Gul: It Is Meaningless To Focus On Rumsfeld's Letter And To Carry The Issue To Different Dimensions

ANKARA - Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Gul said on Friday, ''it is meaningless to focus on letter of U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and to carry the issue to different dimensions.''
Speaking at a program on the private CNN-Turk TV Channel, Gul said, ''whatever necessary have been done after detention of Turkish soldiers in northern Iraq. It is meaningless to focus on letter of U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and to carry the issue to different dimensions.''
''During my scheduled visit to the United States, I will refer to this mistake. We do not consider these as matters which have still been suspended,'' he said.
Upon a question about allegations saying that Turkish soldiers in Suleymaniyah were staging some activities without permission of the government, Gul said that the allegations were not true.
''These are not correct. They are special teams of the Turkish Armed Forces. All of them are parts of the Turkish Armed Forces. There is a chain of order and command in the Turkish Armed Forces. No one can act out of this chain,'' he said.
Noting that allegations saying that terrorist organization PKK/KADEK had opened an official bureau in Kirkuk were totally baseless, Gul said, ''these allegations cannot be correct because PKK was included in the United States' list of terrorist organizations. Under the resolution no: 1483, U.S. and British forces have undertaken authority of the region. Presence of terrorist organization and its opening a bureau are impossible in a region under responsibility of the United States and Britain.
(UK-AÖ) 18.07.2003