 Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan and U.S. President Bush
The Kurdistan Workers’ Party
(PKK) was formed in 1978 as a
Marxist-Leninist Kurdish terrorist
organization in Turkey. Its
aim is to establish an independent
Kurdish state on the territories of
southeastern of Turkey and the
northern Syria. For this purpose,
the PKK carried out numerous
terrorist attacks in Turkey. 35,000
thousands people including governmental
officials and Turkish-
Kurdish civilians lost their lives
due to the PKK attacks. It is out
of debate comparing to human
cost; however, the PKK also cost
to Turkey for over 125 billions of
dollars.
Beginning of the 1990s were the heydays of the PKK; however, the
support of Kurdish people even on this period was also symbolic.
The PKK never has drawn attentions of Kurdish people for its aim
for autonomous Kurdish state. Finally, after the capture of the PKK
leader, Abdullah Ocalan, in 1999 by a joint operation of the U.S. and
Turkish forces, PKK activity within Turkey considerably reduced.
The terrorist organization had difficulties to recruit new members
for its activities. However, the war between the U.S. and Iraq in
2003 has commenced a new period for the PKK. The weakness
of the new Iraqi government gave new opportunities to the PKK
to train their recruits, to provide weapons, and safe bases to attack
Turkey. As a result, the PKK has again begun its terrorist attacks
by crossing the border since April 2007. The first assessment of
Turkish people regarding increased PKK terrorist attacks was that
the weakness of Iraqi government caused these outrages terrorist
activities, and military action for Northern Iraq was inevitable to
stop the PKK. Therefore, increased public and political pressure on
Turkish government for the military operation forced Turkey to take
immediate necessary steps for effective and permanent solutions.
 Prime Minister Erdogan and President Bush shake hands
For the first step, rather
than crossed border military
operation to finish the
existence of the PKK, Turkish
government gave priority in
gaining the support of many
countries including Iraq and
the U.S. through diplomacy.
Turkey started intensive
diplomatic campaign, while
focusing on military measures
as well. Normally, Turkish
Parliament authorized the
government to carry out
crossed border operation, but
according to the previous
experiences, Turkey has
realized that though military
measures alone cannot effectively resolve the problem. Although
neither the U.S. nor the Iraqi governments were unwilling to carry
out military operation considering that any military action would
more destabilize the Northern Iraq, Turkey was decisive to stop the
PKK at any cost after consuming diplomatic efforts.
For this purpose, minister of foreign affairs, Ali Babacan, visited all
countries in the region. In this regard, Turkey signed an agreement
with Iraqi central government to close down all PKK offices and
stop its activities in Iraqi territories. However, Iraqi government
could not meet the requirements of the agreement. Despite this
negative feedback, Turkey wanted to finish all diplomatic steps
before taking the military action.
In this respect, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited the
U.S. president George W. Bush and asked from the U.S. government
to take immediate action to stop the PKK in using Iraqi territories
as a safe haven. The meeting was successful and the U.S. president
George W. Bush said that “PKK is a terrorist organization and
enemy of Turkey, enemy of the United States and enemy of freedemocratic
Iraq.”
As a result, the U.S. government had an agreement with Turkey to
create a system that ensures to share intelligence and to establish
a military partnership between Turkey, the U.S., and Iraq. In this
way, Turkey managed to obtain international support as a result
of her diplomatic efforts. For an immediate outcome, Central and
Northern Iraqi governments closed down the PKK offices to finish
its activities in their territories.
The other aspect of this meeting was that Turkey gave a message
to the world showing her decisiveness to stop the further PKK
activities. On the other hand, diplomatic efforts of Turkey towards
finding a democratic solution made Turkey more respectful in the
international arena. Rather than taking military action in the first
step, implementing cold-blooded policies confirmed Turkey’s
rightness in her struggle against the PKK.
*President of TIPS
**Turkish Police Major and Ph.D. student at University of
Cincinnati, Department of Criminal Justice
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