Annan plays down prospect of US intervention in Cyprus

UN chief Kofi Annan Thursday played down Turkish calls for US intervention to help reunify Cyprus before the divided island joins the European Union in May.

The secretary general said he would prefer a figure who knows Cyprus intimately if talks on a UN-backed peace plan are to resume in the weeks ahead.

"I believe my good friend Secretary of State Colin Powell already has a job and has his hands full," he told a news conference in Brussels, following the call for US intervention from Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Annan said his special envoy for Cyprus, Alvaro de Soto, "knows the issues inside out".

"In the process we were helped by representatives of several friendly countries and I think if we were to resume the process, because of the time factor, I would want to have somebody in charge who knows the issues," he said.

Erdogan called Wednesday for the United States to help find a speedy solution to the division of Cyprus, which has been split since 1974 between Greek and Turkish sectors.

Erdogan said that President George W. Bush had asked Powell to recommend a neutral figure with "political weight" who might help.

An end to the division has become all the more pressing with Cyprus due to join the EU on May 1, along with nine other nations.

Without a settlement, the EU will welcome the internationally recognised Greek-Cypriot government alone, leaving the Turkish community in the cold. But UN efforts to reunite the island have failed to bring agreement.

Turkish-US strategic cooperation changing

Turkey is moving ahead at a fascinating speed in the Cyprus issue. It usually wins but sometimes it cannot get what it wants. For instance, it could not make Powell the mediator, it failed to get rid of De Soto. But still, both the EU and the US applaud the government's steps
U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said such words in a previous interview (on May 6, with CNN Turk) that there emerged the impression that Turkish-U.S. relations will never recover.

That interview took place after the Turkish Parliament rejected a request to allow deployment of U.S. troops on Turkish soil and Wolfowitz said clearly in the interview that Turkey should admit that it had made a mistake. He highlighted the anti-U.S. position of some figures in the Turkish Armed Forces and leveled harsh criticisms against the Turkish military. He even hinted that the United States could leave Incirlik air base, saying the United States has no desire to stay in a place where it is not wanted.

Eight months after that interview, we, me and Cengiz Candar, again sat together with Wolfowitz and discussed where Turkish-U.S. relations stand now.

Everything has changed.

Turkey has seen the mistake it made and has done whatever the United States wanted.

The United States has not achieved what it wanted in Iraq; it has taken up a more realistic position.

Wolfowitz showed that he did not want to look back and scratch old wounds. The language he used was quite different. He was using rhetoric that accepted that both sides had made mistakes.

The full text of the interview with the U.S. deputy defense secretary is available on the e-kolay web portal (www.e-kolay.net). The following is a summary of the most important points.

Full agreement reached on Iraq
Wolfowitz was crystal clear especially on the Iraq issue.

His assurances are as follows: There will be no independent Kurdistan; The Iraqi federation will not be based on an ethnic or sectarian basis, it will be based on geographical borders just like Turkey wants; Kirkuk will be a city of not only Kurds but of everybody; Turkmens will have their place in the new Iraq; the PKK will have no place in northern Iraq and no matter what name it calls itself it will be remain a terrorist organization for the United States. If the group does not pull out voluntarily, then they will be forced out, this is a matter of time.

These assurances by Americans please Ankara.

The United States is unwilling to undertake a military operation to force the PKK out of northern Iraq's mountains. It does not want a new war in northern Iraq as it is already in trouble in other parts of Iraq. Therefore, it wants Ankara to give some time. And the Turkish government signals that it understands this.

Wolfowitz maintained this stance in his interview with us.

Strategic partnership is back, but changed
What interested me the most in what the deputy secretary of defense said and what, I believe, will provide the biggest comfort to Turkey in the long-run, was his comments about whether the strategic partnership with Turkey was in place.

Wolfowitz highlighted that the strategic partnership had changed.

He said, in sum, the following:

"Our strategic partnership has changed. It is no longer as it was before. In the past, this relationship was based on a military basis. Only military relations used to be discussed. This era is now closed. Military relations of course do exist but the new strategic partnership is not based on a military field but rather on democracy and politics."

This is a new formula.

It has not been put forward so far.

It is true that Turkish-U.S. ties used to be ahead of everything. Turkey, in the eyes of the United States, used to be a front base. Bases in Turkey used to be seen valuable. Only the cooperation in Korea used to be commemorated and praised.

Now, "the Greater Middle East Project" of President George W. Bush has changed this attitude.

At the heart of this project lies an objective to achieve transition to democracy in Middle Eastern countries. And precisely from this perspective, Turkey is now the new favorite of the Bush administration. Turkey is the sole example of the co-existence of Islam and democracy.

Turkey, until recently, was a country that drew attention because of its geographical location. Now, its democracy is in the spotlight.

To tell the truth, it is better to be the favored country because of our democracy than to act as the gendarmerie and take risk.

Annan did not sacrifice De Soto
Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktas did not like Alvare De Soto from the outset. He was calculating that his job would have been much easier if he could have Alvaro's head rolling. This attitude had nothing to do with De Soto's personality. If De Soto had been dismissed from the U.N. Secretary-General's team, that would have been equivalent to the collapse of the Annan plan in a certain way. Because De Soto was perhaps the only person who knew the plan well. He was the person who originally drafted the plan and contributions from outsiders determined the details.

Turkey made a big mistake by demanding De Soto's head.

First, it failed to see that the U.N. secretary-general would throw his support behind De Soto. Secondly, it never thought that De Soto's remaining in the U.N. team will bring a better advantage to the Turkish side. Wouldn't it be better to benefit from his knowledge, instead of attacking him?

In addition, De Soto is neither in law with Greek Cypriots nor has he a special interest for the Greeks. What bothers him is the resolution of the Cyprus dispute. He criticized the Turkish side as it continued to drag its feet. And Denktas got angry as De Soto criticized.

What happened today?

Annan refused to give up on De Soto.

Let's leave the struggle with De Soto and do our own business.

EU front: Words promising, now show it at the table
In the European Union, Turkey's Cyprus efforts have made a very positive impact. Especially in the EU Commission, there are people who are even shocked. Conversations with high-level officials gave me the impression that they are quite satisfied with the statements made so far but that they still have doubts:

"The Turkish side has come up with undertakings in the past as well. But whenever negotiations start, Denktas used to raise old issues and cause the negotiations to become deadlocked immediately. Now we are curious: What will Denktas do? Are these efforts part of a game or of a serious undertaking? We will understand this once the negotiations start."

That is, even those who applaud the Turkish initiative have doubts.

Don't we have the same skepticism?

We don't precisely know what Denktas will do either.

We don't know what kind of tricks those circles who want to keep their grip on Cyprus will devise?

Let's see if the government can stand firm. Or will it bow to pressures after a while?

US front: Don't try to name us
Turkey insists: The U.S. state secretary will get involved as a "mediator" or "facilitator."

Americans, on the other hand, keep saying this: "Do not try to put tags. Don't worry, we will be working behind the scene and definitely prevent talks from going off track."

Our team, on the other hand, is insistent:

"No, let's give a name to this. The word facilitator will be better..."

Americans keep explaining but in vain.

It is clear, indeed, what Powell will do. He will put pressure on both sides, and more importantly, he will conduct the final bargaining.

Leaving aside this tag bargaining, Turkey got what it wanted in general. Perhaps it could have been better if it had gotten more. For instance, everybody would be very happy if Bush had kissed Erdogan on the cheek (!) and told him what great deeds he had accomplished. But let's not forget that Washington does not want to win enmity of Greece and Greek Cyprus. Therefore, it is reluctant to have a high-profile involvement.

Mehmet Ali Birand's article is translated by TDN staff
31 January 2004, Turkish Daily News

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