Today’s Zaman, Turkey
April 17 2010

DavutoÄ?lu to rush to Baku, Tehran after Washington talks

In an apparent sign of Ankara’s foreign policy priorities, Foreign
Minister Ahmet DavutoÄ?lu will pay visits to neighboring Azerbaijan and
Iran next week, following intense talks with US officials in
Washington on the normalization process between Armenia and Turkey and
on Iran’s controversial nuclear program. DavutoÄ?lu, who accompanied
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄ?an to a nuclear security summit in
the US capital on Monday and Tuesday, stayed in Washington after
ErdoÄ?an’s departure and had talks with senior US officials.

Speaking at a press conference at the Turkish Embassy in Washington on
Thursday, DavutoÄ?lu recalled a meeting held between ErdoÄ?an and US
President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the nuclear summit and said
issues concerning Iran, developments in the Caucasus and the process
of normalization with Armenia were on the agenda of the meeting.
DavutoÄ?lu’s press conference was held after his meeting with US
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The meeting marked their third
since the beginning of the week.

`We are convinced that a window of opportunity for a diplomatic
resolution still exists. We will continue doing our best on this
issue,’ DavutoÄ?lu was quoted as saying by the Anatolia news agency. He
underlined that during their meetings with US officials they clearly
reiterated Turkey’s position favoring diplomatic means instead of
imposing sanctions on the neighboring country to deal with the dispute
surrounding its nuclear program.

`We plan to share with Iran particularly our impressions of the
meetings we had with the US administration by going to Iran in the
shortest time possible,’ DavutoÄ?lu said, adding that he would visit
Tehran next week.

`We want neither military conflict in our region nor the slowing down
of our region’s economic dynamism via new sanctions,’ he said, while
also stressing Turkey’s firm opposition to any country possessing
nuclear weapons.

On Friday, DavutoÄ?lu was scheduled to arrive in Brasà – lia to have talks
with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Brazil and Turkey
— which both hold nonpermanent seats on the UN Security Council and
are reluctant to back a Washington push to impose sanctions as a way
out of the diplomatic standoff over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions — are
studying an alternative proposal to deal with Iran’s controversial
nuclear program.

`Aliyev’s absence loss of opportunity’
During his visit to Baku on Monday, he will have a detailed exchange
of views with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev concerning the
Turkish side’s meetings in Washington this week, DavutoÄ?lu said,
apparently referring to ErdoÄ?an’s meeting with Armenian President
Serzh Sarksyan and his meeting with Armenian Foreign Minister Edward
Nalbandian in particular.

`We will also have consultations [with Aliyev] concerning the steps we
will take from now on,’ he added.

Reiterating Turkey’s uneasiness with the fact that Azerbaijan was not
invited to the nuclear summit even though Armenia was extended an
invitation, DavutoÄ?lu said Turkey did its best to convince US
officials to invite Azerbaijan to the summit. He, nonetheless, also
noted that the US side informed the Turkish side of its `objective
reasoning’ for not inviting Azerbaijan.

`But of course, the presence of Armenia, Turkey and the co-chairs of
the Minsk process [at the summit] was a very important opportunity,’
he said, referring to French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Russian
President Dmitry Medvedev’s participation in the summit.

The Minsk Group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe (OSCE), the three co-chairs of which are France, Russia and the
US, has striven to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, a
territorial conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

`In my opinion, if Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev had been here,
the positive meetings we have held so far could have resulted in even
more progress; a very important opportunity has been missed. I’m
saying this with sincerity and from the heart,’ DavutoÄ?lu said.

Recalling that Ambassador Feridun SinirlioÄ?lu, the Foreign Ministry
undersecretary, last week paid consecutive visits first to Yerevan and
then to Baku as ErdoÄ?an’s special envoy, DavutoÄ?lu said Turkey
listened to Aliyev’s fundamental stance and concerns about the issue.
He didn’t elaborate on whether he meant the issue of the absence of an
invitation to the summit or the Nagorno-Karabakh issue.

DavutoÄ?lu highlighted that he would travel to Azerbaijan soon after
wrapping up his visit to Brazil `not even spending time with [my]
family,’ and added, `That’s to say, we won’t let even one day pass.’

Following talks with Sarksyan earlier this week, ErdoÄ?an said
maintaining regional peace is among the fundamental elements of
Armenia and Turkey’s efforts for the normalization of their relations;
thus, the resolution of the territorial dispute between Armenia and
Azerbaijan is naturally linked to this process.

ErdoÄ?an’s remarks came when reminded of Sarksyan’s comments on the
issue, which were made after their meeting. In remarks delivered at a
gathering of the Armenian community, Sarksyan made clear that his
country would not accept Turkey’s imposition of the resolution of the
Nagorno-Karabakh dispute as a precondition to the normalization of
relations.

17 April 2010, Saturday
TODAY’S ZAMAN ANKARA