Don’t let us create a northern Iraq problem as well

The danger is not over yet. It will hang over our heads like Damocles’s legendary sword.

The uneasiness I feel — along with many other people — in fact stems from the developments in northern Iraq. Unless the situation in northern Iraq is brought under control without any delay, northern Iraq will turn into a major bundle of problems of Turkey’s own making.

We must not have turn northern Iraq into an enemy
Turkey tends to see the northern Iraqi Kurds as an enemy on an increasing scale. Some of the northern Iraqi Kurds undoubtedly have ulterior motives. We know, for example, that, after building their independence — or their own system within a confederative structure — they want to unite with the Kurds in Turkey to realize their dream of Greater Kurdistan.

However, we find fault with the Turkish stance against that. With this approach, expansion of the Kurdish problem cannot be prevented. On the contrary, that would expand the quagmire.

Turkey’s attitude creates the impression that it wants to put troops in northern Iraq and keep the developments under control, that it is trying to organize-train-arm the Turkmens and use them against the Kurds.

Officials, the civilians included, keep making statements in which they rap northern Iraq. Imposing restrictions all the time on Habur border gate, northern Iraq’s food supply line, they use Habur, in a way, to punish the Iraqi Kurds.

To sum up, Turkey seems to have the tendency to turn northern Iraq into a region that is hostile to Turkey.

This is not the way to fight with PKK/KADEK
Turkish officials approach the issue in this manner because they want to:

* ensure that PKK/KADEK will leave Iraq, laying down its arms,

* and prevent northern Iraq from constituting a model for the Kurdish separatists in Turkey.

To have the PKK-KADEK militants disarmed and driven out of the region, Ankara is trying to use its relations with only Talabani and Barzani but also with the U.S.

However, there has been a friction with Washington and — here my worries begin — there is the danger that if no move is made the Ankara-Washington relations may gradually get out of control. Therefore, it seems that the support Ankara expects from Washington on the PKK issue will not be forthcoming.

For Turkey it is impossible to keep up the fight against the PKK while having friction with the U.S. Turkey cannot solve the PKK problem by keeping up the hostility towards Americans and Kurds. In fact, the region may become a "hotbed of enmity" that embraces the PKK.

This is why former president Suleyman Demirel has issued repeated warnings in recent days.

Demirel says that the PKK cannot be "rendered marginal" by having a fight with Talabani and Barzani and by having hostilies with the U.S. He says, "Let us clearly define the boundaries of the duties of our troops over there, disclosing these boundaries to the public."

He implies that if Turkey does not act in a transparent manner on this issue, if Turkey cannot reach an agreement with the U.S., Turkey may be faced with bigger incidents in the future.

He is right.

Fear of Kurds and Islamists being revived
There are certain columnists in Turkey that, by using their columns, you can see which institutions exactly think in which vein.

In recent days the PKK attacks and the activities of the Islamists have been pushed to the foreground. Curiously, they use these cases to spew fire at the harmonization with the European Union bills. What they imply is this:

"Let us suspend the democratization drive since this is only a big trick. Don’t let us play into the hands of those who want to split up the country, who want to bring about a religious state."

I am not belittling the importance of these issues.

However, I believe that an effective fight against these can be conducted through democratization rather than through the age-old methods. There are ample examples of that in the world.

The Turkish society has shown clearly that it will give points to the Kurdish militants or to those who want to spread political Islam. Should we not admit that the seventh harmonization with the EU package is important not for the EU but for us, ourselves?