Journal of Turkish Weekly
Turkish PM Erdogan: ‘Incidents at Xinjiang are almost Genocide’
Saturday, 11 July 2009

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan who reacted to Israel at
Davos in an unconventional manner, declared incidents in
Xinjiang-Uighur region of China "was almost genocide".

Yesterday Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement
that, "Turkey has no intention to intervene China’s internal affairs"
and added that, "correlative efforts will continue to take forward
developing relations between China and Turkey."

Ministry of Foreign Affairs also added that Uighurs form a "strong
bridge of friendship" between Turkey and China.

But after that statement Erdogan told journalists at the G8 summit in
L’Aquila, Italy "I used the word of wildness in my statement in Turkey
and I am standing for this word because there is no any word to
describe the killing and wounding of hundreds of people, it was almost
genocide." He added that "we have difficulty in understanding how
China’s leadership can remain a spectator in the face of these
events."

Turkey Minister of Industry Nihat Ergun also reacted to the
developments in Xinjiang-Uighur region of China by saying, "Organizing
protests is not enough for reaction, we should react goods of that
country too. We should take into consideration humanitarian values of
that country."

After these recent events, a contrast and contradiction occurred among
statements of Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Erdogan and Ministry of
Industry. All these events occurred at a time of which Turkey is
trying to strengthen its relations with china.

President Abdullah Gul visited China in June, accompanied by 120
businessmen to strengthen trade links. The total trade volume between
Turkey and China reached more than $ 17 billion.

By Burhan Dogus Ayparlar (JTW)

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress