Russia-Turkey conflict - Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association

Expert says Russia would not tolerate Turkey’s actions to populate NK territories with Syrians

Armen Press — Thu, 26 Nov 2020 06:35:28 +0000

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 26, ARMENPRESS. Turkey’s plans to populate the territories of Nagorno Karabakh, which have come under the Azerbaijani control, with Syrians will not be accepted by both Russia and Iran. Russia would not allow it or will take anti-terrorist measures later, Expert on Turkish studies Ruben Melkonyan told Armenpress, commenting on the foreign and local media reports according to which Turkey is transferring Syrians to the territories of Nagorno Karabakh currently controlled by Azerbaijan.

The expert said these reports, even they are not coming from real facts, have a very serious potential of becoming a reality.

According to him, the issue should be viewed from two important domains. “The first one is that Turkey’s open participation to the recent war [in Karabakh] made us suppose that after the war as well Turkey will continue to keep its active presence in this matter. And it’s natural that Turkey will try to take some steps in its policy priorities. Secondly, we need to take into account that the demography policy or the demographic engineering has a very important place in Turkey’s policy. It is based on a state tradition and has a history of centuries. In the occupied territories Turkey is immediately starting the policy of neutralizing the further threats and creating additional threats for the enemy countries”, the expert said.

Melkonyan reminded that before the Armenian Genocide Turkey has populated various territories of historic Armenia with different Muslim nations which later played a role in the implementation of the Armenian Genocide. He said Turkey, by occupying several territories in Syria, is populating them with people faithful to it. According to the expert, Turkey is trying the same also in the territories of Artsakh which have come under the Azerbaijani control. “My analysis is based on the principles of the Turkish demographic policy, and these principles allow to claim that populating the occupied territories of Artsakh with people faithful to Turkey is very realistic”, he said.

Melkonyan is sure that some of these people will be terrorists with their families who can turn from a ‘peaceful civilian’ to an extreme terrorist at any moment, by participating in military or terrorist operations. “In other words, by populating that territories with that people, Turkey in fact is deploying a special division of the army in the face of terrorists and their families”, the expert on Turkish studies noted.

Asked why there is no wish to populate those territories with Azerbaijanis, Melkonyan said the question should be viewed in the context of expected public developments, complaints in Azerbaijan and we should understand whether Azerbaijan’s statement that the refugees want to move to Aghdam and other territories is true or is another myth.

Melkonyan also stated that Turkey’s such plans are not in the interests of Iran and Russia.

“Russia should not allow transfer of terrorists to that region which is closer to its borders. But if we look at the issue from political perspective, the presence of terrorists in this territory would allow Russia to take certain steps at any moment under the anti-terrorist war flag or other”, he said.

Ruben Melkonyan proposed to wait for developments and understand which priority will be more influential for Russia – the humanitarian one or the anti-terrorist one. The expert, however, believes that both Russia and Iran would not accept these steps and may take some actions either now or later. “Nevertheless, we need to understand that this issue is going to be one of the key points of the Russian-Turkish or Turkish-Iranian clash”, Ruben Melkonyan said.

Interview by Anna Grigoryan

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan

Source: https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1035922.html

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A disaster in Syria as Russia and Turkey clash

Ishaan Tharoor — Thu, 27 Feb 2020 00:52:50 +0000

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Syrian internally displaced persons in a camp north of Syria’s Idlib province on Feb. 17. (Rami al-Sayed/AFP/Getty Images) (Rami Al Sayed/Afp Via Getty Images)

Almost a decade into its ruinous civil war, Syria is experiencing perhaps its single biggest humanitarian crisis. An offensive by the Syrian regime in the last remaining rebel-held enclaves in the country’s northwest has sparked an exodus of more than 800,000 civilians, mostly women, and children, since Dec. 1. For some of them, it’s the third or fourth time they have fled bombardments in a war that has claimed close to 400,000 lives and displaced more than half of the country’s population.

For years, Syria’s besieged province of Idlib has served as a final haven for those escaping forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad. But they are now running out of places to go. Turkey, which already hosts upward of 3.6 million Syrian refugees, has closed its border, even as it threatens to launch a retaliatory campaign against Assad’s regime.

Convoys of civilians have snaked their way out of Idlib’s cities as regime artillery and Russian aircraft pounded what they say are rebel positions. Hundreds have been killed since the offensive began, while eyewitness reports suggest the regime and its allies have indiscriminately targeted schools, health facilities, and mosques in a “scorched earth” advance that has ravaged dozens of towns. The current movement of people is the largest human exodus since a 2017 campaign carried out by Myanmar’s military forced hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims to seek sanctuary in neighboring Bangladesh.

Then there’s the brutal cold. Last week alone, more than a dozen refugees died of exposure. Aid workers, mostly operating from across the border in Turkey, say they are overwhelmed and warn of a dire shortage of tents. Potable water is in short supply and sanitation facilities are mostly nonexistent as fleeing civilians set up ramshackle camps in the depths of the Syrian winter.

For Assad, though, it’s a moment of triumph. On Monday, he gave a speech in Aleppo hailing the regime’s reconquest of a strategic highway that enters the city via Idlib.

“We know this liberation does not mean the end of the war or the crushing of all plots or the end of terror or the surrender of the enemy, but it definitely rubs their noses in the dirt,” Assad said. “This is a prelude to [the rebels’] final defeat, sooner or later.”

On the same day, Mark Lowcock, the U.N. undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs, warned in a statement that the situation in Idlib could soon pose “the biggest humanitarian horror story of the 21st century” if world powers don’t force a cease-fire.

But, as is ever the case in the Syrian war, the world is largely looking away. The Trump administration is laser-focused on disengaging from the conflict. NATO officials have reiterated that the alliance won’t back Turkey should it embark on another foray into Syria. Clashes between Turkey and regime forces have already led to dozens of deaths on both sides. But Assad is keen to press his advantage.

“The Syrian regime is determined to wipe out the last stronghold of rebel resistance in Idlib province. … And Russia has given the offensive its full support, through airstrikes,” my colleagues reported last week.

“Moscow’s goal is not just backing an old friend, Syria,” they added. “It’s also about projecting Russian global power against NATO, all the while juggling President Vladimir Putin’s complicated friendship with another like-minded authoritarian, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.”

Russian and Turkish delegations concluded another round of talks in Moscow on Tuesday. The talks were aimed at de-escalating the conflict, but it is unclear how much genuine progress was made. The two countries find themselves locked in a tense geopolitical contest, at opposite ends of two civil wars, in Syria and Libya.

“The rapprochement between Ankara and Moscow, which has accelerated since the 2016 coup attempt against Erdogan, has been one of the surprising regional dynamics of the past few years,” noted Sinan Ulgen, the executive chairman of the Istanbul-based think tank EDAM. He pointed to speculation that Ankara was tacitly pivoting toward Moscow after the NATO member’s controversial acquisition of a Russian missile defense system.

“But the true limits of a convergence of Turkish and Russian interests may have been reached in Idlib,” Ulgen added. “Direct Turkish-Syrian conflict could inflict lasting damage to the burgeoning Erdogan-Putin bromance.”

Turkey, meanwhile, is in a bind. Erdogan, an illiberal demagogue, has irked most major Western governments in recent years and finds himself in a political mess: The proxy rebel groups that Erdogan’s government has backed in Idlib are facing a slow defeat, while the majority of the Turkish voting public is staunchly opposed to welcoming any more Syrian refugees into the country.

“What should have been a balancing act between Russia and the West is now looking like a prison for Turkey,” wrote Washington Post columnist Asli Aydintasbas. “Whatever the original motivation was, Erdogan and his allies have made Turkey too vulnerable — and isolated — to stand up to Russia over Idlib.”

The choices in Idlib are grim. “If you go back you can be detained and spend your life in jail or worse,” a Syrian named Obaid told CNN, when reckoning with the prospect of living once more under Assad’s rule. “I would rather die than ever go back to the regime.”

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/02/19/disaster-syria-russia-turkey-clash/

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