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Pedro Gonçalves

Kurdish separatists call for 'uprising' in Turkey - TURKEY - KURDS - FRANCE 24 - 0 views

www.france24.com/...-uprising-military-separatists

Turkey Kurdistan

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 30 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • Kurdish separatists in Turkey on Friday called for an "uprising" after an air force raid killed 35 villagers near the Iraqi border in what the ruling party admitted could have been a blunder.
  • "According to initial reports, these people were smugglers and not terrorists," said Huseyin Celik, vice-president of the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP).
  • The PKK took up arms in Kurdish-majority southeastern Turkey in 1984, sparking a conflict that has claimed about 45,000 lives. It is labelled a terrorist organisation by Ankara and much of the international community.
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  • The protest in Istanbul on Thursday called by the BDP drew 2,000 people in the city's Taksim Square. Afterwards, several hundred youths shouting pro-PKK slogans threw stones at riot police, who responded with water cannon and tear gas, making several arrests.
  • Clashes between Kurdish rebels and the army have escalated in recent months. The Turkish military launched an operation on militant bases inside northern Iraq in October after a PKK attack killed 24 soldiers in the border town of Cukurca, the army's biggest loss since 1993.
Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Europe | Turkey hits Kurdish bases in Iraq - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8026364.stm

Turkey Kurdistan Kurds Iraq PKK

shared by Argos Media on 30 Apr 09 - Cached
  • Turkish warplanes bombed Kurdish rebel positions in northern Iraq on Wednesday and Thursday, Turkish officials say. The raids came hours after the deaths of 10 Turkish soldiers in two separate attacks that were blamed on the rebels, the deadliest in months.
  • Air force planes bombed targets in the Iraqi border regions of Zap and Avasin-Basyan in the overnight raids.
  • On Wednesday, a powerful bomb blast killed nine soldiers in Diyarbakir in south-eastern Turkey. Suspected rebels also shot dead a soldier near the town of Semdinli, close to the border with Iraq.
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  • Turkish warplanes have often targeted rebel hideouts in the autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan region, where Ankara says some 2,000 PKK guerrillas regularly stage hit-and-run attacks on Turkish territory.
Argos Media

Obama's Visit to Ankara: Turkey Trip Offers Pitfalls and Opportunities - SPIEGEL ONLINE... - 0 views

www.spiegel.de/...0,1518,617714,00.html

US Turkey Armenia Armenian Genocide EU NATO Incirlik Anders Fogh Rasmussen

shared by Argos Media on 07 Apr 09 - Cached
  • It was only Barack Obama's telephone diplomacy -- which came in the form of a call to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan -- that solved the problem. In the end, the two agreed that Turkey would not blackball Fogh Rasmussen in return for reportedly gaining an important seat in the alliance and a pledge to start procedures to shut down the Danish television station Roj TV, which Turkey accuses of having ties to the Kurdish militant group PKK.
  • Turkey is a very important strategic partner for the US, a fact which already led presidents Clinton and Bush to give vocal support to Ankara's ambitions to join the EU.
  • Another fact is that Turkey's army -- which alone has 1,200 soldiers stationed in Afghanistan -- is the second largest among those of NATO's member states.
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  • And, then, there is the Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey, which serves as logistics hub for missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. There's also the fact that Turkey's proximity to the central-Asian countries that are rich in raw materials makes it an important transit hub in the energy supply.
  • Then, of course, there's the issue of Iran. Ankara nurtures strong ties with the country, meaning that Turkey could play a role in facilitating new diplomatic overtures between Washington and Tehran.
  • Turkey's government has already helped to organize talks between high-level officials in Pakistan and Afghanistan and to negotiate a cease-fire in the Gaza conflict.
  • According to poll figures, more than half of all Turks think Obama is the most trustworthy foreign statesman
  • America's reputation has suffered major damage in Turkey, particularly as a result of its disastrous invasion of Iraq. When Obama was elected president, polls indicated that only 9 percent of Turkey's population approved of Washington's policies. America's efforts to aid Turkey's ambition to become part of the EU have impressed few Turks, particularly since progress has been so sluggish.
  • "Obama should treat Turkey as more than a Muslim country," says Soner Cagaptay, an expert on Turkey at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. As he sees it, it was a good idea for Obama to visit Turkey right after attending meetings with NATO and EU representatives as a way of underscoring the country's close ties with the West.
  • last year, Swiss mediators helped Turkish and Armenian diplomats hammer out a comprehensive agreement that would envision a historic coming to terms with the events of 1915 -- as well as to clear the path for the resumption of diplomatic relations between Turkey and Armenia.
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