its share to poison the atmosphere.
Despite pleas from the Bush administration and personal appeals from
Gul, who served as foreign minister at the time, and other prominent
Turks, the Foreign Affairs Committee of the US House of Representatives
passed a nonbinding resolution last year that described the World
War I-era deaths of Armenians during the final years of the Ottoman
Empire as genocide.
Revealing the depth of the crisis, a poll last summer showed just 9
percent of Turks saw the US favorably.
Gul’s visit comes amid an improvement in the US image in Turkey. But it
also marks a change of stance in Washington towards Gul, who, as the
prime minister in 2003, was widely blamed among US neo-conservatives
for Parliament’s rejection of US requests for cooperation in the Iraq
war. Gul’s reception by Bush at the White House shows that the era
of mistrust of Gul in certain segments of the US administration is
over now, according to Turkish analysts.
Before his official meetings at the White House on Tuesday, Gul
visited an exhibition of paintings by Turkish artists. The exhibition
was jointly organized by the Turkish Central Bank and the US Federal
Reserve.
Gul was accompanied by his wife, Hayrunnisa, and by Foreign
Minister Ali Babacan. Gul will meet Defense Secretary Robert Gates
on Wednesday before flying to New York to meet at the United Nations
with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
In the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC), presidential
spokesman Hasan Ercakýca said he expected Gul to convey the Turkish
Cypriot expectations and their position on efforts to restart
reunification talks to the United States and the United Nations.
While in the United States, he is also to meet with representatives
of the Meskhetian Turks. A minority group ousted from the Soviet
Republic of Georgia. The Meskhetians were bounced around to other
Soviet republics until settling in Krasnodar Krai in southern Russia.
The timing of Gul’s visit has been a contentious issue in Turkey,
with critics saying it was not necessary to pay a top-level visit
to the United States just two months after a landmark visit by Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoðan in November. In Ankara, main opposition
Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal claimed such
visits may lose their importance if they take place too often.
Others, however, say Erdoðan’s visit was focused particularly on one
issue, namely that of cooperation against the PKK, while Gul’s talks
in Washington are about everything that concerns Turkish-US relations.
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