BY CUNEYT ARCAYUREK
CUMHURIYET)- Publications and statements which sing Turkey’s praises, say that we will add to the prosperity of Europe, and stress that we are a secular country that will serve as a bridge between the East and the West -- well, they said this before last December’s European Union summit, but no longer!
Relations with the United States are tense, and EU countries are not behaving the way they did four or five months ago.
Now we see gloomy and negative reports in the media.
For example, US officials tell the Turkish Industrialists’ and Businessmen’s Association (TUSIAD) delegation visiting the US that relations with Turkey are still doubtful and uneasy.
Former Ambassador to Ankara Mark Parris says that the special relations between the two countries are regressing.
The European media wants Abdullah Ocalan to be retried. Our EU membership bid is being used as a tool.
In Warsaw and Budapest, people in the streets greeted Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan with banners that read: ‘The EU Constitution and the Koran gives different rights to women. Which do you prefer, Sir?’
Meanwhile, it’s not only the media of the US and Europe that are pressing for the retrial of Abdullah Ocalan without even bothering to investigate what the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights really is about. Some of us also favor the same method.
Nobody says, ‘Let’s investigate this ruling, determine which doors it opens and which it closes, and then take the necessary measures.’
The ECHR for example, called Ilich ‘Carlos the Jackal’ Ramirez Sanchez a terrorist, but elaborately avoided writing that Ocalan, the murderer of 35,000 people, is the head of the terrorist group PKK.
We are at such a stage that they are trying to make Turkey become a country which bows to all kinds of pressure. However, after so much self sacrifice, we have nothing left to give.