InternationalToward the Obama-Erdogan meeting in Washington
Published: Friday December 04, 2009
Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is expected on December 7 in Washington, where he is to meet President Barack Obama. The two leaders are likely to tout progress in the relationship between Turkey and the United States. But Mr. Obama will have to impress on Mr. Erdogan the need for real steps forward.
The relationship between the United States and Turkey is an important one for both countries. It was strained during the Bush administration, especially after Turkey refused to allow the United States to use Turkish territory to wage war on Iraq, and the United States opposed Turkish incursions into Iraqi Kurdistan.
Turkey wishes to assert itself a major state actor that does not take orders from anyone. Recognizing that wish, President Obama made the gesture of traveling to Turkey early in his presidency. This gesture has helped improve the relationship. But Mr. Erdogan is going to take heat during his U.S. visit for a number of policy choices. These include his propensity for tough talk regarding Israel, his support for Iran's president and its nuclear policy, and his willingness to meet with the leader of Sudan, who is under indictment for genocide.
Not avoiding the issues
In seeking to improve relations with Turkey, Mr. Obama has not avoided the tough issues. To his credit, he has pressed Turkey on its relationship with Armenia and on its denial of the Armenian Genocide.
It is a testimony to the strength of Mr. Obama's leadership that in Ankara in April, speaking before the Turkish Grand National Assembly, he called on Turkey to have a "reckoning with the past." Noting that the United States "still struggles with the legacies of slavery and segregation, the past treatment of Native Americans," he called on Turkey to come to terms with "the terrible events of 1915."
Mr. Obama, who as a senator spoke openly about the Armenian Genocide, confirmed that his views on those events have not changed. This indirect affirmation of the Genocide, made during a press conference in Turkey, brought on an outburst from his Turkish counterpart, Abdullah Gül, who took the opportunity to deny the Genocide.
We expect that Mr. Obama will continue to press Turkey's leadership on this issue when he meets with Mr. Erdogan on December 7.
The protocols
Everyone likes to cite progress, and the two leaders will no doubt point, as a measure of progress, to the signing of the protocols on ending the 16-year Turkish blockade of Armenia. But the protocols are subject to ratification, and for Turkey, signing and ratifying are two entirely different things.
A commentator in Today's Zaman, cited by columnist Harut Sassounian, noted that there are now 146 agreements with 95 countries awaiting the approval of the Turkish parliament's Foreign Affairs Commission. The oldest was signed 26 years ago.
In the case of the agreement with Armenia, it is far from certain that Mr. Erdogan will press the Turkish parliament to act promptly on ratification. He has stated repeatedly that Turkey will not end the blockade until the Karabakh conflict is settled to Azerbaijan's satisfaction. This condition was deliberately excluded from the protocols; to raise it is to negate the progress that was made. By linking the Karabakh settlement process with the normalization of Armenia-Turkey relations, Mr. Erdogan started reneging on the agreement with Armenia before the ink on the protocols was dry. That is unacceptable.
The U.S. State Department has said as much. It has insisted repeatedly on "no preconditions" and the opening of the border "within a reasonable timeframe." It will be up to Mr. Obama to drive the point home. To talk of progress in Armenia-Turkey relations will be dishonest if Mr. Erdogan continues to stonewall.
The Armenian Genocide
Mr. Obama, in addressing the events of 1915 in Ankara, took the position that the "best way forward for the Turkish and Armenian people is a process that works through the past in a way that is honest, open and constructive."
The Turkish people and the Armenian people certainly have a lot of work to do in this regard. But governments have a leadership role to play.
Even if the Turkish government is not now ready to acknowledge the Genocide, it must, at the very least, facilitate a process "that is honest, open, and constructive." That means it should decriminalize acknowledgement of the Genocide and other uncomfortable facts, and it should encourage society to take a fresh look at history.
The Armenia-Turkey protocols call for the establishment on an intergovernmental subcommission "on the historical dimension" of the relationship. Potentially, such a commission could help the Turkish people come to terms with their history - for example, by drawing attention to officials and regular people throughout the country that resisted the state's mandate to exterminate the Armenian people. But instead of focusing on these possibilities, Turkish leaders have indicated that they see the commission as an instrument of denial, a way of persuading other countries to withhold judgment on the Armenian Genocide.
Mr. Obama can help bring about real progress on "the historical dimension" by reiterating his call for Turkey to address the events of 1915, and specifically by calling for government leadership.
And above all, Mr. Obama should speak the truth about the Armenian Genocide. He knows, because he has said so in the context of the Holocaust, that "silence is evil's greatest coconspirator." His work on this matter is unfinished until he calls the evil of 1915-17 by its name.
And it is our job as Armenian-Americans to remind him of that.
