PULSE of TURKEY No:99 ............................MARCH 27th, 1999
DEMIREL SAYS RUSSIA IS IN THE WRONG ABOUT KOSOVO
Turkey has taken every measure to receive migrants from Kosovo with refugee camps in Kirklareli and Istanbul. They had already served for the Bosnian refugees during the previous crisis. A four-phase Nato plan is in force over Kosovo and Turkey has committed itself to do its share. Turks ruled over Kosovo for 524 years between 1389 and 1913 and is determined to safeguard its kinsmen’s safety. The Kosovo confrontation starts a new era in world history requiring new arrangements in defence and international relations. "Nato cannot possibly back down on this issue before it achieves its goal," said President Demirel about the current bombings of Yugoslav military installations by the Alliance over the Kosovo dispute. Explaining Turkey’s stance about the bombings the President told the nation in a televised interview on Friday (26th) evening, a few hours after he chaired over the National Security Council in Cankaya, that Nato’s armed intervention in Yugoslavia was to render that country unable to make war. "It is enforcing a plan with certain phases to this end. Whenever Yugoslavia concedes to the plan to which the Albanian ethnical group has already come round to conceding and signs it the problem will end," said the President.Turkey is determined to play its part in the Kosovo confrontation
About Turkey’s stance over this hot confrontation, he said, "We are a Nato member. We are also involved in this affair. We also have our aircraft and ships there and Nato cannot possibly back down on this issue. It has taken the step and cannot backtrack on it. And, in fact, in the event of Nato’s failure in Kosovo, peace in Bosnia-Herzegovina will also be disrupted."
Asked about its impact on the Balkans and if the confrontation would also spread there the President said, "Nothing much will happen in the Balkans now. Macedonia and Albania are not the targets. There will be no such thing as the confrontation spilling over into Turkey. Whoever is inventing such things, they are not right. What may happen is that our citizens, our kinsmen in Kosovo may migrate here. As of 3 pm today about 3000 have arrived in Turkey. And they are being settled with their relatives resident in Istanbul, Bursa, Kocaeli and several other places. Turkey is ready to meet such a wave of migration and is capable of it. Turkey is open to everybody who says Turkey is my second home country.
"Let my fellow citizens rest assured. The matter will definitely be resolved before it evolves into a Balkan war. With whom will the war break out? The countries around Yugoslavia are not a party to the dispute. It is a matter that concerns Nato, which is following up this affair. Nato is not doing it to gain lands. It is not doing it to enlarge its frontiers. Neither is it doing it for economic gains. It is doing it for humanity. And certainly Russia should not hearten the Serbs in this affair. It would be very wrong. This is not a matter of Slav, Orthodox solidarity. It is not a fight of Slav Orthodox on one side and Muslim Albanians on the other. In fact, excluding Turkey, all of the countries in Nato that have come to the Muslim Albanians’ help are Christians. There is no such thing as a Muslim-Orthodox Christian confrontation. It is a humanitarian issue. The important side of this affair for Turkey is that, above all, we have historic ties and responsibilities. Our kinsmen are there. Furthermore, we also have a moral commitment towards Muslim Albania. They are also our brethren. And we will share the burden and do our part in this affair that may not necessarily evolve into a war. It may be an economic burden. In trying to work out peace in the Balkans, we have faced such an event. I believe that common sense will prevail and the Kosovo affair will be wound up within a week. This is the estimation of Nato and not mine."
Turkey’s military role in the Kosovo confrontation
The President said that the Secretary-General of Nato visited him and there were talks with Nato at all levels before the outbreak of the confrontation. President Clinton sent him a letter and gave information about the event. "He thanked us for our support." (TRT-1, 26th).
Asked how he received this first decision for war by Nato in its 50-year history, President Demirel told Fikret Bila of Milliyet (26th), "Nato would have exhausted its function of deterrence if it had not taken this decision. The international community would have been left with no power of sanction. Bloodshed, massacre and cruelty are happening in Kosovo. It is a continuation of what happened in Bosnia."
Asked if NATO sought ground forces from Turkey, PM Bulent Ecevit said, "Not yet. They had said sometime ago that a unit should be ready for any possibility and we are keeping it at standby in Mamak." Asked if a land operation would prove to be necessary, he said, "It is a matter of a four-stage plan. At the moment the first stage is being implemented." Answering a question he explained the following phases of the plan. "The first phase foresees hitting the air defence systems and the command control centres. The second phase concerns rendering ineffective the army and police forces. The third phase is for the enhancement of the intensity and efficacy of the air operations. The fourth phase is for the land operation." Asked about what was the possibility of the fulfilment of the fourth phase, PM Ecevit said, "There is no talk of it at this stage."
Turkey has committed every military contribution to Nato’s current action concerning Kosovo. It has put 11 jets and a frigate at Nato’s disposal, but they are not actively participating in the confrontation at this stage. If the confrontation prolongs Turkey may step in with also an army unit at the fourth phase of the conflict.
A noteworthy development in this regard was that President Haydar Aliyev’s foreign policy advisor, Vefa Guluzade said in Baku on March 26th that Azerbaijan would sent a platoon of 30 soldiers to the Nato ground forces in Kosovo as part of the Turkish contribution to the possible land operation. Agreement in principle had been reached for it, but the Azeri forces had not yet joined the Turkish unit, said Guluzade.
Ankara has already given Nato every assurance about fulfilling its part in possible land operations. It has put in a state of alarm the Second Army Corps commanded by Lt. Gen. Ilker Basbug on the Greek frontier and the Fifth Army Corps commanded by Lt. Gen. Tuncer Kilic on the Bulgarian frontier. Military sources said that there was no need to deploy new forces in Thrace because these two army corps were the best equipped and strongest units.
The TGS (Turkish General Staff) Information Service announced on Thursday (25th) that nearly 150 jets from 13 Nato countries including 11 F-16 jets from Turkey, as well as the US and UK warships in the Adriatic took part in the military operations. They are not restricted to Kosovo, but cover air defence and command control centres and military airfields throughout the Yugoslav Federation. The 11 Turkish F-16s are stationed at Italy’s Ghedi Airbase and they will take part in the military operations for defence services only. "Within this context, our aircraft rendered service for six hours uninterruptedly at night by refuelling in the air a few times. All Nato aircraft have returned to base without casualties," reads the TGS press release.
Turkish diplomacy at work on Kosovo conflict
Even though Turkey was the main factor in inducing Nato to military action over Kosovo, Belgrade has not included Turkey in the first list of five Nato countries (the USA, UK, Germany, France and Italy) with which it severed relations. Nevertheless, Ankara suspended the activities of the Turkish Embassy in Belgrade and withdrew all its diplomats from Yugoslavia with the possibility that the confrontation may grow bigger and eventually draws Turkey into a hot confrontation on land.
During the countdown for the imminent military action, the Yugoslav Foreign Ministry invited Turkish Ambassador Ahmet Acet on March 23rd and urged Ankara to be calm over the forthcoming confrontation. The same initiative was taken by Yugoslav diplomacy with its four next door neighbours. Ambassador Acet responded that as its member Turkey would certainly respect Nato’s resolutions.
Back in Ankara PM Ecevit said on the same day that the scourge of war in Kosovo could engulf the entire Balkans and that the responsibility for it rested with the Serbs, the Serbian Administration and certain external forces that were supporting them. Turkey would fulfil any duty incumbent on it within Nato.
If the final agreement is signed with Belgrade a 28,000 strong Nato peacekeeping force will be stationed in Kosovo and Turkey will be one of the major contributors to this force. It already has 1100 soldiers fulfilling the same duty in Bosnia.
Kosovo was an autonomous region for 15 years between 1974 and 1989 with an independent judiciary, the police and educational system. Its population of 2 million is 90% Albanian and 60,000 Turks also live there. With President Milosevic’s ending this autonomy in 1989 the trouble culminating to today’s hot confrontation started in the region. Paradoxically, the Serb adventurers led by President Milosevic scrapped Kosovo’s autonomy on the 600th anniversary of the battle of Kosovo in 1389 that put the Balkans under the Ottoman rule for 524 years.
The atrocities meted out to the ethnical Albanians by racist Serbs after scrapping the autonomy gave way to the UCK (The Kosovo Liberation Army) resistance movement for full independence or even annexation to Albania. Ankara, for its part, rejected to support such moves against a sovereign country’s territorial integrity, but firmly stood behind their efforts for autonomy and security.
A founder of the UCK, Florin Krasniki, told Radikal (27th) in New York that Turkey was the country that gave the biggest aid, $40 million, to the Kosovo Liberation Army. He complained, however, that Ankara was not supporting the independence of Kosovo because it was afraid of a similar action for the Kurds. Turkey had historic responsibility for the Albanians and the people of Kosovo with its centuries old rule there.
Turkey’s Nato allies and all the Balkan countries excluding Greece (Albania, Macedonia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Romania and Bulgaria) have also come round to this policy and they all exclude independence at this stage.
Contrary to what President Demirel said above, these Balkan countries now face the danger of being disturbed by their Serb minorities or by Serb forces persecuting the civilian people in Kosovo. Albania and Macedonia are the first to face the ill effects of it and Romania and Bulgaria may come later. Bosnia, Sanjak and Voyvadin may also face Serb attacks, fears Ankara. That is why the crisis management group in the Foreign Ministry in Ankara has decided to urge Nato to give these Balkan countries and regions bigger assurances for security within the PfP (Participation for Peace) movement and financial aid for possible migration movements from Kosovo.
Foreign Minister Ismail Cem has also received Soviet Ambassador Lebedev, urging Moscow to refrain from encouraging Milosevic. He stressed that as a member of the Contact Group and with its clear influence on Belgrade Russia should work for preventing the furtherance and hardening of the conflict.
International consequences of Kosovo
PM Evgeni Primakov has taken strong objection to Nato’s military action on Yugoslavia without seeking the Security Council’s resolution and said that this military intervention was likely to upset the world balances established in the post-WW II period. "With this mentality some may want to attack Turkey by using the Kurdish problem as pretext," he warned.
This first Nato military action without a UN Security Council resolution tends to introduce new rules to international relations in the new century. One is that Article 2, paragraph 7 of the UN Charter about non-interference in countries’ domestic affairs is changed greatly. Now the rule is that grave and massive violations of democracy and human rights to the degree of upsetting regional peace and stability is no longer deemed the domestic affairs of a country. Nato may intervene militarily in such an eventuality.
Such an intervention by Nato or any other international organisation should not be prejudicial to the territorial integrity of any country. Advanced autonomy within that country’s sovereignty may be a remedy for the prevention of such human rights violations, while the national frontiers are kept intact.
Tito had said, "Yugoslavia has six republics, five nations, four languages, three religions, two alphabets and one political party." His wise and tolerant administration kept this jungle in unity, making Yugoslavia a strong and developed nation leading the non-aligned movement along with India.
The fascist ethnical cleansing policy of his successors today are facing even the disintegration of the two-republic Yugoslav federation, as Montenegro is preparing to leave the Federation to be a more democratic independent country, not counting the appearance of nearly ten independent countries or autonomous regions out of Tito’s Yugoslavia. uras@ada.net.tr, March 27th, 1999