BY NURAY BASARAN
AKSAM- Turkey’s foreign policy contacts are gradually expanding. The government is trying to strengthen relations with neighboring countries and it also has initiatives to put its global relations on a new level. There are also international changes which began with the Iraq invasion. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s efforts to combine these two atmospheres and obtain the maximum benefit are contributing greatly to our marshalling world developments.
There’s been a great change of atmosphere which was accelerated with the Middle East project. There is a serious crack in the Paris-Berlin line, which was opposed to the US during the war in Iraq. Berlin recently declared a change of policy through German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer. Berlin proposed a new transatlantic cooperation with Washington and signalled that it might act independently of Brussels in the Great Middle East project. At the same time Paris took a step by signaling a new military cooperation with Britain, that is, indirectly with the US. Now a new international atmosphere is rising, but it’s too early for it to be definite. Only time can foster this new atmosphere. Now Erdogan hopes to see the conditions of this new world and to be included in it. Another meaningful development is German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s visit to Ankara and its content.
Since 1993, when then German Chancellor Helmut Kohl came to Ankara, Schroeder is the first German chancellor to visit Turkey. Schroeder’s visit is about quelling fears about this December’s EU summit and giving a date to Turkey for EU membership negotiations. Many years have gone by since Kohl’s visit, and Turkey is now on Germany’s agenda as someone to help Iraq. Schroeder is making this visit in order to observe Turkey’s possible role as a door opening to the greater Middle East and start a new relationship. Time changes so many things due to changing conditions. Maybe in these changing times we can find a hub formed by the spokes of Ankara, Berlin and Washington.