- This week's visit to Turkey by Syrian President Bashar
Al Assad is of considerable geo-strategic significance. It has taken place
in close co-ordination with Syria's ally Iran, whose foreign minister Kamal
Kharazzi was in Damascus on the eve of the visit. And Turkey's foreign
minister Abdallah Gul is expected in Tehran tomorrow.
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- The three countries are intent on sending a firm message
to the US about its policy in Iraq. They are telling Washington that Iraq
must remain a unitary state and that they will strongly oppose any attempt
to break it up into three mini-states - Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite. Above
all, they are warning the US not to encourage the Kurds to seek permanent
autonomy, let alone independence.
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- This is the first time the major states bordering Iraq
have publicly united to check what they see as a dangerous American temptation,
strongly supported by Israel, to seek to weaken Iraq permanently by re-building
it on a federal basis without a strong centre - thereby dealing a blow
to the entire Arab system.
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- The region wants to conciliate Washington, not to threaten
it. But they have recognised that America's intervention in Iraq - and
its declared intention to remain there for several years - has profoundly
altered the strategic environment. Syria, Turkey and Iran believe they
can help the US in stabilising Iraq, but only if the US recognises their
security interests and concerns.
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- Fears About US And Israeli Policy
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- It is now widely recognised that the US invaded and occupied
Iraq not because of the alleged danger from Saddam Hussain's weapons of
mass destruction, nor because of his gross abuses of human rights, but
because a strong and independent Iraq was seen as a threat to the western-dominated
political order in the Gulf and to Israel.
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- The Washington hawks who pressed for war - several of
them friends and allies of Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon - made
no secret of the fact that, in their eyes, the overthrow of Saddam was
only the first move in an ambitious project to re-shape the entire Middle
East.
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- Their hope was that once Arab nationalism, Islamic militancy
and Palestinian resistance were defeated, the Arab world could be re-made
on "democratic" lines, under a sort of US-Israeli protectorate.
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- The regional states are now rebelling against this geo-political
fantasy, which they see as fundamentally hostile to their interests and
aspirations. They share a profound apprehension about the future intentions
of the US and Israel.
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- The fate of the Palestinians under Israeli occupation
is another huge factor of uncertainty and instability, not least because
of the passions it arouses among the Arab and Muslim public.
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- Future Of Syrian-Turkish Relations
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- The Middle East peace process was among the subjects
discussed by Assad and his Turkish hosts, with the suggestion that Turkey
might play a mediating role between Syria and Israel. Assad recently called
on the US to revive the Syrian track of the peace process and indicated
he is ready to resume negotiations at the point at which they were broken
off in 1999-2000 between his father and then Israel prime minister, Ehud
Barak.
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- But few observers believe Sharon is ready to return the
Golan, which is the price of a deal with Syria, or that the US, pre-occupied
with Iraq, will put much energy into promoting an Israeli-Syrian settlement.
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- Both Syria and Turkey have no love for the "neo-cons"
now in power in Washington. Paul Wolfowitz, US deputy defence secretary,
is generally thought to have offended Turkey by pressuring it - unsuccessfully
as it turned out - to allow American troops through its territory to attack
Iraq last March.
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- Syria, in turn, believes the "neo-cons" have
no interest in a regional peace, but would rather see the Syrian regime
overthrown, as Richard Perle, a leading "neo-con" and Arab hater,
has advocated.
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- The fact that US President George Bush is only 10 months
away from a presidential election, while Sharon is facing increasing opposition
at home, only adds to the general apprehension and uncertainty.
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- Erdogan is, in turn, seeking to strike a balance in Turkey's
relations with Israel and the Arab states, as well as to distance himself
from Sharon's aggressive policies towards the Palestinians and Syria. Two
subjects were not raised in Ankara because they would have spoiled the
cordial atmosphere.
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- The first concerns the Turkish province of Hatay, formerly
the Syrian sanjak of Alexandretta, which France, then the mandatory power
in Syria, ceded to Turkey on the eve of World War II. The Syrians have
not forgotten or forgiven this flagrant act of political immorality.
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- Euphrates Water
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- The second issue not raised is Syria's contention that
Turkey's large-scale programme of dam-building and irrigation in south-east
Anatolia is starving it of a fair share of Euphrates water. In retaliation,
Syria for many years gave shelter to the Kurdish separatist leader Abdallah
Ocalan.
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- War between Turkey and Syria was averted in 1998 only
when Syria agreed to expel Ocalan, who now languishes in a Turkish prison.
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- Today, the two neighbours have decided resolutely to
put such disputes behind them and look to their joint defences in a dangerously
unsettled world.
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- <http://www.gulfnews.com/Articles/opinion.asp?ArticleID=107533
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