Turkey General Claims Whole World Against Sick Man Of Europe
March
28, 2007
Gen. Saygun accuses Turk-Kurd politician Zana of inviting Iraqi Kurdish
intervention into Turkey
ÜMİT ENGİNSOY
WASHINGTON - Turkish Daily News
Deputy Chief of the Turkish General Staff Gen. Ergin Saygun on Monday strongly
criticized France for signing a defense and military cooperation pact with the
Greek Cypriot government, saying the move threatened regional stability.
Speaking at a conference on U.S.-Turkish relations here, he also accused Western
European nations of failing to take adequate measures against the Kurdistan
Workers Party (PKK) - which they, like Turkey and the United States, view as a
terrorist group - and Iraqi Kurds of usurping the central Baghdad government's
authority to set up an undeclared state in the country's north and supporting
the PKK. The French-Greek Cypriot defense cooperation agreement "is a threat to
stability, a flagrant violation of international law" and encourages the Greek
Cypriots against efforts for a solution to the conflict on the Eastern
Mediterranean island, Saygun told the conference.
The annual meetings were held jointly by the American-Turkish Council, an
organization of mainly U.S. companies doing business with Turkey, and the
Turkish-U.S. Business Council. France and the Greek Cypriots signed the pact in
Paris on March 1 and the agreement's contents are not clear. "Turkey won't
withdraw any military units until a solution has been reached on Cyprus," Saygun
said, adding that France and several other European nations were content with
only "faint measures" against the PKK, briefly arresting and soon releasing the
group's members. "There are four television stations, 13 radio channels and 10
news papers operated by the PKK in Europe," demonstrating the degree of freedom
the terrorist group enjoys there, he said.
On Iraq, Saygun said the Kurds now had an undeclared state with its own flag,
setting their eyes on capturing control of the oil-rich and multi-ethnicity of
Kirkuk. Under the disguise of reversal of an Arabization campaign during former
leader Saddam Hussein's term, a Kurdish exodus into Kirkuk is under way, he
said. Probably 120,000 Kurds were expelled, he said, "but 450,000 Kurds
returned."
Saygun called for the disbanding of all militias in Iraq, including the Kurdish
peshmerga and the strengthening of the central Baghdad government and he
reiterated the military's accusations that the PKK has been receiving weapons,
explosives, shelter and logistics from northern Iraqi Kurds. Saygun also chided
Leyla Zana, a prominent Turkish Kurdish politician who had spent several years,
for recently saying that "the Kurds' leaders are Talabani, Barzani and Ocalan"
in reference to Iraq's ethnic Kurdish President Jalal Talabani, leader of the
Iraqi Kurdish regional government Massoud Barzani and PKK leader Abdullah
Ocalan. "Such statements are inviting Iraqi Kurds to intervene in Turkey,"
Saygun told the Turkish Daily News on the sidelines of the conference. "I think
these are very serious and dangerous statements and I believe state prosecutors
are probing these remarks."
He said that at a time when Armenian genocide resolutions are pending in the
U.S. Congress, Armenia has territorial ambitions toward Turkey. "Armenia's
declaration of independence calls eastern Turkey western Armenia," he said.
