Cengizer: While Nato Could Not Talk About War, Turkey Was Asked To Take A Decision To Support War

NEW YORK - Altay Cengizer, the deputy permanent representative of Turkey to the United Nations, said on Wednesday, ''while debates at NATO about Patriot missiles to be given to Turkey were prevented because it would mean giving support to the war in Iraq, Turkey was asked to take a decision to support the war.''
Speaking at a conference in New York, the United States, Cengizer briefed representatives of American public opinion on reasons of tension, which had erupted between Turkey and the United States before and after the war in Iraq.
Besides representatives of the new conservatives group, representatives of Jewish, Kurdish and Arab groups attended the conference.
Cengizer said, ''prior to the war, Turkey has suffered a serious damage due to negative approach of the U.S. press, which became a part of the war. In addition to inappropriate caricatures in the U.S. press, it was also claimed that if the motion to accept deployment of U.S. soldiers in Turkey was approved by the Turkish parliament, Turkey would be given 26 billion U.S. dollars. In fact, this amount was only 4-6 billion U.S. dollars.''
Noting that statements of the United States and information given to Turkey did not satisfy and convince Turkey, Cengizer said, ''the Americans either had a plan about the future of Iraq or not. But, they did not tell it to us.''
Cengizer said that Turkish public opinion and most of parliamentarians were against the war that time and stated that not passing of a U.N. resolution which allowed use of force against Iraq was one of the reasons for it.
Noting that the United States changed doctrine in a very short time and it left prevention strategy and passed to pre-intervention doctrine, Cengizer said that but this doctrine was changed suddenly and no time was left for allies including Turkey, France and Germany to adapt to new doctrine.
Cengizer noted, ''while debates at NATO about Patriot missiles to be given to Turkey was prevented because it would mean to support the war in Iraq, Turkish parliament was asked to take a decision which would mean direct support to the war.'' In spite of that, the parliament disapproved the motion only with a 3 votes margin. He added that the result was completely democratic and valid.
Upon a question on Baku-Ceyhan pipeline, he said, ''the United States has supported this project so far. If it withdraws this support now, it will be very wrong. That's why, I think that there is not any danger regarding the future of this project.''
Cengiz said that Turkish-Israeli relations did not weaken, on the contrary, those relations improved.
Underlining that Turkey was in favor of a government which would represent all circles in Iraq to come to political power, Cengiz said that it could take place in 2004.
(UK-EÖ-AÖ) 18.06.2003