Young Diplomats

On Sunday, Recep Tayyip Erdogan , Turkey’s longest- ruling prime minister, won the country’s first direct presidential election. He will now change hats, moving from one executive position to another, but will keep his place as the most powerful man in Turkey.

For over a decade, the United States and Europe have viewed Turkey as a model for other Muslim-majority nations. For many, Mr. Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party, known by the initials A.K.P., seemed to affirm that an Islamist polity could also be democratic. But this line of thinking was mistaken.

Throughout his tenure, Mr. Erdogan has governed in an increasingly authoritarian manner. The A.K.P. has used democracy as a vehicle to consolidate power, rather than as a system of checks and balances to protect political and ethnic minorities. Mr. Erdogan’s government has made a habit of quashing any opposition, most prominently during the 2013 Gezi Park protests where the police used tear gas and water cannons on demonstrators.

And despite Mr. Erdogan’s victory in Sunday’s vote, his era may actually be coming to an end. Just as he once rode to power on a wave of conservative Islamist sentiment as formerly marginalized Turks found their political voice, the next great wave in Turkish politics will be a liberal one. Even after dominating the airwaves during the campaign, Mr. Erdogan eked out only 52 percent of the vote, a similar result to his past victories. His support appears to have peaked.

Mr. Erdogan cut his political teeth in the 1980s within Turkey’s Islamist Welfare Party, also known as the S.P., when it was a lonely opposition voice in a staunchly secular state. When I lived in Turkey in the 1990s, the future had Mr. Erdogan written all over it, even if he was then a political unknown and the S.P. was only a marginal party. He rose to prominence because the party led a grassroots political movement promising to make Turkey a more just place for the pious underclass. At that time, Turkey was poor, and the dream of a fair society, sold by door-knocking S.P. activists, appealed to the masses. Islamists represented the future. In 1995, Mr. Erdogan was elected Istanbul’s mayor, and in 2002, he became the country’s first Islamist prime minister.

Once in power, Mr. Erdogan resorted to anti-elitist rhetoric to boost his support, using his underdog image to attack his critics. He targeted his secular opponents first, with assistance from the conservative Gulen movement. Alleging that these groups were about to carry out a coup, he locked up hundreds of military officers, and used the incident to justify imprisoning scholars, secular politicians, and journalists. Even though the prosecutors could not produce a full and convincing account of the supposed plot, Mr. Erdogan acted pre-emptively against his opponents. The paradox of employing authoritarianism to protect democracy went unnoticed in Washington and Brussels.

Last year he went after the Gezi Park protesters, charging them with running a vast conspiracy against him with assistance from Europeans and the “interest-rate lobby,” a thinly veiled reference to Jews. The police used tear gas and water cannons to disperse millions of Turks who took part in these anti-government rallies.

Finally, he went after his allies. In December 2013, when Gulen-affiliated prosecutors pressed corruption charges against him and other A.K.P. officials, Mr. Erdogan employed his signature tactic. He made the movement his new political piñata, accusing the Gulenists of conspiring with the United States to overthrow him.

The narrative of victimization that Mr. Erdogan has deployed since his days in the opposition, combined with Turkey’s undeniable economic success, has created an untouchable cult of personality. All three branches of government in Turkey are now firmly in his hands.

But a problem awaits President Erdogan: Turkey is nearly evenly split; on Sunday 48 percent of Turks did not vote for him. And Mr. Erdogan cannot rely on growing popular support. In the 2011 parliamentary elections, his party received 21.5 million votes. In March’s nationwide local polls, it got 20.5 million votes and on Sunday, Mr. Erdogan was able to collect 20.7 million votes. He and his party have plateaued.

This is because the A.K.P. no longer represents the future of Turkey. True, Mr. Erdogan has transformed the country economically — the Turks are not poor anymore — but he also rules with an iron grip, and Turks increasingly want a free society. Moving forward, Mr. Erdogan’s biggest challenger will be the amorphous liberal movement that led the Gezi Park protests.

Today, Turkey’s future has liberalism written all over it. Just as the Islamists came from the fringes in the 1990s after years in the political wilderness under strictly secular Kemalist rule, a new generation of liberals is emerging as a grassroots movement, using the power of social media to sell their own dream: a truly democratic Turkey.

The liberals do not yet have a charismatic leader or a party to bring them to power, as Mr. Erdogan and the S.P. eventually did for Islamists in the 1990s. The country’s opposition, the Republican People’s Party, or C.H.P., is a mix of secularists and die-hard leftists. It needs to undergo a metamorphosis to become a real force. And although the Kurdish-led People’s Democratic Party, or H.D.P., has promoted a decidedly liberal message and increased its share of the national vote from 5 to almost 10 percent, it’s still a small party and having violent Kurdish nationalists among its ranks won’t help win broader support.

Turkey’s future liberal movement will have to bring together liberal Kurdish nationalists and liberal secular Turks. Its leader is yet to emerge. But the energy and ideology are there, and he or she will one day step forward to transform Turkish politics the same way Mr. Erdogan revolutionized the country after surfacing from the youth branch of his party.

He will go down in history as the leader who transformed Turkey economically, but the liberals will transform it politically

As ISIS keeps advancing on the ground in Iraq, the hardline jihadi militants have revived with a vengeance one of the oldest conflicts there is: the rift between the Sunnis and Shiites in Islam.

Iraq is a perfect ground for the divide to turn violent: it has a Shia-majority population, a Shia-led government under Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, and an embattled Sunni minority, which dominated the country for centuries, from the Ottoman Empire until the U.S. invasion deposed Saddam Hussein in 2003.

“The Iraq conflict plays out on several levels between Sunnis and Shiites. First and foremost, it’s about how to share power in a 21st century state. The prime minister, a Shiite, has failed abysmally in creating a formula to share power with the Sunnis, the traditional political masters in Iraq,” Robin Wright, a joint fellow at the U.S. Institute of Peace and the Woodrow Wilson Center, non-partisan institutions, told NBC News.

The divide between the two major branches of Islam has lasted for centuries — and the schism is not always just a religious one. It began when the Prophet Muhammad died in 632 A.D. and a clash erupted over who should succeed him. One side, which became the Shiites, believed Muhammad’s successor should be someone from his bloodline; those who spawned the Sunnis held it could be a pious individual who could follow Muhammad’s customs. The rift has divided the Muslim landscape across the Middle East and beyond for 1,350 years, with some countries being controlled by Shiites and the others by Sunnis, and shifting back and forth.

While the two sects may disagree over the politics of succession, they share many of the same beliefs. Both read the Quran as the Word of God, believe in the sayings of the Prophet and follow the Five Pillars of Islam. Their prayer rituals are nearly identical — for instance Shiites will stand with their hands at their sides, Sunnis will put their hands on their stomachs. Both sides also believe in Islamic law, but have different ways of interpreting and enforcing it.

The large majority of the world’s Muslims are Sunni. Shiites are concentrated in Iran, southern Iraq and southern Lebanon, with significant communities in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf states, Yemen, Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.

The Iranian Revolution in 1979 was a turning point in the Sunni-Shiite conflict, creating a radical Shiite theocracy in a large, oil-rich and well-armed nation. While the Ayatollah Khomeini, the revolution’s inspiration and Iran’s supreme leader, tried to build bridges between the two sects, other religious and secular leaders advanced the divide. Today, Iranian Sunnis do not have a mosque of their own, they do not hold top government posts, and Sunni businessmen have difficulties obtaining import and export licenses.

In Saudi Arabia, it’s the opposite. Sunnis are in power, with Shiites being the target of discrimination. Most Shia holy places in the kingdom have been destroyed by the Saudi royal family. A particularly rabid brand of local Sunni fundamentalism entwined with the state, known as Wahhabism, places severe restrictions on Shia practices, with some leaders being jailed.

While there’s a history of violence between the two groups, there were periods where they lived peacefully together for centuries. Today’s fighting in Iraq stems from a political power struggle.

There, Sunnis are a minority of the population, concentrated in the north and west. Since the end of World War I and the creation of Iraq by the British from the defeated Ottoman Empire, Sunnis have controlled Iraqi politics, often brutally. In 2003, when the U.S. invaded Iraq, Saddam Hussein’s Sunni regime was toppled and Shiites took power.

Three years later, Maliki, a Shiite allied with Iran, became the country’s new leader. Rather than seeking peace between the two groups, critics say he oppressed the Sunnis both inside government and by squashing protests in the streets. Today, ISIS militants from neighboring Syria have crossed the border into Iraq and have taken advantage of the discontent among the nation’s Sunni population. After the U.S. withdrew its forces in 2011, the Iraqi army it trained — which is itself divided along sectarian lines and is largely Shia — proved unable to fight the Sunni militants and has in fact fled before their advance.

“Sunnis have always held power in Iraq in significant quantities,” Haider Ala Hamoudi, an associate professor of law at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, told NBC News. “Over the course of decades, through a series of revolutions, the decision to exclude Shia became much more conscious. They were feared as a group that could somehow sell the country to Iran. The exclusion of the Shia was not something that was just a historical accident, but was viewed as something that was important to preserve the state in its current form.”

In other parts of the Arab world, relative peace has prevailed between the two sects. In 1959, al-Azhar University in Cairo, the world’s most influential center of Sunni scholarship, admitted Shia jurisprudence to its curriculum. In Azerbaijan, where the Shias are in the majority, there are mixed mosques where both sects pray together.

But tensions are on the rise in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkey, Kuwait, Lebanon, Bahrain, Libya, Tunisia, Malaysia and Egypt. The growing concern is the possibility of a transnational civil war between Sunni and Shias where countries are divided along sectarian lines.

A collapse of states in the Middle East could follow, Olivier Roy, a history professor at the European University Institute in Italy, told New Republic. Iraq might lose Kurdistan, and Syria might collapse next: “The collapse of the existing nation-states will in turn weaken the international borders, even if they are not redrawn. The border between Iran and Iraq and the border between Turkey and its southern neighbors will be de facto open. Goods, people, and weapons will move more easily.”

As for Iraq, even Maliki’s top aide in charge of reconciliation told the New York Times that it may be fruitless to try and resolve the conflict now.

“Now there’s a war, there’s not reconciliation,” Amir al-Khuzai said. “With whom do we reconcile?”

Vladimir Putin has a very clear strategy in Ukraine: first, sow panic among Ukrainians and the West and then wait, then provoke Ukrainians into doing things that distance them from the West, and then wait; invade when both Ukrainians and the West are off balance; and then repeat the process.

Such a strategy, one could almost call it a recipe given its invariability, reflects three unfortunate facts: First, Putin has a longer time horizon than do either Ukrainians or Western governments. He doesn’t have to achieve all his goals all at once, whereas they want a resolution extremely quickly. By sowing panic, he is promoting his program.

Second, Putin understands that if he can provoke some Ukrainians into statements or actions that put distance between Kyiv and the West, he makes progress toward his goal of subordinating Ukraine and ultimately the rest of the former Soviet space and perhaps more to his will.

This tactic works either if Ukrainians call wolf once too often by predicting an invasion that doesn’t happen, thus leading Western governments to conclude that Ukrainian predictions are not to be trusted and can be dismissed even when they ultimately prove true, or if Putin’s offensiveness prompts some Ukrainians to say and do things that some in the West, to the applause of Putin’s clique, will invoke as more reasons not to support Ukraine.

And third, Putin knows even if some in Ukraine and elsewhere do not that sowing panic and provoking Ukrainians are an alternative to invasion but rather part and parcel of such a plan. Not only do these tactics make an invasion easier and cheaper for the Kremlin leader if he needs to use military force, but they could eliminate his need to invade.

That could happen if Ukrainians lose heart and conclude on their own that they have no choice but to submit without the use of force or if the West pushes Kyiv to make ever greater concessions to Moscow in the name of a peace process intended not to reverse Putin’s aggression but rather to find a settlement that will allow the West and Moscow to resume business as usual.

Both Ukrainians and the West need to understand what Putin is about. He is an aggressor, and his aggression must be reversed rather than accommodated. He has already invaded Ukraine and seized territory, and both Ukrainians and the West need to recognize those realities and begin the hard process of reversing Putin’s crimes and punishing him for them.

That will not be easy for either Ukrainians who are forced to look down the barrel of Russian guns and at the pipeline of Russian gas, and it will not be easy for the West which in its desire to declare victory and do business has consistently refused to recognize just how horrific the Soviet system was and how much Putin embodies its worst features.

But it can be done. And three steps are necessary immediately. First, Ukraine and the West must understand what Putin is doing and call it by its rightful names: invasion, Anschluss, provocation, intimidation, and panic-sowing. And both must understand that this is part of a single policy rather than a set of alternatives as some in both Kyiv and the West appear to want to believe.

Second, the West must declare formally a non-recognition policy relative to Crimea and the southeastern portions of Ukraine where Moscow forces are currently operating. Western governments must say clearly that they will never recognize as legitimate the Russian occupation and annexation and that they will never recognize the government that does those things as legitimate either.

That won’t reverse Putin’s crimes immediately, just as the US-led non-recognition policy about the Soviet occupation of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania took 50 years to achieve its goal; but it will serve notice to Russia and the world that the results of Putin’s actions will be reversed eventually.

And third, it is long past time to be talking about whether NATO countries should be supplying Ukraine with weapons. They should have been sent at the time of the first Putin moves against Ukraine, and the flow of such weapons and related assistance should have been stepped up with each new Putin action.

In short, the time has come for the West to extend NATO membership to Ukraine, a country that has made the choice to be part of the West and that the West now acknowledges that reality. That alone will not solve the current crisis, but it will disrupt Putin’s strategy and cause both him and his supporters to realize that his approach won’t be tolerated any longer.

If that message isn’t delivered now, Putin will repeat his strategy not only in Ukraine but elsewhere as well.

Summary

With Turkey and Russia now at odds, Central Asia’s prevailing attitude toward Turkey has changed in recent months. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was scheduled to visit Turkmenistan in October, but a terrorist attack in the Turkish capital led him to delay his trip. Since then, Turkey downed a Russian fighter jet near the Turkey-Syria border, and the resulting tension led to a series of trade spats between Moscow and Ankara. These circumstances will change the atmosphere of Erdogan’s Dec. 11 to Dec. 12 visit to Turkmenistan, during which he will meet President Gurbanguly Berdimukhammedov.

Analysis

Turkey has had a hot and cold relationship with the Central Asian states. Although Turkey shares ethnic and linguistic roots with four of the five Central Asian states, they have been wary of Ankara’s attempt to extend its influence into the region. Each state has closed Turkish-sponsored schools and nongovernmental organizations that operated in their countries. Turkmenistan, which is arguably the most neutral and paranoid of the Central Asian states, led the regional crackdowns on Turkish influence starting in 2011.

But Turkey remains crucial for Turkmenistan. Turkey is Turkmenistan’s top import partner; Turkish goods — mostly electronic equipment, machinery, processed metals and furniture — make up 26 percent of Turkmenistan’s imports. Since Russia and Turkey’s most recent spat began, some of this trade has been disrupted. A Stratfor source has indicated that trucks of goods from Turkey meant for Central Asia have been prevented from transiting Russia. During the past week, more Turkish goods that once crossed Russian territory have been moved to a route that goes through Azerbaijan and across the Caspian Sea to Central Asia.

Turkmenistan’s vast energy resources are more important, however, in Turkish-Turkmen relations. The Central Asian country holds the world’s fourth- or fifth-largest natural gas reserves (estimates vary). Turkmenistan currently produces some 83 billion cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas per year and exports 58 percent of that, almost entirely to China. Turkmenistan has the potential to produce even more natural gas, but its location has made it difficult to connect with customers.

One of the most eager potential customers is Turkey, which is working within a consortium to construct the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline from Azerbaijan to Turkey, where it will connect with the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline, which will carry natural gas onward to Europe. However, Azerbaijan can fill only a portion of the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline’s 16-bcm capacity, leaving room for another supplier. Turkey, Europe and Azerbaijan have long courted Turkmenistan to fill that role through the proposed Trans-Caspian pipeline. All of these pipelines are the cornerstones of the European Union and Turkey’s Southern Corridor energy strategy, meant to transport natural gas from the Caspian area to Europe, bypassing Russian territory and natural gas supplies.

But Turkmenistan has been wary of partaking in a project that counters Russia, which holds a great deal of influence in Turkmenistan and elsewhere in Central Asia. Moreover, Turkmenistan has been more focused in recent years in fulfilling its natural gas contracts with China. But even as Turkmen natural gas exports to China rise, reaching an expected 45 bcm this year, Ashgabat is looking to diversify its exports, especially because Russia is building a natural gas route to China that could rival Turkmenistan’s. Ashgabat is flirting with the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline, which is fraught with security and financial concerns. Turkmenistan is also holding more discussions with Tehran about using Iran as a transit partner, but Iran is a strong natural gas producer itself and is not likely to help the competition. This leaves the Trans-Caspian pipeline as the last option for diversifying Turkmenistan’s customer base.

Turkey has also grown more interested in the Trans-Caspian because the proposed TurkStream project, which would carry natural gas supplies from Russia, is likely frozen because of the fallout over the Russian fighter jet incident. As the competition between Turkey and Russia grows in a number of areas, Ankara will not want to increase its already considerable energy dependence on Moscow. Pressing Turkmenistan to finally agree to participate in the Trans-Caspian project has become a higher priority for Turkey.

However, Turkmenistan will strive to keep out of the intensifying Turkish-Russian row. Erdogan may feel he can use his strong connections with Turkmenistan’s elite business circles and government officials, but according to a Stratfor source, the current Turkmen president has taken away some of the business groups’ influence and has set up a system of governance that relies more on his decisions than on lobbying from special interests. Ashgabat will remain cautious in any deal that could worsen its position with Russia, even if the deal could bring economic and financial gain.

Some African capitals have been signaling to Israeli officials a desire to deepen ties for several years, and are frustrated that Jerusalem has not responded faster.

This article was written by Jeremy Sharon for the Jerusalem Post and published here.

African Nations are willing and ready to develop and expand their diplomatic and business relations with Israel, a spokesman for the ruling political party in the Ivory Coast said on Wednesday.

Joel N’guessan, an official in the Rally of the Republicans party, headed by Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara, said in Jerusalem on Wednesday that the historical cause of the rupture in relations between Israel and African states was a result of political pressure imposed on them by Arab countries who dominated the Islamic world in the 20th century.

Today, as that influence has waned, Israel is in a position to expand its diplomatic relations with African countries, but Jerusalem must show its intent by investing in the continent, he said.

“In order for Israel to be supported by African countries in the UN, it is important for Israel not only to restore diplomatic relations with Africa, but there must be within Israel an evolution of a diplomatic effort to create investment in Africa,” said N’guessan.

The official spoke during a press conference at the annual Feast of Tabernacles at the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, which has brought numerous government officials to Israel for the festival, along with 5,000 Christian pilgrims.

The comments follow the recent UNESCO resolution condemning Israel over its governance of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount, which ignored the Jewish history of the site.

However, several African nations, namely Cameroon, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Kenya and Togo refused to back the resolution and abstained from the vote.

The embassy, which is a strongly pro-Israel evangelical organization, says it has sent delegations to numerous African states in recent years and discovered that certain countries were keen to deepen relations with Israel.

“Even leaders of Muslim- majority African nations have expressed their strong interest in restoring relations with the Jewish state – a message we have faithfully conveyed to Israeli officials,” organization officials said.

Dr. Jurgen Bühler, executive director of the embassy, said that the destabilization of several central Arab states since 2011 has “reshuffled” the cards in the region, and that the diplomatic bloc of Islamic and Arab countries has begun to crumble.

“If you go to West Africa today, senior officials, including Muslim government officials, are telling us ‘we are fed up with Arab leaders, they are racist, they hate black people, they only want to bring jihad to our country,’ and that their natural partner is the State of Israel, which can help develop their countries,” said Bühler.

He also said that it was incumbent upon the Israeli government to move quickly to take advantage of the opportunity to develop relations with Africa.

Some African capitals have been signaling to Israeli officials a desire to deepen ties for several years, and are frustrated that Jerusalem has not responded faster, according to the organization.

“There is a possibility to change voting patterns [in the UN], even from countries who have been against Israel for decades,” said Bühler.

Following the approval of the UNESCO resolution on Tuesday, the embassy reiterated its opposition and condemnation of the decision.

“The resolution omits the traditional, biblical names of sacred Jewish sites, calling them by alternative Muslim names only,” said the organization to the press.

“This is tantamount to rewriting history and stripping these sites of their 4,000 years of Jewish and 2,000 years of Christian connection,” they said. “We are deeply concerned that the wording accepted by an international body intends to eradicate any Jewish and Christian bonds to these holy places.

“This represents a calculated insult against the Jewish people, as well as an affront to over two billion Christians worldwide, who know full well that as a faithful Jew, Jesus regularly visited the holy Jewish temple on this site, taught there and called it a ‘house of prayer for all nations,’” they continued.

The thousands of Christian pilgrims currently in Israel for the 37th annual celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles come from some 90 nations around the world.

Among those present for the event are several dozen pro-Israel Christian parliamentarians and government officials from more than twenty countries, many of whom are affiliated with the Israel Allies Foundation, while several African nations have sent government delegations to represent their countries at this year’s feast.

“These are evangelicals who love Israel and are working in their nations back home to build support for the Jewish people,” said Bühler. “This feast will no doubt strengthen their resolve to stand in solidarity with Israel, especially as they interact with like-minded Christians from all over the world.”

Source : http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Politics-And-Diplomacy/African-nations-open-for-diplomatic-ties-business-with-Israel-470452

Brazil. Throughout the country, protests against Dilma Rousseff

Brazilians are tired of corruption, recession, political elites. Sunday, they took to the streets to demand the departure of their president.

"Out Dilma!" "No to corruption!" Such were the claims of 900,000 to 2 million Brazilians who marched on August 16 in over a hundred Brazilian cities. They demand the departure of President Dilma Rousseff, mired in a triple economic storm, political corruption and reports Voice of America.
 
At the root of their anger: the sprawling political and financial corruption scandal that has cost more than $ 2 billion to the public oil giant Petrobras. He splashes the Workers Party (PT) and is, according to the site, "the biggest corruption case in Brazil ever unveiled."

But it is also the economic recession and unpopular austerity measures taken by the Chair that "make her the first target of the protesters," said the Wall Street Journal.

Dilma Rousseff, easily re-elected last fall and facing a historic collapse of his popularity to 8%, concentrated in fact all the criticism, as shown by the images of the events published on the site Mashable. For the first time, the opposition leader, Aécio Neves, actively participated in events in the city of Belo Horizonte.

However, for the New York Times, "the protests do not emit the same energy that we observed during massive demonstrations this spring."