TRKNWS-L Turkish Daily News (February 2, 1996)

From: TRKNWS-L <trh@aimnet.com>

Turkish News Directory

CONTENTS

TURKISH DAILY NEWS / 2 February 1996

[01] PM Ciller converts her Kardak success into political capital

Turkish Daily News

ANKARA- Prime Minister Tansu Ciller on Wednesday continued to make domestic political capital out of the "Kardak Rocks" crisis which brought Turkey and Greece to the brink of a military confrontation on Tuesday.

Meanwhile officials in Ankara have said that Turkey is prepared to discuss all the problems that exist between the two countries.

They have indicated that Turkey will not accept talks where only isolated issues are taken up selectively while other related problems are overlooked.

Meanwhile in Brussels, Greece was reported on Thursday as having failed to muster the support it sought from its European Union partners to condemn Turkey.

Addressing the parliamentary group of her True Path Party (DYP) on Wednesday, Ciller said she had resisted "intense international pressures" not to act, and had ordered Turkish forces to move against Greek forces which had landed on Kardak.

Delivering an emotional address to deputies from her party, Ciller said that she had been cautioned "by the voice on the other side of the telephone" that even a single civilian's landing on Kardak would trigger a war.

The reference to the "voice on the telephone" appeared to be to President Bill Clinton who on Tuesday night intervened with Ankara and Athens to defuse the crisis.

"But this country has a historic legacy. For us there is giving up life but not land. Every pebble in this country carries the blood of martyrs," she said, using emotional words which brought her close to tears from time to time.

"Pressures (against Turkey) are continuing. But at ten to two after midnight Turkish soldiers land on the island. Sometimes history takes shape between the two lips of a person," Ciller said using the present tense apparently for heightened effect.

"But what really writes history is the legacy of the past. What I told everyone throughout the night was this: `That flag will come down and that soldier will leave.' There was great diplomatic shuttling going on involving everyone from (President Bill) Clinton to (U.S. Assistant Secretary of State) Holbrooke.

But I said the same thing throughout: `That flag will come down and that soldier will leave,'" Ciller said.

She was referring to the Greek flag that had been posted on Kardak Rock and the Greek soldiers that had landed on it.

"At eight in the morning that flag came down, and at eight-thirty that soldier left," she said, concluding that what had taken place with this incident "would be left to future generations as a legacy." The Anatolia news agency quoted officials in Ankara on Thursday as saying that no indication had yet been received as to how Richard Holbrooke intended to bring up the problems between Turkey and Greece relating to the Aegean when he visits the capitals of the two countries soon.

Holbrooke has announced that he will be travelling to the region in the coming days to try and defuse the rising tension between the two countries.

"We want a settlement to all the problems between Turkey and Greece, including the disputes in the Aegean. As it is, all the problems in the Aegean are related to one another. If you bring one up then the other naturally comes up," an unnamed Turkish official was quoted by Anatolia as saying.

"Turkey is ready to discuss all the issues, including the question of minorities. If Athens says `What about the Greek minority in Istanbul?' we are prepared to discuss that also" the official said, making a reference to the plight of the Turks of Western Thrace in Greece.

"But we cannot accept a situation whereby we take up some of the problems and disregard others as if they did not exist," the official said.

Also reporting on the subject from Brussels on Thursday, Anatolia said Greece had failed to get the support it sought for its case from the European Parliament and the European Commission.

It said that Greek Euro MPs had failed to get EP speaker Klaus Hansch to make a statement on the subject critical of Turkey, and also failed to have an urgent motion put on the Parliament's agenda for a resolution condemning Ankara.

Anatolia said the only positive response to the Greek request had come from Socialist Group leader Pauline Greene, but added that her position had been considered as "premature" even by some Socialist deputies.

It also quoted European Commission President Jacques Santer as saying in response to Greek demands that this was not a subject for the Commission but for the EU Council to take up.

Anatolia said that Greek deputies would be bringing the matter up again during the upcoming session of the EP starting on Feb.12.

Basking in the afterglow of his successful mediation role in settling the crisis between Turkey and Greece, Richard Holbrooke told a National Press Club luncheon on Wednesday that a stiff public admonition for both Turkey and Greece had "made people realize that you just can't fool around like this," TDN Washington representative Ugur Akinci reported on Thursday.

Drawing attention to the central role played by eight hours of negotiations launched by the U.S. administration, Holbrooke said Turkey and Greece preferred to deal with each other through Washington.

"In the end, neither side would give the other a guarantee they wouldn't do something again in the future," he said.

"But each side was willing to say to the United States they wouldn't do something in the future ... and we conveyed it. The United States is holding in escrow these two agreements that they will go back to the status quo ante," he said.

Commenting on his upcoming visit to Athens and Ankara Holbrooke said the focus would not be on the Cyprus issue, as announced before, but "on trying to lower tensions in the Aegean." Until Greece and Turkey "normalize" their relations, there would always be instability in that part of the world, Holbrooke said.

He also underlined Turkey's continuing geostrategic importance and repeated his earlier assertion that "Turkey is and remains the frontline state of Europe."

[02] Turkey to get Harpoon anti-shipping missiles

WASHINGTON- Turkey will receive in August 1997 an unconfirmed quantity of Harpoon missiles and spare parts from the United States under the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program, according to the U.S. Department of Defense. Harpoon is a long-range sea-skimming anti-shipping missile deployed in surface ships and submarines, in land-based coastal defense positions, and on some aircraft. Currently the Turkish Navy has Harpoon missiles deployed on destroyers, frigates and missile crafts.

McDonnell Douglas Aerospace, is being awarded a $17.3 million contract for Harpoon Launch Systems and spares for Harpoon Missiles, Pentagon said. Turkey will receive 21 percent of the missiles produced. The remainder will be purchased by Korea (60 percent), Denmark (6 percent), Australia (6 percent), Israel (4 percent), Egypt (2), and Japan (1). The Harpoons will be produced in McDonnell Douglas facilities in St. Louis, Missouri; Baltimore, Maryland; and San Diego, California and are expected to be completed by August 1997.

[03] Bulgaria monitoring PKK activities on its soil

ANKARA- Bulgaria is closely monitoring the activities of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) on its soil, the Anatolia news agency quoted a Bulgarian police official as saying.

Col. Jivko Zhelev, head of the National Security Department of the Sofia police, said two PKK members had meetings in Bulgaria last year. "One of them came from Germany and the other from Turkey. They were from the PKK's political wing," he said.

Zhelev reported that the activities of two Kurdish associations in Sofia were also being closely monitored by the police. Turkey says the associations have close links with the PKK.

Zhelev said that the Bulgarian police have been more concerned about PKK activity since the bomb explosion at a small Kurdish restaurant in central Sofia on Jan. 1 in which three people were injured.

Bulgaria's crime rate has more than tripled from 1990 to 1995 as the country has grappled with the transition to a market economy. President Zhelyu Zhelev urged the Socialist government in a brief New Year speech to crack down on crime and the mafia.