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More food for thought. Source is here.

Turkey, Cyprus and NATO

Fogh in the Aegean
Sep 10th 2009 | ANKARA
From The Economist print edition

NATO’s secretary-general seeks better ties with the EU

THE (perhaps vain) hope of Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO’s newish secretary-general, when he visited Greece and Turkey recently was to get these hostile NATO members to set aside their longstanding rivalry so as to improve co-operation between the alliance and the European Union. Turkey objects to this because of a Greek and Cypriot block on its own participation in EU military planning, and on its putative membership of the European Defence Agency. As Mr Fogh Rasmussen complains, this means NATO cannot formally protect EU policemen in Afghanistan. “It’s a security issue. It’s absurd,” he says.

Turkey, which has NATO’s second-largest army, fiercely opposed Mr Fogh Rasmussen’s candidacy for NATO’s top job because he was Denmark’s prime minister during the Prophet Muhammad cartoon crisis and because the Danes have refused to ban Roj TV, a satellite channel run by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) that is beamed out of Denmark.

Mr Fogh Rasmussen’s choice of Ramadan as the time to visit Turkey was calculated to ease Muslim anger. He took part in a lavish iftar (breaking of the fast) organised by the Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It was, says Mr Fogh Rasmussen, “a clear manifestation” of his respect for Islam. Yet his Turkish hosts remained unswayed. His request for combat troops for Afghanistan seems to have been rebuffed, as were his entreaties that Turkey allow Cyprus to join NATO. But at least he wangled a commitment of more Turkish troops to work on reconstruction projects in Afghanistan.

Mr Fogh Rasmussen concedes that, unless and until the Cyprus dispute is resolved, there is little chance of a big improvement in NATO’s relations with the EU. Turkey does not recognise the Greek-Cypriot government. Its continuing refusal to open ports and airports to Greek-Cypriot carriers may yet lead to a freezing of its EU membership negotiations later this year.

Mr Fogh Rasmussen wants pragmatism to prevail because the “lives of our forces are at risk”. He suggests that “the EU must accept a security arrangement with Turkey, and NATO a security arrangement with Cyprus”. Yet Greece recently protested that eight Turkish fighter jets had flown dangerously close to a Rhodes-bound Greek passenger aircraft. Western diplomats talk of a marked escalation in dogfights between Turkish and Greek pilots over the Aegean. Another NATO crisis in the making?

And from Al Jazerra. Source is here.

UPDATED ON:
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
21:13 Mecca time, 18:13 GMT
News Europe
Iran hails Turkey's nuclear support

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's president, has said that he "appreciates" the support shown by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey's prime minister, over Tehran's nuclear programme.

Erdogan, who arrived in Tehran for bilateral talks on Tuesday, has accused Western nations of hypocrisy in criticising Iran's uranium enrichment programme while remaining silent on Israel, which is believed to have an undeclared nuclear arsenal.

Ahmadinejad told Erdogan: "When an illicit regime possesses nuclear arms, one can not talk about depriving other nations from the peaceful nuclear programme.

"Your clear stance towards the Zionist regime had a positive effect in the world, especially the Islamic world, and I am sure that everyone was satisfied," he said, according to the Iranian presidential website

'Peaceful' programme

Erdogan had told journalists travelling with him to Iran that the country's nuclear programme, which Western nations say could be a cover for building weapons, "is an energy project with peaceful, humanitarian purposes".

He said talks between Tehran and world powers in Geneva on October 1 showed that it "can work with" the United States and Russia on uranium enrichment.

"If their positive attitude is answered with a positive attitude, this will bring forward the process in the positive direction," Erdogan said.

His latest remarks came after an interview in Britain's The Guardian newspaper in which he accused Western powers of treating Iran unfairly and referred to Ahmadinejad as a "friend".

Ties between Israel and Turkey have deteriorated since the December-January war on Gaza.

Ankara had previously attempted to mediate relations between Israel and other Middle Eastern nations, but earlier this month, Turkey banned Israel from an international air exercise because of the Gaza conflict.

Gas 'co-operation'

The Turkish prime minister has brought a 200-member delegation, comprising ministers, members of parliament and business leaders, to Iran to discuss a wide range of bilateral, regional and international issues.

Isna, the Iranian students news agency, said that Ahmadinejad had told Erdogan there were no limitations to Iranian-Turkish co-operation.

Taner Yildiz, Turkey's energy minister, said that one of the areas in which the two neighbours would work together was gas exploration.

He said that Turkey would start exploration work at Iran's South Pars gas field next month as part of a project to sell gas to Europe, the state-run Anatolian news agency reported.

"Turkish Petroleum will be exploring in the South Pars Field ... The work will have started by the first or second week of November," Yildiz said.

It was not immediately clear whether the gas would go through the planned $11.76bn European Union-backed Nabucco pipeline, which was agreed with [A]nkara in July.

Erdogan on Tuesday said he supported Iran's presence in the Nabucco project and added: "I believe that sooner or later, the project will understand the importance of Iran's participation".

Iranian-Turkish trade stands at around $12bn a year and the two nations are seeking to expand it to $20bn in the next two years.

Erdogan is also expected to hold talks with Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader and Ali Larijani, the parliamentary speaker during, his visit.

The interview mentioned above is available here.