Inclusive and exclusive foreign policies

The minister spoke of how a Europe increasingly unable to live with its Muslims is finding its cultural influence wane as its policies exclude the cultures that are right next to it, while by contrast Turkey’s cultural influence only increases in concert with its inclusive approach. The contradiction between the inclusiveness-exclusiveness approaches is telling.

Though Turkey’s diplomatic facilities may still be limited, its frenzied activity is beyond doubt. There is unseen diplomatic traffic, with new embassies being opened up all over the world, a new presence in Africa and assistance to war-torn and abandoned Somalia.

Also, add in challenging initiatives such as the lifting of visa restrictions for many countries, top-level positions in international institutions and countless efforts to act as honest broker or facilitator between hostile parties.

And then there is as well Turkish participation in international military operations, taking counter-positions when necessary against former allies, and not to mention the widespread regional economic and cultural influence increasing in concert with diplomatic activity. Pretty impressive!

This hyperactivity is valuable, but not always adequate. There remain some strange and stubborn moves next to the commendable actions. Perhaps one of the most distressing moves of late has been Turkey’s military cooperation with Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir, a global persona non grata known for his massacres of Christians in the south and Muslims in Darfur.

But I would like to underline a basic oxymoron of foreign policy herein. It appears that while Turkey carries on with sparkling foreign policy moves, it continues to live with countless internal and external problems that contradict its foreign policy actions. These internal problems are well known. All of them have turned, over time, into foreign policy dossiers of their own.

First, it is because we are living in a world where problems have become globalized. Second, for a century now, people suffering problems in Turkey have been moving outside of the country with their problems, and have developed counter-policies. This refers to all those groups who have resettled in Europe, the Middle East and the US (non-Muslims, Kurds), all those big and small issues related to them (Cyprus, the Heybeliada/Halki Orthodox seminary, Western Thrace, Armenia, etc.) and of course third parties directly or indirectly involved in these issues (France, Russia, the US, etc.).

Previous governments ignored and overlooked these problems and their consequences, taking advantage of the Cold War’s “comfort” and happily relying on the Western alliance. Today, just as visible and audible as the activism and inclusiveness in foreign policy is, so are the pending Turkish or Turkey-related problems. In fact, the situation appears almost schizophrenic. A simple example: How is it that the prime minister can pay a visit to the late Coptic Patriarch Shenouda III of Alexandria in Cairo but manages to avoid paying an official visit to the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I in İstanbul. A wealth of other contradictory situations abound these days.

It is just not possible that Davutoğlu is not aware of this situation. To the contrary, his comments to Ali Bayramoğlu of the Yeni Şafak daily regarding Armenians are clear proof of his awareness.

Regarding the centenary in 2015 of the widespread massacres that wiped the Armenians out from Anatolia, the minister declares: “Who they face is not a foreign minister saying that nothing happened in 1915.” He then talks of three efforts at hand: the revival of the Zurich Protocols, a dialogue with the diaspora and the approach of “just memory” when it comes to 1915. “We are not the Germans,” he says. “Throughout our history, there has been no concept of ethnic carnage, of ghettos. What’s more, we too have experienced great pains during the same period. There were also concerns, fears and losses experienced by Muslims living in the Balkans and the Caucasus. … There were some events resulting from the paranoia that we would be expelled from Anatolia as well. In the struggle to hold on to the land, some mistakes, massacres and illegalities took place. But you cannot compare this to Nazism, and you cannot describe us as a murderous race.”

It might be so, but more is needed -- because searching out some sort of “historic rationality” in the decision made by the Committee for Union and Progress (CUP) to carry out the annihilation of Armenians should not be the endeavor of those who carry an anti-İttihadist agenda and who are busy designing the new Turkey. What they should instead be concerned with is exposing those actors responsible for these black stains as the main vein that nurtures yesterday’s İttihadism and today’s İttihadist mindset.