Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

[gegev]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

Hi Gegev,
And comes the point: "Essense of Turks"? Where does this essense comes from? Our genes?

Dear may and hitite,

You are the only ones that didn't catch what I mean.
Please read the post once again, I will answer you in April.

Thanks for the fantastic information; so you claim that Turks are an outstanding nation and Turkey is one of the best countries in the world; even better that Greeks (on Obama's opinion?) and some people/nations have much to learn from them.

Sorry but I’ve learned about the essence of the Turks from my grandparents about my perished relatives and I trust the facts they told me. And nowadays nothing is changed in Turkey except diplomatic manners and clothing.

Therefore let me doubt in your words trustworthiness.

GevorgP

[may]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

Thanks for the fantastic information; so you claim that Turks are an outstanding nation and Turkey is one of the best countries in the world; even better that Greeks (on Obama's opinion?) and some people/nations have much to learn from them.

Sorry but I’ve learned about the essence of the Turks from my grandparents about my perished relatives and I trust the facts they told me. And nowadays nothing is changed in Turkey except diplomatic manners and clothing.

Therefore let me doubt in your words trustworthiness.

Gevorg

Hi Gegev,

I've read your post again as you asked, but I think my questions are still valid and they are directed for the bold fotmatted text above.

I do not want to doubt your good intentions based on the words that you choose and emphasize in your previous post. But still, your post include a good deal of prejudice and mis-interpreted content.

I'll be waiting for your response.

may

[Palavra]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

You are realy wasting your time with this stupidy.

hitite,

I think gegev has a point.If Turkey wants to join the EU, Turkey needs to have good neighbourly relations with their neighbours - that is what the EU report says.

do you realy think so? Interestingly, I did not see much pressure from EU about armenians at last years.

We see that Europea can make some difference for some countries.(A good example would be cyprus.)

Anyway, It is RAO who is working for opening borders, not Turkey. So even, This can show that who need opening borders..

[Alexandros]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

You are realy wasting your time with this stupidy.


do you realy think so? Interestingly, I did not see much pressure from EU about armenians at last years.

We see that Europea can make some difference for some countries.(A good example would be cyprus.)

Anyway, It is RAO who is working for opening borders, not Turkey. So even, This can show that who need opening borders..

46th MEETING OF THE

EC-TURKEY ASSOCIATION COUNCIL

(Brussels – 27 May 2008)

POSITION OF THE EUROPEAN UNION

In line with the Negotiating Framework and previous European Council and Council conclusions, Turkey needs to unequivocally commit to good neighbourly relations and to the peaceful settlement of disputes in accordance with the United Nations Charter, including, if necessary, jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice. In this context, Turkey should address any sources of friction with its neighbours and refrain from any threat or action which could negatively affect good neighbourly relations and the peaceful settlement of disputes.

You can read more here

"Good neighbourly relations" are the key words.It will be up to Turkey - since it`s Turkey who wants to join the EU - to show that they can solve disputes peacefully and in accordance with the "United Nations Charter..."

[Palavra]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

Repeating same thing wont help discussion.

Even you are right(And you are not. Neither cyprus nor greece had good relation with her neighbors.). EU is a long run project and We can open borders after 10 year.

Armenia is realy an unimportant problem at EU-Turkey relationship. So It is not a good weapon for Armenia.

[Alexandros]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

Repeating same thing wont help discussion.

Even you are right(And you are not. Neither cyprus nor greece had good relation with her neighbors.). EU is a long run project and We can open borders after 10 year.

Armenia is realy an unimportant problem at EU-Turkey relationship. So It is not a good weapon for Armenia.

Ok then.Let`s exclude Turkey and Armenia and talk about Greece and Cyprus - who are both members of the EU since 1981 respectively 2004 - and their relations with their neighbours.

I`m going to make it very easy for you and not ask so many questions; three questions will be fine:


1.Does Greece and Cyprus occupy a part of land of their neighbour/neighbours?

2.Does Greece and Cyprus have their border closed with their neighbour/neighbours?

3.Does Greece and Cyprus continuously violate their neighbour/neighbours airspace?


Remember: Turkey and Armenia are excluded!

[egeli]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

Hi Gegev,

And comes the point: "Essense of Turks"? Where does this essense comes from? Our genes?

There are unfortunatly many people, such as gegev, who seem to lump all Turkish citizens into the same ethnic background. The reason why some Turks and the Turkish state are so insecure about Turkishness is because it is very much a constructed identity. Just as an example, if the Greeks accepted Cypriot and Cretan muslims as their fellow kin, they would have been integrated into the Greek nation and never have been pushed to be Turks. Conversely, if Ottoman muslims accepted Christian Anatolians as their own, they would have never been massacred.

Greek, Armenian, and Turkish national idenity has nothing to do with ethnicity, and everything to do with religion. While every nominal follower of Greek or Armenian Othrodox Christianity are respectively identified as Greek or Armenian, ethnic Greek and Armenians who converted to Islam during the centuries of Ottoman rule have become Turkish.


-

Alexandros, you are right we will see what will happen. Turkish relations with Isreal and America are very instuitionalized and resilient against populish black lashes. According to surveys, Turks consider America and Israel to be their primary enemies! What a weird country.

[hitite]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

hitite,

I think gegev has a point.If Turkey wants to join the EU, Turkey needs to have good neighbourly relations with their neighbours - that is what the EU report says.

"Good neighbourly relations" are the key words.It will be up to Turkey - since it`s Turkey who wants to join the EU - to show that they can solve disputes peacefully and in accordance with the "United Nations Charter..."

Alex, good neighbourly relations is pretty subjective. No relations at all could mean "good" relations which IMHO is the case with ROA.

The EC-EU experiment has lost much of its allure for Turkey and the people. Part of it is due to the fact that Turkey is faced with a lot of double standards with regards to conforming with EU norms and the other is the fact that Europe does not want us, the epitome of this being Frances clearly expressing tha Turkey does not belong in the EU and that it would take the final decision to referendum when the time comes. The final inclusion of mafia ridden states Bulgaria and Romania into the EU was the icing on the cake and was a complete turn-off. I perosnally also do not feel much for joing the EU any more and think that Turkey will become much more powerful in a shorter time if we dont join. Then Europe might beg Turkey to join in order to "contain" the country but then Turkey might put forward her own standards for them to comply to. Sounds like fantasy but it just feeds the indifference of many Turks lately for the EU.

I think Turkey needs to have full soveregntly in its foreign policy for the next few decades since we are living in interesting times. EU membership would just take that sovereignty away.

[hitite]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

Ok then.Let`s exclude Turkey and Armenia and talk about Greece and Cyprus - who are both members of the EU since 1981 respectively 2004 - and their relations with their neighbours.

I`m going to make it very easy for you and not ask so many questions; three questions will be fine:


1.Does Greece and Cyprus occupy a part of land of their neighbour/neighbours?

2.Does Greece and Cyprus have their border closed with their neighbour/neighbours?

3.Does Greece and Cyprus continuously violate their neighbour/neighbours airspace?


Remember: Turkey and Armenia are excluded!

These are good questions:

1- No.
2- No. But MACEDONIA continues to be an emotional pain in the ass.
3- Yes. This has been going on for years and I think we should both shake hands and accept the fact that TR and GR airplanes just need to have their occasional dog fight over the Aegean. Its good training for pilots.

[Alexandros]

Re: Turkey will be split apart as Iraq is.

Alex, good neighbourly relations is pretty subjective. No relations at all could mean "good" relations which IMHO is the case with ROA.

The EC-EU experiment has lost much of its allure for Turkey and the people. Part of it is due to the fact that Turkey is faced with a lot of double standards with regards to conforming with EU norms and the other is the fact that Europe does not want us, the epitome of this being Frances clearly expressing tha Turkey does not belong in the EU and that it would take the final decision to referendum when the time comes. The final inclusion of mafia ridden states Bulgaria and Romania into the EU was the icing on the cake and was a complete turn-off. I perosnally also do not feel much for joing the EU any more and think that Turkey will become much more powerful in a shorter time if we dont join. Then Europe might beg Turkey to join in order to "contain" the country but then Turkey might put forward her own standards for them to comply to. Sounds like fantasy but it just feeds the indifference of many Turks lately for the EU.

I think Turkey needs to have full soveregntly in its foreign policy for the next few decades since we are living in interesting times. EU membership would just take that sovereignty away.

Well, threatening your neighbour with war or "Casus belli" is not very friendly.Greece`s former government was prepared to solve the Aegean dispute by asking(and did so many times) Turkey to take the issue to the ICJ - but Turkey wasn`t willing to do that.The current Greek and Turkish government are now trying to solve this issue by having meetings or "exploratory talks" - but nothing happens.If you think about it, Turkey themselves has extended their territorial waters in the Black Sea and and the Mediterranean Sea to 12 nm but threatens Greece with war if Greece does the same in the Aegean Sea - is this "good neighbourly relations"?Then we haven`t talked about the Cyprus issue or when Turkey was prepared to invade Armenia back in the 90s but the Russians told Turkey to back off which they did or for example take the incursions(although they were limited) - which were opposed by Iraq - by the Turkish military into northern Iraq in order to fight the PKK...

However I have to say that their are external powers who wants to see the Aegean dispute to continue between Greece and Turkey since it`s feeding($) their defence industries.This dispute also serves the military pashas in Turkey since they have to show that there is a "threat" against Turkey in order to show to the Turkish public that the Turkish military needs to continue to have a strong say in politics...The Turkish military strong influence in Turkish politics and foreign policy creates a lot of problem between Turkey and their neighbours.On the other hand, the Turks - as egeli mentioned - consider America and Israel to be their primary enemies.Greece comes in the third place.The Turkish military has to try a little harder.

On a serious note, I think it`s great news to see that only 5,7 % of the Turks see Greece as an enemy - I`ve read about this survey too.

Anyway, as for the EU-Turkey relations I have to admit that the signals coming from some EU countries haven`t been the "right" ones.You know hitite, there was a time when Germany,France,UK.. were blaming Greece for stopping Turkey to join the EU.Now it`s France(Sarkozy), Germany(Merkel), Austria...who doesn`t seem to be exactly happy to see Turkey joining the EU.And I also agree that maybe EU should have waited a little more time before letting Bulgaria and Romania to join the EU.But the negotiations continues between EU and Turkey.Turkey will probably join the EU but it`s going to take time.If you ask me personally, I rather have a stable and democratic Turkey within the EU than an unstable and undemocratic Turkey outside the EU.I want to see a future Europe who functions as a counter weight against USA but in order to do that, Europe needs to have a common army and a common foreign policy.I`m pretty sick and tired of US foreign policy; Europe could be playing an important role in the world by being a "soft power" instead of a world police.

Having said that, I`m not saying that the EU is perfect.We have our flaws too.There`s a lot of things that could be improved.However some people likes to blame the EU for everything when they see an EU country having unjust laws but the EU doesn`t have a say in all issues.Some issues are being handled by the EU countries themselves which frankly the EU can`t do very much about since these are the "play rules" or that an EU country agreed with the EU before they joined the EU that they wanted to determine themselves in that particular area.But when it comes to the common EU laws and rules which the EU countries must follow, if an EU country breaks against a law or a rule, the EU commission could take that EU country to the EU court.And in very extremely situations, an EU country could actually be stripped of its EU membership if they don`t follow the common EU laws or rules - but that of course hasn`t happened.