Gagrule.net News, Views, Interviews worldwide
Discussions on Karabakh will continue during the NATO summit in Warsaw, OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chair James Warlick said.
“Just arrived in #Warsaw for the @NATO summit. It’s an opportunity to continue discussions on #NKpeace with #Armenia and #Azerbaijan,” the diplomat tweeted.
Earlier it was reported that President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan will head to Warsaw for a NATO meeting on Afghanistan.
(DW) The German foreign minister has said recent NATO maneuvers could further inflame the security situation in eastern Europe. He has called for dialogue with Russia ahead of an upcoming NATO summit in Warsaw in early July.In comments published Saturday, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier sharply criticized recent NATO military exercises in eastern Europe, calling such drills counterproductive to security in the region.
On June 7, NATO launched exercises codenamed “Anakonda-16,” which simulated a Russian attack on Poland. The two-week-long drills involve some 31,000 troops, including 14,000 from the United States, 12,000 from Poland and 1,000 from the UK, as well as dozens of fighter jets and ships, along with 3,000 vehicles.
Speaking to Germany’s “Bild am Sonntag” newspaper, Steinmeier (SPD) said more dialogue and cooperation with Russia are needed, not what he deemed military posturing.
“What we shouldn’t do now is inflame the situation further through saber-rattling and war cries,” Steinmeier said in comments made available ahead of publication on Sunday. “Whoever believes that a symbolic tank parade on the alliance’s eastern border will bring security, is mistaken.
“We are well-advised to not create pretexts to renew an old confrontation,” he added.
Steinmeier instead called for dialogue and diplomacy, saying it would be “fatal to now narrow the focus to the military, and seek a remedy solely through a policy of deterrence.”
He told the newspaper that a willingness to negotiate must also be present alongside military precautions, and that the alliance should be prepared to “renew discussions about the benefits of disarmament and arms control for security in Europe.”
July summit
NATO is set to hold a summit on July 8 in Warsaw, where the member nations are expected to discuss perceived threats from Russia, boosted by conflict in neighboring Ukraine.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the organization plans to beef up its presence in eastern Europe with four additional multinational combat battalions in response to potential Russian expansionism.
Moscow has repeatedly criticized NATO’s recent actions, calling them needless provocations. The alliance has said it will hold formal talks with Russia ahead of the July summit.
bw/sms (dpa, Reuters, AFP)
Armenian MP Kortyun Nahapetyan spoke of the results of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly’s session in Tirana, Albania, on May 28-30, at a meeting with reporters on Thursday.
Prior to the session, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg addressed a letter to the Armenian and Azerbaijani delegations to discuss the Nagorno-Karabakh problem. The Armenian MP voiced his concern over the fact that the letter claims it to be a problem between Armenia and Azerbaijan alone and the OSCE Minsk Group is dealing with the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process.
“Our delegation noted that we did not consider it advisable to discuss the issue as the only efficient format is the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs, and discussing the issue in any other organizations is not in line with conflict settlement mechanisms,” the Armenian MP said.
According to Nahapetyan, Armenia counteracted to the Azerbaijani delegation leader’s remark on “Armenian occupations”, pointing out directly the side responsible for unleashing a war.
“Apart from the war operations in April, Azerbaijan’s violations of international humanitarian norms, brutalities and tortures were highlighted. There was reference also to the Ramil Safarov case, the human rights and democracy situation in Azerbaijan, and the armament purchased with oil revenues,” he said.
“We reiterated our willingness, saying that the Armenian authorities do not want a military settlement of the conflict.”
Nahapetyan said that an Azerbaijani delegate attempted later to ask questions on Nagorno-Karabakh, provoking tension adding that the Armenian delegation managed eventually to exclude the question from the agenda.
Greek left wing protesters have held a major rally outside the NATO base in Souda Bay on the Greek island of Crete, demanding the expulsion of the “imperialist” alliance which they claim “violates” the “sovereignty” of the country.
Amid heavy police presence, the protesters, led by Greek MP and Communist Party member Manolis Syntychakis, burned EU and NATO flags in front of the cameras. Holding protest banners and chanting anti- NATO slogans, the crowd delivered a letter bearing a list of demands to Air Force Colonel Ioannis Gerolimos, commander of the Hellenic Air Force base.
“We are here and we call upon citizens to fight and close the foreign bases and disengage our country from any form of US and NATO [participation],” said the chairman of the All Workers Military Front (PAME), Joanna Kourpa.
The Hellenic Air Force Base, home to Greek Air Force’s 115th Combat Wing, located east of the city of Hania, is also used by the United States Naval Support Activity (NSA). In addition it houses NATO Missile Firing Installation.
In February, a seven-ship flotilla was ordered to the Aegean to carry out reconnaissance patrols to help the coastguard of Greece and Turkey stem out the immigrant flow.
The protesters who are led by PAME view the Aegean operation as “mortal danger” which “violates sovereignty” of Greece. They accuse Athens and the EU of using the European refugee crisis as a “pretext” to promote “imperialist” ambitions and start interventions in countries such as Syria and Libya.
Furthermore, the anti-NATO activists argue that Greek bases are being used “in competition with Russia in the region and to encourage the aggressiveness of the Turkish state.”
© seselj.vojislav.srs / Facebook
Serbian radicals in Belgrade are protesting against NATO on the 17th anniversary of the bombing of Yugoslavia. They also rallied against a UN war crimes tribunal which yesterday sentenced former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic to 40 years in jail.
The rally was organized by the Serbian Radical Party, which is headed by Vojislav Seselj – who served as deputy prime minister of Serbia between 1998 and 2000.
The protest marked the 17th anniversary of the start of NATO’s bombing campaign in Yugoslavia, which began on March 24, 1999. The demonstrators held banners saying “NATO dropped more bombs on Serbia than all the terrorists in the world.”
“Those who were bombing us in 1999, who were killing our children, those criminals from NATO, have now got the right voted in by parliament to walk freely across Serbia,” Seselj said in his address to the crowds, as cited by the website Balkan Insight.
The protesters also criticized Thursday’s verdict delivered by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), which sentenced Karadzic to 40 years in prison. The former Bosnian Serb president was found guilty on 10 charges out of 11.
Some of the protesters were carrying portraits of Karadzic.
Karadzic “was convicted [even though] he was innocent… and because he is Serb who found himself at a decisive and historic moment at the head of [the administrative entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina] Republika Srpska,” Seselj said.
The one charge that was dropped related to the allegations that Bosnian Serb forces committed genocide in seven municipalities of Bosnia. However, the 44-month siege of Sarajevo also amounts to a war crime, the judge ruled.
Though Karadzic was indicted by the tribunal in 1995, he was captured 13 years later in Belgrade, where he lived disguised as a faith healer. The Serbian authorities handed him over to international investigators for the trial, which began in 2009.
Stanley Weiss, The World Post,
February 24, 2016
One of the American diplomats who engaged fully in the creation of the North Atlantic Treaty was called Achilles, and therefore did not fail to excite the imagination of historians. As head of the office of the State Department for the affairs of Western Europe after the Second World War, then as Assistant Vice President of the North Atlantic Council, Theodore Achilles has played a leading role in the development of this Treaty, designed to deter an expansionist Soviet Union trigger an attack in Western Europe. With 11 European countries joining the US as founding members in 1949, the alliance grew rapidly to include in 1952 two countries – Greece and Turkey – to count 28 members today. It was so difficult to imagine that any member of the organization to betray the rest of the alliance, we only discovered these days that nothing in the Nato procedures to exclude a country that misbehaves; no definition is also there what would be considered a “wrongful conduct”. Yet, nearly three decades after the fall of the Soviet Union, members of NATO to pronounce each other the same solemn oath known to Article 5, they created in 1949 that an attack against any member shall be considered an attack against all member states, and called for an immediate and mutual response. For nearly seven decades, this combination of factors is a potential Achilles heel for NATO one day, its members will be called to defend the actions of a rogue state that no longer shares the values of the alliance, but whose attitude puts its “allies” in danger in a nightmare scenario for the world order.
After 67 years, that day has come: Turkey, which has been for half a century a faithful ally in the Middle East while demonstrating that a nation made up mostly of Muslims can be both secular and democratic, s it is at this distant point of its Nato allies that it is considered a support of the Islamic state in Syria in its war against the West. Since the strong man of Islamism Erdogan came to power in 2003, Turkey has taken a frankly authoritarian turn, supporting Islamic terrorists of all stripes while engaging in battles that it can carry out through region – including the escalation of a war against 25 million Kurds of EI fighter and a cold war warming up against Russia, which she shot without thinking a plane in November. These fights that install – while the bombs in its cities and that the enemies are on its borders – Turkish leaders demand the unconditional support of NATO, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Saturday that he expected “that US supports our ally Turkey without if or but. “ But it was too little, too late. NATO should not not take the defense of Turkey – instead, it should be undertaken without delay to the already long list that gets longer by the day sprains of Turkey towards the West, in prominently support Islamic terrorists. And if it does – and there is no doubt on this point – the supreme council of the alliance, the North Atlantic Council should formally oust Turkey from NATO, once and for all, before his belligerence and his continual assaults involve the international community in a third world war.
This should have been done long ago. As I have shown there are five years, “Erdogan, who has Islamist at heart, who once said” the mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets, and our faith is our soldiers “- seems to regard as the Islamist leader of the Muslim world after the Arab Spring”. He has spent the past 13 years the dismantling of all components of the Turkish company that made secular and democratic reshaping that country, as Caroline Glick wrote of the Center for Security Policy, “in a hybrid and autocracy putiniste Iranian theocracy. “ Last fall, he went up to praise the powers of the executive given one day to Adolph Hitler.
Under the leadership of Erdogan, our ally within NATO have arrested more journalists than China has arrested, imprisoned thousands of students guilty of having used the freedom of expression, and replaced secular schools by madrasas dedicated to the teaching of Islam. Erdogan has publicly flaunted its support for Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood while accusing its longtime ally Israel of “crimes against humanity”, he violated an embargo on the supply of arms to Gaza, acquired an air defense system (and short-range missile) to the Chinese in spite of NATO, and denied to America’s use of its own air base for strikes in Iraq and later against terrorists Islamists in Syria. While Western allies fought to stem the fighters of the Islamic state in the town of Ayn al-Arab in western Syria there two years, Turkish tanks were quietly stopped on the other side of the border .
In fact, there is undeniable proof (made at Columbia University), Turkey has tacitly fueled the EI war machine. “It is proven that Turkey, as recently wrote Outlook Near East, allowed jihadists from various parts of the world to infiltrate into Syria through the territory of Turkey”; Turkey, writes journalist Ted Galen Carpenter, “authorized the EI to send oil to Turkey from northern Syria to be sold on the world market”, the own son Erdogan worked with EI to sell this oil, which is “the lifeblood of the death of the Islamic state of merchants”, and that entire refueling trucks were allowed to move freely through Turkey to the fighters of the EI. There is also the “most direct support evidence” as Forbes reported, “providing equipment, passports, training, drugs, and perhaps more to Islamic radicals”, and evidence that the Erdogan government, according to a former ambassador, worked directly with the Syrian branch of al Qaeda, al-Nusrah front.
While in Ankara is claimed initiate military action against EI, obsessed with the Kurdish issue, Turkey is conducting a series of incessant artillery fire against units of protection of Syrian Kurds (YPG) that combat troops of EI in northern Syria. The Kurds are the largest ethnic group in the world without a country – 25 million of Sunni Muslims who live at the intersection of the borders of Syria, Iraq, Iran and Turkey. Turkey is three decades of bloody civil war against its 14 million Kurds represented by the PKK, the Kurdistan Workers Party – which has cost a life to 40 000 people. The latest peace process écoué when the Turks were again targeted the PKK, plunging the southeast of the country once again into war giving Erdogan growing fears that Syrian Kurds Turkish and operate the junction of their forces over the border from Turkey.
The Kurds, like the Turks, are sometimes viewed through the prism of what they were then, and not for what they are today. In 1997, Turkey had convinced the United States to place the PKK on the terrorist list, and Erdogan argues that the Syrian Kurds are guilty by association. But in fact, the YPG has worked closely with the US against Islamic terrorists to the point that the Washington Post has referred to its members as the “US proxy forces”. The Kurds – be they Syria, Iraq and Turkey, are all points of view the fiercest and most courageous fighters on the field of battle against IE in Iraq and Syria. And furthermore, the group represents a powerful alternative to the apocalyptic jihadist Islamists, representing what has been described as having “a level of gender equality, respect for secularism and minorities, and design modern Islam, moderate and ecumenical which are to say the least, rare in the region. “
The Turkish government has tried to cast aspersions on the YPG, following the recent bomb blasts in Ankara, hoping to push the United States to oppose the Kurds. An exasperated Erdogan railed about the loyalties of the West, accusing the US of creating a “sea of blood” in the region through their support of the Kurds, and posing an ultimatum: he said that it was time for the United States to choose between Turkey and the Kurds. I can not agree more: it is time for the US to choose the Kurds rather than Erdogan’s Turkey.
Critics argue that the Kurds do not want to fight against the EI beyond their borders, but in fact provides an opportunity for the United States. In exchange for the fight of the EI across the region, an international coalition might offer the Kurds a state of their own. A Kurdish state would become a critical ally in the region for the US and play a valuable role in filling the power vacuum that has settled in the Middle East. With the help of the United States, a Kurdish state could also help to restore the refugees who have flooded the immigration systems in Turkey and Europe.
In the long term, it could play the role of a regional partner value to stabilize the region, and it could be a very successful example of democracy. In other words, Kurdistan could hold the role that Turkey had. It has been said that the difference between being and being almost Achilles Achilles is the difference between living and dying. NATO can exist without Achilles tendon: it’s time to throw Turkey out for good.
Stanley Weiss, a mining company executive and founder of Business Executives for National Security based in Washington has been widely published in national and international numbers for three decades.
Gilbert Béguian translation for Armenew
Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova © Maksim Blinov / Sputnik
NATO’s promise of security and attempts to drag Serbia into the alliance are humiliating for the Balkan country at a time when two of its diplomats held hostage in Libya were killed in a pin-point US airstrike, Russia’s FM spokeswoman said.
On Friday, US airstrikes against positions of an Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) affiliate group in Sabratha, Libya, killed more than 40 people including two Serbian nationals held hostage by the jihadists. Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic said the death of two embassy workers was “terrible collateral damage” and demanded explanations from Washington.
On Sunday, speaking on the Rossiya 1 TV channel, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said Washington keeps accusing Russia of bombing civilian targets, providing no evidence whatsoever, and at the same times behaves as if nothing has happened when their own strikes result in confirmed civilian deaths.
Zakharova noted that just a few days after the disinformation campaign, which accused Russia of striking an MSF-supported medical facility in Idlib province of Syria, a US anti-terrorist air raid conducted in Libya without authorization “killed two Serbian embassy staff.”
The US government should have known that two Serbian hostages were being held by IS affiliates in Libya, Zakharova said, as the Serbian government had shared their information with US intelligence agencies prior to the strikes.
“The most tragic is that this information was given to the FBI and CIA. This is what the Serbian authorities said,” Zakharova noted, adding that the US is now “denying” knowledge of the hostages whereabouts.
Zhakarova questioned how the US can promise Serbia security once they have joined NATO, if Washington can’t avoid doing things such as striking targets that have been red flagged ahead of time. In this case, by Serbia concerning its diplomats.
What security [guarantees]? What are you [US] talking about?” she asked rhetorically, calling the situation a “special form of humiliation.”
“This is an imposition of the Stockholm syndrome [on Serbia], when they force their victims to love them and admit publicly that they want to be with them,” the spokesperson said.
“This is a special kind of perversion,” Zakharova repeated.
Serbia witnessed a mass wave of demonstrations on Saturday, prompted by the government signing a deal guaranteeing diplomatic immunity and free movement to NATO troops.
Thousands of people across the country rejected the deal as unconstitutional and against the will of the Serbian people.
While PM Vucic has defended the decision, saying, “Serbia is maintaining its sovereignty and wants to cooperate both with NATO and with the Russian Federation,” critics from the ultra-conservative nationalist Zavet and Obraz movements promised to launch a legal appeal against the treaty.
As tensions escalate between Turkey and Russia, NATO has warned Ankara that it will not take part in a war provoked by the Turkish government.
Last November, Turkey shot down a Russian jet flying through Syrian airspace. While many feared that the incident would plunge both countries into war, conflict was avoided, though relations between Moscow and Ankara have remained chilly.
As Turkey pushes to deploy ground forces across its border to remove the legitimate government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, the Turkish government is, again, threatening the world with war.
“The armed forces of the two states are both active in fierce fighting on the Turkish-Syrian border, in some cases just a few kilometers from each other,” one NATO official told Der Spiegel.
Ankara’s aggression seems partially based on the assumption that, should conflict erupt, Turkey will be supported by its NATO allies. According to Article 5 of the NATO treaty, the collective defense clause would be invoked if any member state is attacked.
But European leaders have made it abundantly clear that they have no interest in participating in a war of Turkey’s making.
“NATO cannot allow itself to be pulled into a military escalation with Russia as a result of the recent tensions between Russia and Turkey,” Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn told Der Spiegel.
Of Article 5, Asselborn stressed that “the guarantee is only valid when a member state is clearly attacked.”
Germany appears to agree.
“We are not going to pay the price for a war started by the Turks,” said a German diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity.
NATO leadership made similar warnings soon after Turkey’s downing of the Russian bomber last year.
“We have to avoid that situations, incidents, accidents spiral out of control,” NATO General Secretary Jens Stoltenberg said at the time. “I think I’ve expressed very clearly that we are calling for calm and de-escalation. This is a serious situation.”
On Friday, French President Francois Hollande stressed the need to prevent conflict between Moscow and Ankara.
“There is a risk of war between Turkey and Russia,” he said in an interview with France Inter radio.
As Turkey calls to escalate the violence in Syria, Russia has called for a meeting of the United Nations Security Council to address its concerns over the rising tensions.
“The situation is becoming more tense due to increased tensions on the Syrian-Turkish border and Turkey’s stated plans to send troops to northern Syria,” reads a statement from the Russian Foreign Ministry.
Turkey has recently reiterated its intention to build offensive missile systems, claiming that it is “difficult for a country to be deterrent with defensive missiles only”; the move has puzzled NATO, as it’s doubtful that the member state’s demand for such arms has any “strategic sense” and calls into question whether Turkey intends to go rogue.
“It is puzzling from a NATO perspective that this ally wants to develop offensive missile capabilities,” one NATO ambassador in Ankara told the website Defense News. “Turkey is part of the security umbrella. We are not sure if any Turkish effort for offensive missiles makes strategic sense … despite [Turkey’s] legitimate perceptions of increased military threat in its region.”
His words are echoed by an EU ambassador in Ankara, who also said that the Turkish move to put an offensive system in place was “confusing”.
“Such ambitions can fuel sectarian tensions in the region. A missile rivalry between a NATO member and Iran does not sound pleasant in any way,” he is quoted as saying by the website.
Turkey’s ambitions have caused concerns from other experts, who are wondering if Turkey may eventually go rogue.
“Ballistic missiles have certain disadvantages … like lack of precision. They can also be easily intercepted. Their limited payload is another problem. In comparison a modern fighter jet can carry up to four or five times more payload and is an agile aerial asset,” said one London-based Turkey specialist.
He explained that missiles are often preferred by “rogue states” as they can carry biological, chemical and nuclear warheads.
“Turkey is not a rogue state and it is curious that it has ambitions to develop offensive missile systems,” he added.
On January 7, Turkey’s top procurement official, Ismail Demir, reiterated Turkey’s ambitions to develop offensive missiles.
“It is difficult for a country to be deterrent with defensive missiles only … This is why offensive [missile] systems too should be developed,” Demir claimed at a briefing to the Turkish parliament’s defense committee.
“The political authority is determined that Turkey should possess such missile capabilities. How, at what cost and how soon are questions that remain to be examined,” he added.
In November, Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on the Turkish national TV channel ATV that Turkey may adopt a strategy of local acquisition of long-range surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) with offensive capabilities with a range of about 3,000 kilometers.
Earlier in November Turkey scrapped a $3.44 billion tender for the SAM system, code-named T-Loramids, for which in 2013 it selected as a contractor China Precision Machinery Import-Export Corp. (CPMIEC), offering the HQ-9 system.
The selection of CPMIEC drew considerable criticism from the US as well as from other NATO allies over inter-operability and the security issues of operating a Chinese system.
“What is important is whether we will engage in defense or offense in the long term. We want [these missiles] to be developed locally but to also have an offensive nature. With the cancellation of the missile tender we took this step. We are currently developing missiles, but we are not at the level we want them to be concerning their range,” Erdogan told ATV on November 18, highlighting that the canceled T-Loramids project was a missile defense project.
The politicians admit that at any such program’s initial stages, Turkey would need foreign know-how.
Without naming any particular country that may be willing to assist any Turkish program, Ismail Demir, however, did not reject the “Chinese option.”
Turkish media also suggests that it is highly possible Ankara may “knock on China’s door” to develop its own long-range missiles with ballistic missile capability.
“This is because Turkey’s allies will refrain from forging any cooperation with Ankara to help it develop long-range missiles that will have ballistic missile capabilities as well,” suggests Turkish English-language daily Today’s Zaman.
The move, it says, will mark a dramatic change in Turkey’s defense policy of acquiring non-offensive weapons.
“Hence it now seems Turkey will no longer rely solely on NATO’s security umbrella in the case of any threats posed to it and will go solo when necessary.”
Source:sputniknews.com
Iraq’s readiness to take military action against Turkey if Ankara fails to withdraw its troops from Iraqi territory has increased the possibility of NATO involvement on the side of Turkey and its territorial ambitions, reported the German press on Thursday.
Even though Iraq is aiming for a diplomatic solution to its dispute with Turkey, its government hasn’t ruled out using military force in order to remove Turkish troops from Iraqi territory, thus raising the possibility of NATO involvement, German Economic News (DWN) reported on Thursday.
“If it comes to war, NATO must be on the side of Turkey in Iraq,” the newspaper pointed out.
‘Iraq doesn’t want any Turkish troops in its country, and threatens war against a NATO country,’ reported DWN.
The Federal Republic of Germany has been a NATO member since 1955. In December the German government announced that its forces were joining the US-led anti-Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) coalition in a non-combat, support role.
On Wednesday, Iraq’s Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said that although Iraq wants to use diplomatic means to resolve the conflict, it does not exclude the use of force if “fighting is imposed on us.”
“We will consider it (the use of military force) to protect our sovereignty, people and resources,” said al-Jaafari.
In early December, the Turkish government sent a battalion of 25 tanks and about 150 troops into northern Iraq without the permission of the Iraqi government.
Ankara said its forces were there with the assent of the Iraqi government, and were sent in response to security concerns in northern Iraq, where its forces help to train Iraqi militia battling Daesh in northern Iraq. The Iraqi government in Baghdad called the incursion a violation of Iraqi sovereignty, and demanded the troops withdraw in 48 hours.
At first Turkey refused to withdraw troops from the Bashiqa military base, which is close to Mosul in northern Iraq, but later agreed to withdraw some of the forces after Iraq complained to the UN Security Council. On Wednesday the Iraqi government again complained, that Turkey has so far failed to honour the agreement to withdraw all its troops from Iraqi territory.
Turkey has been a NATO member since 1952, and according to the terms of the North Atlantic Treaty, the principle of collective defence commits its members to defend each other in the event of an armed attack against another member. However, Article 5 of the Treaty makes no reference to the alliance’s responsibilities to intervene in the case of an act of aggression by a NATO country.
Source:sputniknews.com