BUSH VOWS CAMPAIGN WITH TURKEY AGAINST KURDISH REBELS
AFP
11-05-2007
WASHINGTON (AFP) — President George W. Bush, vying to avert a
Turkish incursion into Iraq, Monday pledged to step up US military and
intelligence cooperation to aid Turkey’s fight against Kurdish rebels.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan welcomed Bush’s commitments
following crisis talks here between the two leaders, but said his
country had no plans to withdraw some 100,000 troops massed on the
border with Iraq.
Bush insisted that the United States stood shoulder to shoulder with
its NATO ally Turkey over a spate of deadly cross-border attacks by
the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
"PKK is a terrorist organization. They’re an enemy of Turkey. They’re
an enemy of Iraq. And they’re an enemy of the United States," Bush
told reporters after the White House meeting.
The president announced a new three-way military partnership grouping
the United States, Turkey and Iraq to improve the sharing of real-time
intelligence on the PKK.
Washington was also looking at cutting off money flows to the Kurdish
rebels, and their ease of travel, he said.
As Pakistan sinks deeper into political crisis, Bush would be loath
to see any escalation in tensions between Turkey, another crucial
anti-terror partner, and US allies in northern Iraq’s autonomous
Kurdish region.
As the two leaders met, hundreds of banner-waving ethnic Kurds
including many in traditional dress rallied outside the White House
with chants of "stop the Turkish invasion."
"We are not after war. We have a mandate from the Turkish parliament
to conduct an (anti-PKK) operation," Erdogan said at Washington’s
National Press Club, describing himself has "happy" as a result of
his talks with Bush.
The prime minister said Turkey was awaiting concrete action following
assurances by Iraq’s government that it is clamping down on the PKK.
"And so I will trust this process and we will see what takes place
as this process moves along," he said through an interpreter, while
declining to say whether Turkey might now review its massed deployment
of troops on the border.
"We will continue to take those precautions," he said.
Ahead of his meeting with Bush, Erdogan warned "the Turkish people
have run out of patience."
But in an interview with the Italian daily La Stampa, Erdogan also said
Turkey could call off its threatened incursion if "the Iraq government
took urgent and permanent measures against the PKK in Iraqi territory."
Earlier Monday, Iraqi Kurdish regional prime minister Nechirvan
Barzani proposed four-party talks to end the PKK incursions —
with his government as one of the participants along with Ankara,
Baghdad and Washington.
"This is a transnational issue, complicated by ethnic ties, and
no party can find a solution on its own," Barzani wrote in the
Washington Post.
But PKK leader Murat Karayilan called on the Iraqi Kurdish leadership
to stand by its ethnic kin.
"No action (against the PKK) can be successful … as long as we,
the Kurds, preserve our unity," he told the Firat news agency,
considered to be a mouthpiece of the PKK.
Erdogan was being accompanied by Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan
and Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul on his brief visit to Washington,
before he heads to Rome for talks with Italian Prime Minister Romano
Prodi.
Despite Iraq’s announcement of new steps to curb the PKK separatists,
Babacan said military options "remain on the table."
Some observers fear that US influence with Turkey has been undermined
by a push in Congress to label the Ottoman Empire’s World War I
massacre of ethnic Armenians as "genocide."
But fierce pressure from both Turkey and the White House appears to
have paid off for now, with its Democratic authors agreeing late last
month to shelve a House debate on the resolution.
"We view this with cautious optimism," Erdogan said, thanking the
Bush administration and House members who had spoken out against the
bill for fear of its damage to sensitive ties with Turkey.
"We are ready to settle accounts with our history, but our documents
indicate that no such genocide took place. In fact our values do not
permit our people to commit genocide," the Turkish leader said.