Following a story run by Syria’s government-controlled Ikhbariya TV on the morning of Feb. 19 that forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad could enter the northwestern town of Afrin near Turkish border in the next few hours, Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan spoke on the phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
It is obvious from diplomatic contacts and statements last week that the Turkish government is seeking to adopt a new line to decrease antagonism with the West, both with the U.S. and the European Union. The change comes after a steady course of declining relations for the past six or seven years, roughly since the start of the Arab Spring.
Two important developments in two days reanimated hopes that Ankara is opting to improve its relations with the West and that, vice versa, the West is opting to better understand Turkey’s problems.
Following a meeting with Turkish Defense Minister Nurettin Canikli in Brussels on Syria, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Feb. 15 that he believed the two countries are “finding common ground,” even though “there are areas of uncommon ground where sometimes war just gives you bad alternatives to choose from.”
The weeks-long escalation in the skirmish of words between Turkish and U.S. officials entered a wait-and-see phase after a Feb. 14 statement by U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
An Istanbul court of appeals confirmed on Feb. 13 that Enis Berberoğlu, a member of parliament from the social democratic main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) list, must serve five years and 10 months in jail. The court also ruled for Berberoğlu’s continued imprisonment throughout that term.
Turkish Foreign Minister Çavuşoğlu said on Feb. 12 that relations between Turkey and the U.S. will either improve or get much worse.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s National Security Adviser Herbert McMaster was in Turkey on Feb. 11 to have a meeting with Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan’s Foreign and Security Policy Adviser İbrahim Kalın in Istanbul, the first stop of his tour covering Jordan, Kuwait, Egypt and Lebanon.
Relations between NATO allies the United States and Turkey are descending into a schizophrenic and dangerous spiral, with the potential to trigger a domino effect in the Middle East and beyond.
