Erdoğan says Turkey is ready to take required steps if ‘found guilty’ of Armenian killings

January 30, 2015 By administrator

ANKARA

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (R) is seen during a live interview on public broadcaster TRT Haber on Jan. 29. AA Photo

Accusing Turkey of committing genocide is a form of execution without trial, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has indicated, while also stating that Ankara is “ready to pay for any misdeed” if an “impartial board of historians” concludes that it was at fault for the events of 1915.

“We are not obliged to accept that the so-called Armenian genocide was ‘made-to-order,’” Erdoğan said late on Jan. 29, speaking during a live interview on public broadcaster TRT Haber.

He mentioned that during his period as prime minister, he had sent a letter in 2005 to former Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing that historians investigate the 1915 killings of Anatolian Armenians during the Ottoman era.

“We are saying, ‘If you are sincere on this matter, then come, let’s leave this to historians, let historians study the issue, let’s open our archives,’” Erdoğan said

“We have opened our archive. We have revealed more than one million documents on this. If Armenia also has an archive, then they should open it too. If third countries have archives, they should do the same. Let them study and then let them present their reports to us. Then let’s sit around the table as politicians,” he added, referring to his proposal for the establishment of a joint commission of historians and experts from both Turkey and Armenia to study the events of 1915 together.

“If the results reveal that we have committed a crime, if we have a price to pay, then as Turkey we would assess it and take the required steps,” Erdoğan said.

“But let’s be careful here. The 1915 events are out in the open as history. The State of the Republic of Turkey is out in the open. Our archives have been opened and are out in the open, but the archives on the opposite side are not open. They are just saying ‘Turkey is guilty,’ but Turkey is not guilty just by saying so,” he added.

Armenia says up to 1.5 million people were killed by Ottoman forces during World War I, in what it calls an act of genocide. But modern Turkey has always rejected the term genocide, putting the toll at 500,000 and blaming the deaths on starvation and unrest in the broader context of the war.

Earlier this month, Erdoğan said he would “actively” challenge a campaign to pressure Turkey to recognize the massacres as genocide, though a year ago he offered an unprecedented expression of condolences for the 1915-1916 killings.

January/30/2015

Erdogan does not want a Kurdistan in Syria

January 27, 2015 By administrator

Turkey does not want to Syria of an autonomous Kurdish zone like Iraq, said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was quoted Tuesday by the press, while the Syrian Kurdish city of Kobané (north) have announced hunting jihadists. “We do not want a (repeat) the situation in Iraq (…) it was the north of Iraq. We can not accept birth now northern Syria, “he told a group of reporters on the plane the

A Conversation With Bashar al-Assad “Erdogan belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood & the base of al Qaeda”

January 26, 2015 By administrator

By Jonathan Tepperman

The civil war in Syria will soon enter its fifth year, with no end in sight. On January 20, Foreign Affairs managing editor Jonathan Tepperman met with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus to discuss the conflict in an exclusive interview.

I would like to start by asking you about the war. It has now been going on for almost four years, and you know the statistics: more than 200,000 people have been killed, a million wounded, and more than three million Syrians have fled the country, according to the UN. Your forces have also suffered heavy casualties. The war cannot go on forever. How do you see the war ending?
All wars anywhere in the world have ended with a political solution, because war itself is not the solution; war is one of the instruments of politics. So you end with a political solution. That’s how we see it. That is the headline.

You don’t think that this war will end militarily?
No. Any war ends with a political solution.

ISIS.

Kobani is a small city, with about 50,000 inhabitants. It’s been more than three months since the beginning of the attacks, and they haven’t finished. Same areas, same al Qaeda factions occupying them—the Syrian army liberated in less than three weeks. It means they’re not serious about fighting terrorism.

So are you saying you want greater U.S. involvement in the war against ISIS?

It’s not about greater involvement by the military, because it’s not only about the military; it’s about politics. It’s about how much the United States wants to influence the Turks. Because if the terrorists can withstand the air strikes for this period, it means that the Turks keep sending them armaments and money. Did the United States put any pressure on Turkey to stop the support of al Qaeda? They didn’t; they haven’t. So it’s not only about military involvement. This is first. Second, if you want to talk about the military involvement, American officials publicly acknowledge that without troops on the ground, they cannot achieve anything concrete. Which troops on the grounds are you depending on?

So are you suggesting there should be U.S. troops on the ground?

Not U.S. troops. I’m talking about the principle, the military principle. I’m not saying American troops. If you want to say I want to make war on terrorism, you have to have troops on the ground. The question you have to ask the Americans is, which troops are you going to depend on? Definitely, it has to be Syrian troops. This is our land; this is our country. We are responsible. We don’t ask for American troops at all.

So what would you like to see from the United States? You mentioned more pressure on Turkey …

Pressure on Turkey, pressure on Saudi Arabia, pressure on Qatar to stop supporting the rebels. Second, to make legal cooperation with Syria and start by asking permission from our government to make such attacks. They didn’t, so it’s illegal.

I’m sorry, I’m not clear on that point. You want them to make legal … ?

Of course, if you want to make any kind of action in another country, you ask their permission.

I see. So a formal agreement between Washington and Damascus to allow for air strikes?

The format we can discuss later, but you start with permission. Is it an agreement? Is it a treaty? That’s another issue.

Do you think you will eventually defeat the rebels militarily?

If they don’t have external support, and no, let’s say, supply and recruitment of new terrorists within Syria, there will be no problem defeating them. Even today we don’t have a problem militarily. The problem is that they still have this continuous supply, mainly from Turkey.

So Turkey seems to be the neighbor that you’re most concerned about?

Exactly. Logistically, and about terrorist financing from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, but through Turkey.

Do you blame Erdogan personally? This is a man you once had a fairly good relationship with.

Yes. Because he belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood ideology, which is the base of al Qaeda; it was the first political Islamic organization that promoted violent political Islam in the early twentieth century. He belongs strongly and is a staunch believer in these values. He’s very fanatical, and that’s why he still supports ISIS. He is personally responsible for what happened.

Do you see any other potential partners in the region? For example, General el-Sisi in Egypt?

I wouldn’t talk about him personally, but as long as Egypt and the Egyptian army and the government are fighting the same kind of terrorists as in Iraq, of course, we can consider these countries eligible to cooperate with in fighting the same enemy.

Two final questions, if I may. Can you imagine a scenario in which Syria returns to the status quo as it was before the fighting started almost four years ago?

In what sense?

In the sense that Syria is whole again, it is not divided, it controls its borders, it starts to rebuild, and it is at peace and a predominantly secular country.

If you look at a military map now, the Syrian army exists in every corner. Not every place; by every corner, I mean north, south, east, west, and between. If you didn’t believe in a unified Syria, that Syria can go back to its previous position, you wouldn’t send the army there, as a government. If you don’t believe in this as a people, you would have seen people in Syria isolated into different ghettos based on ethnic and sectarian or religious identity. As long as this is not the situation, the people live with each other; the army is everywhere; the army is made up of every color of Syrian society, or the Syrian fabric. This means that we all believe Syria should go back to the way it was. We don’t have any other option, because if it doesn’t go back to its previous position, that will affect every surrounding country. It’s one fabric—it’s a domino effect that will have influence from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

If you were able to deliver a message to President Obama today, what would it be?

I think the normal thing that you ask any official in the world is to work for the interests of his people. And the question I would ask any American is, what do you get from supporting terrorists in our country, in our region? What did you get from supporting the Muslim Brotherhood a few years ago in Egypt and other countries? What did you get from supporting someone like Erdogan? One of the officials from your country asked me seven years ago in Syria at the end of a meeting, “How do you think we can solve the problem in Afghanistan?” I told him, “You have to be able to deal with officials who are not puppets, who can tell you no.” So for the United States, only looking for puppet officials and client states is not how you can serve the interests of your country. You are the greatest power in the world now; you have too many things to disseminate around the world: knowledge, innovation, IT, with its positive repercussions. How can you be the best in these fields yet the worst in the political field? This is a contradiction. That is what I think the American people should analyze and question. Why do you fail in every war? You can create war, you can create problems, but you cannot solve any problem. Twenty years of the peace process in Palestine and Israel, and you cannot do anything with this, in spite of the fact that you are a great country.

But in the context of Syria, what would a better policy look like?

One that preserves stability in the Middle East. Syria is the heart of the Middle East. Everybody knows that. If the Middle East is sick, the whole world will be unstable. In 1991, when we started the peace process, we had a lot of hope. Now, after more than 20 years, things are not at square one; they’re much below that square. So the policy should be to help peace in the region, to fight terrorism, to promote secularism, to support this area economically, to help upgrade the mind and society, like you did in your country. That is the supposed mission of the United States, not to launch wars. Launching war doesn’t make you a great power.

See More: http://www.foreignaffairs.com/discussions/interviews/syrias-president-speaks

I wish the ground would swallow you up – Turkish analyst slams Erdogan’s message to Armenian leader

January 26, 2015 By administrator

A Turkish political analyst has criticized President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s move to invite the Armenian president to the country next year to join the Gallipoli battle’s 100^th anniversary events on the day coinciding with the Armenian Genocide centennial.

“I wish the ground would swallow you up. I see you have turned a blind eye to those people’s pain, but you could have at least abstained from mocking at them. Against the background of such a disgrace, Erdogan is inviting Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan to Çanakkale,” Bakin Oran said in an article published in Radikal.

He noted that Turkey earlier traditionally celebrated the the Çanakkale (Galippoli) battle anniversary on March 18. “The president will this year head to Çanakkale with the Azerbaijani despot Ilham Aliyev, the Turkish foreign policy’s biggest ‘attraction stone’. And they will celebrate [the anniversary] on the day symbolizing the heinous atrocities against the Armenians, committed by butchers of Ittihat ve Terakki,” he wrote.

In his invitation letter, sent to the Armenian leader on January 16, Erdogan said that they plan hold massive on April 23 and 24 to mark the centenary of the battle. In his response message, issued shortly after, President Sargsyan said that “it is not our rule to be hosted without receiving an answer to our own invitation”.

Turkey’s Erdogan and the spread of terror

January 24, 2015 By administrator

writes Sayed Abdel-Meguid

Turkey has sided with the Islamic State group, to the ire of Washington, but Erdogan may not be immune to terrorist attacks staged by takfiri militants,

It had not been expected, that is true. But many, especially among the intelligentsia, were not all that surprised by Cumhuriyet’s decision to publish some images from Charlie Hebdo as a way of expressing solidarity with the French satirical magazine whose staff members were murdered by jihadists. report weekly.ahram

The government of the ruling Justice and Development Party (JDP) could not let the incident pass without comment. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan lashed out against the outspoken opposition newspaper. The Istanbul public prosecutor summoned two of its staff members, Ceyda Karan and her colleague Hikmet Çetinkaya, for questioning after pressing charges of incitement to hatred and animosity via the media and of insulting people’s religious values.

Saturday brought a development of a different order. About 500 demonstrators connected to a group calling itself the Fraternal Platform of the Prophet’s Companions rallied in the forecourt of the Fatih Mosque in the heart of historic Istanbul. Their purpose was to pray for Cherif and Said Kouachi, responsible for the massacre at Charlie Hebdo, and to chant slogans in support of Al-Qaeda.

As for Charlie Hebdo, they proclaimed: “The magazine has not died, but its fate is death!” Police blocked the demonstrators from staging a march around the historic mosque and participants soon disbanded.

The two contrasting scenes reflect the gulf in Turkish society that has expanded into a chasm under JDP rule. On one side of this chasm stands the religious conservatives and fundamentalists whose numbers are steadily growing, with the support and encouragement of JDP elites.

These JDP elites, in turn, have been harsh criticised by Turkey’s friends and allies. Two examples illustrate. The first is Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s objections to the presence of his Turkish counterpart, Ahmet Davutoglu, in the solidarity march against terrorism that took place in Paris the Sunday before last. Davutoglu’s participation did not come from the heart, Renzi said.

The second example came from former US ambassador to Ankara, Francis Ricciardone, who said, “Turkey and the US no longer share the same values.” Ricciardone was referring to the JDP government’s repression of freedoms and its cooperation with Daesh (the Islamic State) and other takfiri jihadists.

US State Department spokesperson Mary Harf was asked whether it was the case that Washington and Ankara no longer shared the same values. She refused to answer. Her silence spoke volumes: the US and Turkey are drifting apart.

The trend has its origins in mounting US and Western concerns over Ankara’s clampdowns on civil liberties and press freedoms and its increasing authoritarianism. Erdogan’s boundless thirst for power at home and regionally have driven him to increasing fanaticism in his campaign to bolster fundamentalism and Islamicise Turkish society and government.

According to Alon Ben-Meir, professor of international relations at New York University, Erdogan has promoted religious beliefs as prime criteria for key political and military appointments. At the same time, he has doubled the number of schools for training clergymen.

It could be that the Turkish president’s zealotry is fed, in part, by some wacky historiography. In November last year, Erdogan claimed that Muslims had discovered America in 1178 and that Christopher Columbus had mentioned seeing a mosque on a hill on the Cuban coast.

Be that as it may, there is little doubt that Turkish coffers have been open to radical Islamist fundamentalist groups. Perhaps the most telling evidence in this regard is in the recently leaked documents from the Turkish General Staff indicating that this government body supplied military support to Syrian opposition groups, including Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front.

It appears that convoys carrying truckloads of weapons and other military equipment rumbled across the Turkish border into northern Syria. The existence of this military supply line lends considerable weight to the belief that the Erdogan regime has close relations with terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq, Daesh in particular.

Presumably, this should have immunised Anatolia to jihadist terrorism. But as it turns out, the JDP’s Turkey has come into the terrorists’ crosshairs. Two weeks ago, Turkish security forces forestalled bombing attacks against two shopping centres in Istanbul.

Turkish authorities do not rule out the possibility of attacks similar to those that occurred in France, especially in view of the large number of Turks that have joined the ranks of Daesh. According to some estimates that government sources have not refuted, these are no less than 12,000.

Minister of Customs and Trade Nurettin Canikli stepped forward to reassure citizens. Turkey has the experience and knowhow to stop that kind of terrorism, he said, adding that the government had drawn up policies to confront it.

But then Teref newspaper revealed that security forces have unearthed terrorist plans to attack coastal areas during the summer season. Moreover, the attacks were to have been carried out by homegrown cells. According to the newspaper, a Turkish Daesh recruit who took fought in Syria returned home to Turkey to form a terrorist cell and coordinate with cells in the coastal area.

Why are these terrorist organisations turning against the government that boasts of its piety day and night? The answer could be that Ankara is backing away from them, and once again trying to curry favour with EU and the US. The pro-government Sabah newspaper reported on 6 January that Turkey and the US will sign a memorandum of understanding to train and equip 15,000 fighters from the Syrian opposition.

According to diplomatic sources cited by the newspaper, the programme will begin in March. Some 100 US officers will come to Turkey to support the training. Such a development would obviously incur the wrath of Daesh.

Turkey Erdogan and purification of free thought

January 15, 2015 By administrator

A train Turkish journalists arrested, allegedly in full compliance with the law? Who doubts? In the same obnoxious ideas circulating in the corridors of the Turkish courts include our friend Erol Özkoray worried for statements in his book Gezi phenomenon that could earn him 18 months in prison. In an interview with France Culture, the writer is concerned about the future of Turkey under Erdogan

Erdogan, Turkey will fight “actively” qualification Armenian Genocide

January 7, 2015 By administrator

Ankara, (AFP) – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed on Tuesday to oppose “actively” in any campaign for recognition by Turkey on genocidal massacres of Armenians in 1915, whose centenary is celebrated this year.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and institutions will actively fight these allegations,” Erdogan said during a speech to the Turkish ambassadors gathered in Ankara.

One session of the annual conference of Turkish ambassadors is precisely on the definition of a strategy against Armenia’s efforts and the Armenian diaspora, who advocate that Ankara recognize genocide.

Turkey has so far always refused to admit any planned disposal, citing the massacre by the Ottoman Empire some 500,000 Armenians who had sided with his enemy Russia in fighting or because of famines .

In April, Mr Erdogan, when he was prime minister, had offered unprecedented condolences for the massacres of Armenians (1.5 million Armenians and 500,000 according as Turks), citing a “joint pain”.

Turkey and neighboring Armenia, which does not have diplomatic relations, signed in 2009 called protocols in Zurich to normalize their relations, but five years later these texts have still not been approved by their parliaments.

Armenia will commemorate the 100th anniversary of the genocide on April 24, when, in 1915, hundreds of Armenians were arrested and later massacred in Constantinople, the ancient Istanbul, marking the beginning of the massacres.

Wednesday, January 7, 2015,
Ara © armenews.com

Turkey Judge hushes up Erdoğan’s link to al-Qadi in hearing into bugging case

January 3, 2015 By administrator

The hearing at a trial on Friday into the planting of a bugging device in current President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s prime ministerial office back in 2011 was marred by the judge’s interference into the suspect’s testimony, which hinted that Yasin al-Qadi, a Saudi businessman who was on the UN and US terror lists for financing al-Qaeda, was a special guest of Erdoğan for two months.

The trial of 12 police officers and a former senior member of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) began on Friday at the Ankara 7th High Criminal Court.

Mehmet Sürer, the defense attorney of Serhat Demir, a suspect in the case and a police officer who was assigned to the protective detail of Erdoğan, asked Mehmet Yüksel and Zeki Bulut, former chiefs of the Prime Ministry’s protective services, to disclose the secret assignment given to Demir for two months in İstanbul.

When police chief Yüksel stood up to respond to the question under cross-examination by defense attorney Sürer, the judge, Hüseyin Karamanoğlu, immediately intervened and asked the suspect to not disclose that information, citing state secrecy rules.

In an interview with the liberal Taraf daily a while back, Demir revealed that he had been assigned to protect Qadi for two months. Qadi was barred from entering Turkey at the time by a Cabinet decision pursuant to UN Security Council resolutions. Yet, a corruption investigation into Erdoğan’s son revealed that Qadi entered Turkey illegally under the protection of Erdoğan and met with Erdoğan, National Intelligence Organization (MİT) head Hakan Fidan and others.

In the hearing on Monday, Demir said he was originally assigned to accompany Erdoğan’s special guest in İstanbul for a week but that he had to stay there longer when the guest’s stay was extended by two months. He was prevented from disclosing Qadi’s name in the hearing by the judge.

Emre Uslu, a security analyst, said Demir’s name was added to the government-orchestrated sham trial into the bugging incident because “he is a police officer who, after being asked by Erdoğan, took Yasin al-Qadi from Saudi Arabia to İstanbul, served as his guard during his stay in İstanbul and was aware of his meetings there with a number of authorities, including MİT head Hakan Fidan.”

Police investigators and prosecutors who inquired into the controversial activities of Qadi, who was listed as a financial supporter of the al-Qaeda terrorist organization by the US until very recently, were all reassigned, removed or even fired from their positions.

The botched corruption investigation revealed that Qadi entered Turkey seven times before his name was taken off the US and UN lists of those suspected of supporting terrorist activities. He entered Turkey without any paperwork at various airports, where he arrived on his private jet with the full knowledge and protection of the Prime Ministry. He was also given an official vehicle, a protection officer and a driver by the Prime Ministry, according to a leaked police investigation file. According to the file, Qadi and then-Prime Minister Erdoğan had 12 meetings in Turkey.

Fidan also met with Qadi five times in İstanbul and Ankara during a period when he was not supposed to be allowed into Turkey.

The 13 suspects in the current bugging case face charges of wiretapping Erdoğan for the aim of political espionage, violating the privacy of interpersonal communication and recording interpersonal conversation without permission. In their indictment, the prosecutors seek up to 36 years in prison for the suspects. It states that conversations in the office of President Erdoğan, who was prime minister at the time, were illegally monitored via bugging devices between Nov. 24, 2011 and Dec. 29, 2011.

Prosecutor Durak Çetin submitted the indictment to the court in November 2014, requesting an arrest warrant for 12 police officers who were detained on June 14 and former TÜBİTAK Deputy President Hasan Palaz. Palaz — who was first a witness but is now a suspect in the case — had earlier argued that TÜBİTAK had been pressured to issue a report stating that the bugs had been planted on a specific date.

During their interrogation at the prosecutor’s office, the police officers suspected of installing a bugging device in Erdoğan’s Ankara office denied any link to a device that was found during examinations of the Prime Ministry conducted by MİT three years ago.

The investigation into the spying started two-and-a-half years ago and the prosecutor of the case has been changed three times. No concrete evidence against the suspects has been found. The 72-page indictment in the case is based on newspaper clippings from government dailies, a report by MİT, a report by the Prime Ministry’s Inspection Board and the statements of a secret witness who reportedly works at a company that sells bugging devices.

Apart from the bugging device found in Erdoğan’s office at the Prime Ministry, the former prime minister announced on live TV on Dec. 22, 2012 that bugging devices had also been found in the office at his Ankara home. He did not specify when the devices were found. “Security units [the police] found those devices. They were placed inside the office in my house. Such things have occurred despite all measures having been taken to prevent them,” he said.

Bülent Korucu, a Turkish analyst who is closely following the case, said the indictment is ridden with deficiencies.

He said the prosecutor’s office was first notified of the incident on Feb. 24, 2012. Although the prosecutor’s office requested evidence which could be used for a judicial investigation, the Prime Ministry sent it on Jan. 13, 2014. “The Prime Ministry Monitoring Council [BTK] is said to have conducted the investigation. Yet the case involves a full-fledged judicial crime. It is unlawful to have the BTK conduct a judicial investigation. The BTK is not the authority to conduct an administrative investigation and is not authorized to perform a judicial investigation,” Korucu said.

Korucu also noted that the BTK was ordered to conduct the investigation on Dec. 25, 2012, i.e., exactly one year after the bugs were found on Dec. 24-25, 2011. He also questioned the most serious charge in the indictment, which is espionage for political purposes. “But we cannot find the elements of the offense in the indictment. There are no recordings and there is no information about the country for which this espionage was conducted. The only argument is that there are many foreign missions near the prime minister’s official residence. The suggestion is that these embassies are very close to the residence and can eavesdrop on the prime minister,” Korucu explained.

“The indictment falls short of substantiating the alleged crimes. It cannot establish a link between the evidence and the suspects. There are no fingerprints, no witnesses, no video recording or sound files which are said to have been recorded. It is not known who bought the devices and from where. It must have been a real challenge for the prosecutor to make up a crime and a criminal organization out of so many missing items,” he said.

During the hearing, the police officers suspected of installing a bugging device in Erdoğan’s Ankara office denied any link with a device that was found during examinations of the Prime Ministry conducted by MİT. The hearing also witnessed a procedural violation in which the judge did not order that the indictment be read out aloud in the courtroom. The judge also barred entry into the courtroom after the resumption of the hearing, which is only possible if a judge’s decision is present indicating it is a secret hearing; this, however, was not the case.

Ankara court begins Erdogan wiretapping case

January 2, 2015 By administrator

An Ankara court will begin the first hearing of a case into the illegal wiretapping of then-Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s offices on Jan. 2, Hurriyet Daily News reports.

However, five former policemen, who have been sought by police, are still on the run in the case which includes President Erdoğan.

A prosecutor had issued search warrants for the police officers involved in the probe last June. Eleven officers, including Erdoğan’s former chief bodyguard, were then detained at their homes on June 17, while a local police chief, who is suspected of planting the bug, was not detained because he was out of the country at the time.

The bugging devices, which have already been erased, were sent to the prosecutor in May and taken in by the court’s evidence unit.

Mehmet Sürer, the sought policemen’s attorney, said he had no contact with his clients and he did not know if they would be present in the court room.

The prosecutor’s indictment says the suspects had planted bugs inside three electricity plugs in the working office of Erdoğan at the Çankaya Palace, and the devices were used for political spying from Nov. 24, 2011 to Dec. 29, 2011, when they were discovered.

The indictment also questions six other bugs inside plugs in Erdoğan’s office at his residence in Ankara.

Edoğan made public on Dec. 21, 2012 that wiretapping devices had been found in his office and home, describing the move as “open espionage.

From Atatürk to Erdoğan (II)

December 27, 2014 By administrator

BY MUSTAFA AKYOL

The other day, an interesting email dropped into my inbox. It included a scanned page from the Los Angeles Examiner dated Aug. 1, 1926. One of the headlines was particularly notable, for it read: “Kemal Promises More Hangings of Political Antagonists in Turkey.” The “Kemal” in question was Turkey’s founder and first president Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who was then busy with crushing the “conspirators” against his rule.

The paper quoted Atatürk (who was still called “Kemal Pasha” at the time) as saying: “I shall not stop until every guilty person, no matter how high his rank, has been hung from the gallows as a grim warning to all incipient plotters against the security of the Turkish Republic.”

These “plotters,” Mustafa Kemal explained, were of two kinds. One was “the group who combined religious fanaticism and ignorance with political imbecility.” Their main crime was staying loyal to the Caliph-Sultan, the very leader of the ancient regime that Ataturk did away with. “I crushed them with an iron hand,” Kemal Pasha proudly said to the Los Angeles Examiner reporter. “For example, [I] had over sixty of their leaders hanged at dawn.”

The second group of “plotters” consisted of the members of the Committee of Union and Progress, or the political party that dominated the final decade of the Ottoman Empire. Although these people “fought in our ranks” against the occupying powers, Kemal Pasha explained, once the country was saved, they turned subversive and turned treasonous by trying to assassinate him.

The treason in question was the so-called “Izmir Assassination,” which was an alleged plot to kill Mustafa Kemal in June 1926. Most historians accept that the failed plot was real, but the prosecution that came after turned into a witch-hunt. Almost twenty people were executed, while many others were jailed or sent into exile. Most were innocent. A conspiracy against the iron-fisted ruler, in other words, made his fist even more solid.

Throughout his era (1923-38), Atatürk ruled in the same manner, crushing many of his opponents by blaming them for high treason. What he failed to see was that so many “traitors” existed mainly because of the exclusive nature of his regime. To be sure, he acted with patriotic idealism, hoping to achieve the best for his nation. He just could not accept that conflicting visions for the nation could also be patriotic and legitimate.

Now, let’s fast forward from the 1920’s to today. President Tayyip Erdoğan is again speaking about the “traitors” to the nation, condemning their conspiracies, and even spearheading criminal cases that appear to be witch-hunts to many. Of course, times have changed for the better, thus no one is executed or exiled. Moreover, just like in Atatürk’s time, not every conspiracy Erdoğan complains about is totally imaginary —the “parallel state,” especially, is not just a myth.

But the deeper problem of the 1920’s is valid for the 2010’s, too: The regime is confronted by too many “traitors,” mainly because of its own exclusive nature. The masters of the regime cannot see this, because they have zero tolerance for self-criticism. Moreover, they believe that they are saving the nation from a centuries-old darkness and propelling it towards a golden future. Therefore, they explain every resistance against their rule as an act of treason.

In other words, some things in Turkey never change, unfortunately. Very, very unfortunately.

December/27/2014