Drone warfare has increased dramatically since 2008 and there are over 60 bases across the globe engaging in a US drone missions. US drones are currently deployed in the skies of over 14 different countries, some for surveillance and others for attacking ground targets. The area of Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan, known as Waziristan is the locus of much of the drone operations. But are these weapons keeping us safe, or do they just incite further terrorist attacks? And is their use a violation of the Geneva Conventions?
THE DRONE LANDSCAPE
THE DRONE ECONOMY
THE DRONE MORALITY
As a bonus, here is Al Jazeera’s People & Power talking about the Attack of the Drones: The US government’s growing reliance on aerial drones to pursue its war on al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Yemen, Afghanistan and elsewhere is proving controversial. As governments are increasingly relying on drones, what are the consequences for civil liberties and the future of war? (18 July 2012).
‘Somalian refugees flee famine and fighting as the civil war continues against the government and al-Qaeda allies Al-Shabab. Kenyan troops increased involvement in the Somali conflict have virtually blocked off all escape routes from Somaliainto neighboring Kenya. As a result, Somalis have fled to Ethiopian refugee camps. PulitzerCenter Grantee Fred de Sam Lazaro discusses the reality of these overcrowded refugee camps on a segment for PBS NewsHour. Ethiopian border post Dolo Ado sees 400 new refugees a day, averaging a total of 135,000 refugees in the refugee camp so far. While aid organizations like the UN World Food Program provide resources to maintain the refugee camps, they will soon run out of funding. Doctors Without Borders Dr. Benjamin Levy states malnutrition is the systemic problem in these refugee camps. Levy believes that without food and funding from outside aid organizations, this problem will only persist’ (13 June 2012).
Fred de Sam Lazaro explains further that the “influx [of refugees into Ethiopia] has doubled from September to October [2011] at the remote Somalia-Ethiopia border post of Dolo Ado. More than 400 people, mostly women and children arrive each day, their needs triaged first by the aid group Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym, MSF. Many land next in the group’s emergency feeding center to rebuild bodies withered by days-long treks in blistering daytime heat and nights in the open. Settlement comes next, into four major camps that have been set up in this sprawling arid landscape. A fifth camp is under construction. For aid providers there are myriad concerns and imminent threats: sustaining food and physical security and the donations that are needed to sustain this growing population, now estimated at 135,000. And MSF physician Benjamin Levy isn’t sure he’s seen the end of the influx. Many Somalis, terrified and paralyzed by the conflict, may simply be waiting for the fighting to subside to escape from their drought-stricken homeland. ‘The situation is absolutely far from resolved’, he said. Even the advent of long-awaited rains is a decidedly mixed blessing because they raise the threat of disease outbreaks in a population physically battered by the ordeal to get to the camps”.[1]
As I wrote many months ago, ‘[o]ver the past months Turkey has tried to mediate between Israel and the Palestinians, between Iran and the rest of the world, between Syria and Israel, and following the outbreak of the Arab Awakening, the state founded by Mustafa Kemal was quick to present itself as a future role-model for Arab nation states yearning for freedom and democracy . . . Egypt, Yemen, Libya, and Syria have all continued their course without taking any account of the Turkish road to prosperity, so that the Turkish humanitarian intervention in the Horn of Africa might just prove to do the trick and turn Turkey into an international player of some importance’.[1] And now the pan-Arab, international broadcaster Al Jazeera picks up on Turkey’s new pseudo-Ottoman overtures in Africa: ‘Turkey has been showing unparalleled interest in Somalia, starting with a visit from Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister, in August last year. Al Jazeera‘s Nazanine Moshiri takes a look’.
China’s presence in Africa is well known, but as Miss Moshiri points out, Iran has also displayed an interest in the Black Continent, as illustrated by the former Pentagon official and current resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute Michael Rubin: ‘On January 29, 2008, [Iran’s Foreign Minister] Mottaki declared that this year would mark a “milestone in Iran-Africa ties.” Three days later, while attending the Africa Union summit in Addis Ababa, Mottaki announced that Iran would soon host a summit of African foreign ministers in Tehran. The traditional pattern in which Iranian actions fail to live up to diplomatic rhetoric also appears to be changing in Africa, with Tehran developing strong partnerships with a number of states. The Islamic Republic has forged particularly strong ties with Senegal, once a Cold War ally of the United States but now quietly turning into West Africa’s Venezuela. President Abdoulaye Wade has traveled twice to Tehran to meet with Khamenei and Ahmadinejad, first in 2006 and again in 2008. During his most recent visit, he provided a backdrop for Khamenei to declare that developing unity between Islamic countries like Senegal and Iran can weaken “the great powers” like the United States. It would be a mistake to dismiss this as a rhetorical flourish: on January 27, 2008, a week after Senegalese foreign minister Cheikh Tidiane Gadio announced that he, too, would visit Tehran, Minister of Armed Forces Becaye Diop met with his Iranian counterpart to discuss expanding bilateral defense ties between the two states.Senior Iranian officials have returned the visits. On July 22, 2007, judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi and government spokesman Gholam-Hossein Elham –among the closest confidantes of Khamenei and Ahmadinejad, respectively– departed for Dakar, where they met Wade and Senegalese prime minister Cheikh Hadjibou Soumaré. Shahroudi declared, “We believe it is our duty to expand ties with Islamic countries and use the capabilities and potentials [sic] of Muslim states to help the growth and spread of Islam.” On March 12, 2008, Ahmadinejad left for a visit to the West African state. While the Iranian leadership might be most interested in expanding a Muslim bloc –especially one that might supplant the influence of Sunni Arab states– the Senegalese leadership seems most interested in immediate economic benefits. “Energy, Oil Prospecting, Industry: Senegal Benefits from Iranian Solutions,” a headline in the official government newspaper declared after Wade’s first visit to Tehran. After the reciprocal Iranian visit, Wade announced that Iran would build an oil refinery, a chemical plant, and an $80 million car assembly plant in the West African nation. Within weeks, Samuel Sarr, Senegal’s energy minister, visited Tehran and returned with a pledge that Iran would supply Senegal with oil for a year and purchase a 34 percent stake in Senegal’s oil refinery. Such aid probably came with strings attached. On November 25, 2007, during the third meeting of the Iran-Senegal joint economic commission, Wade endorsed Iran’s nuclear program. Senegal is not alone among those countries Tehran is cultivating. While Iranian officials trumpet Islam during meetings with Muslim officials, the Islamic Republic is willing to embrace any African state –Muslim or not– that finds itself estranged from the West in general and the United States in particular. Here, Sudan and Zimbabwe especially have been beneficiaries. Both European governments and Washington have sought to isolate Sudan for what many international human rights groups deem genocide in Darfur. As the international community sought to tighten diplomatic sanctions on Khartoum, Ahmadinejad moved to embrace Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir. Ahmadinejad was forthright: Iranian-Sudanese ties should be built around the understanding that both governments would defend each other in international settings. [In March 2008] Iran’s defense minister visited Khartoum and called the African state “the cornerstone” of the Islamic Republic’s Africa policies. Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s longtime president, has been as poisonous for his country as Bashir has been for Sudan. Mugabe’s government demonizes racial and ethnic minorities, and his economic policies have forced the breadbasket of southern Africa to face famine. But as the international community has isolated Mugabe’s regime in Zimbabwe, Tehran has reached out to fill the gap. Iranian politicians may speak of their commitment to social justice, but their crass indifference to social issues and public health and well-being are on display as they work to transform Africa’s most brutal dictatorship into a pillar of Iranian influence in Africa. Mottaki initiated outreach to Zimbabwe on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in 2006. The two countries pledged uniformity of policy. At a Tehran press conference in November of that year, Mugabe said, “Iran and Zimbabwe think alike and have been described [as belonging to] the ‘Axis of Evil.’ . . . Those countries that think alike should come together.” In subsequent days, the two countries signed deals to boost energy cooperation, restart Zimbabwe’s defunct oil refinery, and underwrite agricultural policies that have left the southern African nation on the brink of famine. The Iranian ambassador in Harare pledged to help Mugabe repel sanctions’.[2] In other words, Turkey seems to have its work cut out . . .
In the great tradition established by Bush, Jr. the British Prime Minister David Cameron has now issued a warning, insinuating that the UK’s domestic security is at risk from Somali militants. Hyperbole and fear-mongering at its finest, and for good measure the name of that that “catch-all ghost entity” has once again been drummed up to garner support. It seems that Cameron is trying to construct a parallel with Afghanistan, as a way of securing the voting public continuing support, in a fashion similar to Bush’s high popularity ratings in the aftermath of 9/11 and the opening months of the invasion of the Hindu Kush. Will his stratagem work and will the British public be lured into voting Tory again next time around??? The BBC remarks that ‘British Prime Minister David Cameron has told the BBC that radical jihadist islamism in Somalia remains his biggest concern about the country. In an interview with BBC Somali Service editor Yusuf Garaad Omar, Mr Cameron said the international security threat from al-Shabab, which controls large areas of Somalia, is real and substantial. The British government is hosting an international conference on Somalia in London on Thursday [, 23 February] to discuss strategies to tackle the security situation, piracy and aid for Somalia. The conference will be attended by more than 40 political leaders from Africa, the Middle East and other countries’.[1]
The Telegraph’s Damien McElroy informs us that “Britain is to spend £20 million on a new civilian rapid reaction force to secure parts of Somalia wrested from the control of the Islamic militant group al-Shabaab”, once the AU forces have left the country”.[2] Thus, one could argue that Cameron felt compelled to up the ante and sharpen his rhetoric so as to justify this extravagant-looking expenditure to a austerity-struck home public. Like Bush kept on saying that America was battling the terrorists in Iraq, rather than at home in the U.S., Cameron now employs a similar figure of speech to convince his critics that spending millions of Pounds on yet another foreign war is not just justified but necessary to keep Britain safe. The Foreign Secretary William Hague supports the words of his boss: “We want to help Somalis find longer-term political solutions, and a key part of tomorrow will be capitalising on recent security progress on the ground. We can make a huge difference if we get this right”.[3] Cameron and Hague imply that this £20 million spent on weapons constitutes yet another humanitarian intervention that will secure the West, while immobilizing the threat of radical Islam. Al Qaeda and Al Shabaab have become the latest configuration of evil now that the Taliban are seen as a necessary evil in the Hindu Kush and Al Qaeda elements are primarily conspicuous in their absence in the Af-Pak theatre. Yemen, across the Gulf of Aden, has also been mobilized to present another Islamic threat, necessary for the continuation of the never-ending War-on-Terror. Will the Af-Pak theatre now be replaced by the Somali-Yemen axis as the locus for the West’s military interventionism??? Making his point abundantly clear, David Cameron told the BBC Somali service Al Shabaab “encourages violent jihad not just in Somalia but also outside Somalia. And there is a very real danger of young British Somalis having their minds poisoned by this organisation. So there is a terrorist threat that is current today, and if we are not careful, could get worse”.[4]
David Cameron has now ensured that Britain will stay the course on the ever-lasting War-on-Terror, but other world leaders are also attending the London Conference on Thursday, 23 February. Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, and representatives of the World Bank, the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) as well as many others will be present too in London. It seems that a number of Yemenis will be able to attend: the ‘Foreign Minister Abu Baker al-Qirbi, who will represents Yemen in the conference, said the conference will discuss the Somali case and its security and political implications on the Horn of Africa and the world in general. The discussions will be based on seven headings: Security, Political Process, Local Stability, Counter-Terrorism, Humanitarian, and International Coordination, according to Al-Qiribi. Senior representatives from over 40 governments and multi-lateral organizations will come together in London with the aim of delivering a new international approach to Somalia. They will discuss how the international community can step-up its efforts to tackle both the root causes and effects of the problems in the country’, as reported by the Yemen Post.[5]
But not just Yemen, also Turkey – which now sees itself as the pseudo-Ottoman champion of the Third World, as clearly evidenced by the charity campaign organized by the Diyanet during last Ramazan – is present at the London conference. In fact, Turkey’s wily Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu abandons an unofficial meeting of G20 foreign ministers in Mexico to be present at the Somalia Conference. David Cameron thus calls upon the international community to endorse his bold moves to perpetuate the never-ending War-on-Terror. The conference organizers have released this statement, already echoed by the Yemen Post higher: ‘The international community hopes to agree a series of practical measures which will be published in the form of a communiqué at the end of the conference. Discussion will be arranged under seven headings:
Security: sustainable funding for the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), and support for Somali security and justice sectors. Political Process: agreement to what should succeed the transitional institutions in Mogadishu in August 2012 and the establishment of a Joint Financial Management Board. Local Stability: a coordinated international package of support to Somalia’s regions. Counter-terrorism: renewed commitment to tackle collectively the terrorist threat emanating from Somalia. Piracy: breaking the piracy business model. Humanitarian: renewed commitment to tackling Somalia’s humanitarian crisis. International coordination: agreement on improved international handling of Somalia issues’.[6]
In the above clip the Turkish Prime Minister criticizes the opposition in Turkey for remaining “spectators” while world history is being made in their surroundings. He also pronounced some choice words regarding the UN: he asked whether the world was nothing but a slave of the UN’s five permanent members . . .
The Time reporter Ishaan Tharoor, reporting an interview with the Turkish PM – ‘Erdogan sat down with TIME’s Jim Frederick, Bobby Ghosh, Tony Karon, Matt McAllester and Ishaan Tharoor on the sidelines of U.N. meetings in New York City’ – writes in his preamble that “Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is the international statesman of the moment. Greeted as a rock star in Egypt and other countries transformed by the Arab Spring, the Turkish Premier looms like a colossus over the Middle East”.[1]
On the UN, Tayyip had this to say: “First and foremost, what is required is for the U.N. Security Council to say yes to the legitimate demands of the people in Palestine. If anything else should be discussed at this moment, it should be between two states. And there’s another fact we need to consider, primarily the borders of 1967. Israel first seems to have accepted going back to the borders of 1967, but somehow seemed to have got distanced from this ideal. They need to get closer back to it. Palestine is in a form of a maze right now. Through TIME, I’d like to make a call out to humanity: [The Palestinians] are there to exist. They are not there to be condemned to struggle in an open-air penitentiary. Israel’s cruelty in that regard cannot be continued any longer. And, of course, the legitimate demands for Palestine to be a recognized state should be catered to and considered both in the U.N. Security Council and General Assembly. Those who approach these demands negatively will never be able to settle their accounts with history”, going on talk about Turkey’s relationship with the Jewish state: “Our mutual relations with Israel would have been reinforced even further only if Israel hadn’t victimized the positive relations of two countries with [its 2010 raid] on the Mavi Marmara, which was navigating in international waters. The flotillas in question were bearing nothing but humanitarian aid, including toys, food and other sorts of materials. They were holding over 450 citizens from 32 countries. One of the casualties is an American citizen of Turkish descent. And right now the Israeli Prime Minister still alleges that the flotillas were actually loaded with weapons. Had they possessed the weapons that were alleged, why didn’t they fire back? There are reports issued by both the U.N. Security Council and U.N. agencies in Geneva about this incident, and you never see the slightest trace that the flotillas were carrying guns. The Israeli government is not being honest at all. Right now, as long as they refuse to apologize for the nine people of Turkish descent who lost their lives on the flotilla, so long as they refuse to pay compensation to the families, and of course as long as the embargo on Gaza has not been lifted, the relations between the two countries will never become normalized”.[2]
As for his trip of the Arab Awakening in Turkey’s hinterland, the PM declared: “Unlike others, I didn’t just go there to see a few people on the streets. I intentionally wanted to talk to the candidate presidents, the new political parties there, and I had the opportunity to get together with lots of people in order to grasp the situation. At my meetings, I said, all right, Turkey is a model of democracy, a secular state, a social state with the rule of law upheld. We are not intentionally trying to export a regime — we couldn’t care less. But if they want our help, we’ll provide any assistance they need. But we do not have a mentality of exporting our system”, switching to the special relationship between Turkey and America: “In the last nine years, relations between the U.S. and Turkey have never recessed, never gone back, but they have not improved as much as we’d like. The relationship especially between Obama and us has always been very positive. Whenever we speak to each other, we talk about negotiations of certain processes whether in the region or more globally — we always talk about matters quite frankly. But of course what we want to see is relations getting reinforced at the upmost extent possible, particularly in the realms of the economy and commerce. Because Turkey has great potential to take advantage of. We’re really willing to see more and more U.S. entrepreneurs conducting investments in Turkey. I’m optimistic for the future. I should tell you honestly, there are no tensions between us”, ending with a quasi-realistic appraisal of Turkey’s road to Brussels: “When [former French President Jacques] Chirac or [former German Chancellor Gerhard] Schroder were there, Turkey would be involved in all of the European leaders’ summits. But when [current Chancellor Angela] Merkel or [French President Nicolas] Sarkozy took over their offices, the ambience changed dramatically. Despite their attitudes, we were determined to continue this path toward E.U. membership. But unfortunately the trust among my people in E.U. membership started to shake and turn. We’re still determined, because no leader in the E.U. will be there forever. They’ll be replaced one day. We might be replaced one day. But Turkey is getting stronger as time goes by, and the situation of
many European states is quite obvious”.[3]
As noted in a previous entry, ‘The leaders of Britain and France were given an enthusiastic welcome in Libya this week. David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy were welcomed as heroes for leading the NATO initiative that led to the exit of Colonel Gaddafi. But not everyone shares that opinion. The inaugural international conference on the Arab Spring, has opened in Iran’.
The Islamic Republic would very much like to appropriate the Arab Awakening as an Islamic Resurgence inspired by the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Here is Iran’s Press TV’s broadcast to the world: ‘The Leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolution has described the movements in the Arab world as Islamic awakening. A conference on the same theme started today, 18 September 2011, in Tehran. In this edition of News Analysis we will be talking to some of the guests’.
‘During the ending ceremony of the two-day Tehran conference on Islamic awakening in the Middle East and North Africa, Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad calls on revolutionary nations not to let the US and Israel return to their policies’.
On Sunday, 18 September, the Conference issued this statement: “Unity of the entire Muslim Ummah (Nation) is necessary for returning to national and Islamic dignity and independence of Muslim nations from the political, economic and ideological dominance of oppressive powers”.
It’s been more than two weeks since al-Shabab fighters pulled out of the Somali capital, Mogadishu. But fighting has not stopped. The only difference is that the battle between the armed group and government forces backed by African Union troops has moved to the outskirts of the city. Al Jazeera‘s Nazanine Moshiri reports from the new frontline (21 August 2011).
The African Union force in Somalia (AMISOM) has thus clearly made important gains in its fight against the Islamist grouping, that has been declared a terrorist organisation by the U.S. and Australia. Last year, a somewhat murky African organisation disseminating Islamist propaganda, the Al-Kataib Foundation for Media Productions, posted videos decrying the role played by “African Crusaders in Somalia”, by which the organisation is referring to the AU forces present in the country. In early July 2010, the Chinese Xinhua News Agency reported that a ‘senior Islamist official from the hard-line Islamist movement of Al Shabaab on Monday [, 05 July 2010] called on international jihadists to attack the embassies of Burundi and Uganda throughout the world. The troops of both African countries are currently deployed as peacekeepers in the Somali capital Mogadishu and are battling deadly Islamist insurgency led by Al Shabaab fighters’.[1] Subsequently, deadly attacks occurred in Kampala, where Ugandans were celebrating the end of the World Cup, held in South Africa: ‘Panic, chaos and despair followed the twin blasts which cast a dark cloud upon Kampala’s experience of Africa’s first World Cup. Women were wailing hysterically, with some even doing the unimaginable, like foolhardily running across a road darting between the fast-moving vehicles. They said they no longer cared if they got hit by a car. Sandra Akidi who had lost three family members in one of the blasts said she saw no more reason to live. “How could I lose three people at the same time?” she asked, crying. Casualty figures after the blasts at the Kyadondo Rugby Club and the Ethiopian Village restaurant have been rising steadily, with 74 the latest figure. Ugandan Health Minister James Kakooza says emergency measures have been put in place to cope with patients with different levels of injuries, some of whom are critical’, as reported by the BBC’s Joshua Mmali on Monday, 12 July 2010.[2] Al-Shabab’s spokesman, Sheik Ali Mohamud Rage, declared following the blasts in Kampala: “We warned Uganda not to deploy troops to Somalia; they ignored us. We warned them to stop massacring our people, and they ignored that. The explosions in Kampala were only a minor message to them . . . We will target them everywhere if Uganda does not withdraw from our land”.[3] Clearly taking a leaf from erstwhile U.S. President George W. Bush’s book, the Ugandan officer Lt. Col. Felix Kulaigye declared that “Al-Shabab is the reason why we should stay in Somalia. We have to pacify Somalia”.[4] And now, a year later, it turns out that Ugandan forces are in the process of achieving that goal. As indicated by Nazanine Moshiri’s report.
Meanwhile, the Russian state-sponsored broadcaster RT now reports that rebels ‘have reportedly entered Tripoli from the west as fighting in Libya appears to be intensifying, with some claims that hundreds have been killed over the weekend. It’s also believed that major clashes have taken place at the capital’s Mitiga airbase. Dr. Franklin Lamb, from Americans for Middle East Peace, is in Tripoli and says the situation has become increasingly volatile’ (21 August 2011).
Turkey as the self-proclaimed champion of the third world is taking extraordinary steps to its money where its mouth is: Prime Minister ‘Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has become the most high profile leader so far to visit Mogadishu during Somalia’s famine. He and his family, along with five cabinet ministers, were met by Somalia’s President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed at the airport before being taken on a tour of the city, now free of Islamist militants following their withdrawal’.
Turkey’s pseudo-Ottoman overtures[1] are now also being supported by the OIC (or the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation), currently headed by a prominent Turkish academic figure with arguably close ties to the AKP: ‘Professor Ekmeleddin İIhsanoğlu of Turkey is the first by-vote-elected Secretary General of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). Ever since he took the office as the ninth Secretary General in January 2005, he has taken serious steps to make the 57 member states organization as an effective organization. Since his association with the OIC from 1980 as founding Director General of the Research Centre for Islamic History, Culture and Arts (IRCICA) in Istanbul, Prof. Dr. İIhsanoğlu has pioneered activities towards creating awareness about Islamic culture across the world through research, publishing, and organizing congresses in various fields, including history of arts and sciences, and intercultural relations. Furthermore, he has initiated and supervised programs for the protection and promotion of the written and the architectural heritage of Islamic civilization in various countries. He has also contributed to scholarly debates on intercultural dialogues. With his institutional and personal initiatives, he has earned recognition at intellectual circles as a leading contributor to rapprochement between cultures, particularly between the Muslim and Western worlds’.[2]
While Turkey’s PM is traveling the world, the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK or Türk Silahlı Kuvvetleri) have been staging aerial attacks into the KRG in northerns Iraq.
Over the past weeks, the PKK has stepped up its attacks on Turkish targets, killing quite a few soldiers, policemen and members of the gendarmerie in the process. These new “martyrs” have outraged public opinion in Turkey and have emboldened the TSK to stage cross-border attacks on PKK targets. On Sunday, 14 August, the PM had been very clear in his language, speaking at a ceremony to mark the 10th year anniversary of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP): “We will [solve terror] with patience. If we show patience, it is because of the holy month of Ramadan. You can be sure that after Ramadan is over, peace in Turkey will reach a turning point”.[3] But, as it turns out, Turkey’s generals seem less concerned with the niceties of Islamic law and have run out of patience well before 29 August, when the month of fasting and feasting will come to an end. On Wednesday, 17 August 2011, the TSK attacked a number of terrorist targets in the mountains of Kandil. The news broadcaster EuroNews reports ‘[f]ormer Turkish general staff officer and military analyst Mesut Ülker [telling] euronews [that] “The operation against the Kandil Mountains is firstly very important psychologically. It’s also important in terms of the PKK’s human resources and logistics. The Turkish people will welcome this.” He also implied that other regional powers are backing the PKK saying: “Turkey is a rising star in the region. Iran, Syria and other external forces are working to stop Turkey. The PKK is a terrorist organisation being used by those forces.” The air and artillery strikes would seem to indicate an end to clandestine talks between the government and jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, and the tough talk from Turkey’s top politicians implies an escalating military campaign’.[4] Prior to boarding his plane to Somalia, PM Erdoğan declared that “Those who do not distance themselves from terrorism will pay the price”.[5] But, as reported by Today’s Zaman on 20 July: the ‘leader of the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), Abdullah Öcalan, who is currently serving a life sentence on İmralı Island in the Sea of Marmara, has said there could be more violence and attacks from the separatist group if Parliament and the prime minister fail to convince the PKK that they have plans to implement democratic measures to address the Kurdish question’.[6] And, rather than implementing democratic measures and negotiating peaceful solutions, now the army has taken the initiative again, thereby ensuring that the cycle of violence will become a quasi-permanent fixture in Turkey’s dealings with the PKK and Turkish Kurds.
Turkey hosted the UN developing nations conference last May. Leaders from the worlds’ Least Developed Countries gathered . . . in Turkey, with the objective of helping millions live more abundant lives. Participants agreed on a ten-year development plan that would reduce by half the current 48 countries where the annual income is less than US$745 per person. Toward this goal, developed countries are being asked to grant total debt relief as well as to curb military spending, to fund peaceful development endeavours instead (May 2011).
In a solemn voice, Turkish President Abdullah Gül stated: “I declare open the 4th United Nations conference on the least developed countries”.[1] Last year, I coined the phrase pseudo-Ottoman to describe Turkey’s new, self-confident posture on the world stage and it seems that hosting this event in Istanbul was more than just a fortuitous act. Dr. Abdiweli Ali, deputy prime minister of Somalia, expressed Turkey’s not-so hidden agenda behind hosting this event: “Least developed countries need a guide, a mentor, a patron that speaks on their behalf. Turkey is taking that role”.[2] In my piece, I declared rather boldly: “Rather than attempting to establish Turkish hegemony in the region, Davutoğlu’s pseudo-Ottoman foreign policy aims at integrating the erstwhile Ottoman hinterland into the mainstream of Turkish politics today. Turkey’s foreign minister is trying to shine a light on regions and areas previously located in the darkness beyond Turkish recognition and comprehension”.[3] Turkey’s desire to become the third world’s champion is clearly something completely new and totally beyond the experience of Turkish movers and shakers of yesteryear. Dr. Abdiweli Ali was not shy about expressing his enthusiasm for Turkey’s new station in the world: “I am a great admirer of Turkey and [an] admirer of Ottoman civilization. Turkey is strategically located between South and the North, between Asia and Europe. We think Turkey lays a service to fill that gap”.[4]
Last year, Turkey appeared to be at the forefront of countries sending aid to flood-stricken Pakistan: ‘18 million Turkish liras (TL) has been collected in bank accounts within the scope of an aid campaign aiming at helping flood-hit Pakistan, doubling the previous number, [the] Prime Ministry said on Wednesday [25 August 2010]. A statement by Natural Disaster and Emergency Management Directorate of [the] Prime Ministry said that as of Wednesday, 15.8 million TL, 474,491 U.S. dollars and 667,547 euros have been collected in three separate bank accounts opened within the scope of a circular signed by the Turkish prime minister’.[5] By late September 2010, Turkish donations to Pakistan had reached a staggering 183.9 million Turkish Liras, in addition to ‘244 tons of relief support that included vaccines, medicine, medical stuff’.[6] At the moment, the drought in east Africa is another issue that occupies Turkey’s leadership: ‘Donations have reached 40 million Turkish Lira (nearly $22.5 million) in [an] aid campaign launched by Turkey’s Directorate of Religious Affairs [or Diyanet] to help African people suffering from severe shortage of food and water’.[7] As such, this crisis has provided Turkey’s Directorate for Religious Affairs (Diyanet) with an incredible opportunity to improve its image at home as well as abroad. The Diyanet official Zeki Sayar said that “donations have so far reached 40 million TL in the aid campaign launched by our directorate, the Turkish Religious Foundation [Diyanet Vakfı] and the Turkish relief agency Red Crescent [Kızılay] to help dr[o]ught-hit African nations. Our target is to reach 100 million TL by the end of the Ramadan Feast [, 29 August 2011]. Africa lives through the worst [drought] of the last six decades. Millions of people face death because of famine. Our people rushed to African people’s assistance. Muslim people’s holy month of Ramadan has a great impact on the aid campaign. Ramadan is the month of solidarity among people”.[8]
And in an effort to show the world that Turkey means business, the Prime Minister and his wily Foreign Minister are planning to go to Somalia in person. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan gave a speech on Wednesday, 10 August: “We will [be] prepared to help in Somalia [even] if we were the only ones helping the famine victims”. At the speech for his party, the AKP, ‘Erdoğan said he was going to visit Somalia with Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, also accompanied by their families throughout the visit’.[9] Turkey’s pseudo-Ottoman leadership will be going on a family outing to witness first-hand how Turkish benevolence is saving lives in the face of deadly famine and disease killing indiscriminately. The pro-government English-language Turkish daily Today’s Zaman adds that the ‘Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency (TİKA) Chairman Serdar Çam has announced plans to open a new coordination office in Somalia, while he noted [that] Turkey was poised to help further by [aiding] Somalia become a stronger player in the fields of international trade, the economy, agriculture and industry. As the first humanitarian aid gathered by the combined efforts of TİKA, other government institutions and private enterprise landed earlier this week in famine-stricken Somalia [as well], Çam and aid teams led by Turkish Red Crescent Society (Kızılay) General Manager Ömer Taşlı visited refugee camps on Tuesday [, 9 August] to deliver aid packages to the Somalis, the Anatolia news agency reported . . . Çam said that the people of Somalia needed peace and comfort before the state can reach all its citizens and take care of their needs’.[10] Çam even told the Anatolia news agency that “[a]s a society that feels deeply for the pain Somalis are going through, particularly in this holy month of Ramadan, we [, as representatives of the Republic of Turkey] are here to deliver food aid to the country and make sure it reaches people even in the farthest corners of the land”.[11]
Last year’s disaster in Pakistan somehow managed to stay off the world’s television screens, as floods are slow disasters that gradually rise up and cause destruction and mayhem in slow-motion. But, famine, on the other hand, appears like much more a media-friendly calamity, offering the opportunity to beam horrendous pictures of starving mothers and babies across the world, with a glimmer of hope in the background in the shape of Turkish Red Crescent flag perhaps??? In early August, the President of the Turkish Kızılay (The Red Crescent) Tekin Küçükali stated publicly that Turkey would send ships and planes carrying aid to Somalia.[12]
And on top of all that pseudo-Ottoman effort to bring relief to the starving Muslim nation of Somalia, ‘at Turkey’s instigation’, the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) convened an emergency session ‘to discuss the crisis in Somalia, [which] has ended with the agreement of the 57 member countries on concrete steps for action to help the famine-stricken country’.[13] The OIC released a final statement on Wednesday, 17 August, which read that “we have decided to form a task force composed of Kazakhstan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Senegal and the OIC Secretariat-General”, “In order to closely follow the situation in the horn of Africa, particularly in Somalia, and to take measures as necessary”.[14]
Turkey’s efforts to persuade Syrian President Assad to halt his bloody crackdown on protestors and other hapless civilians has not yielded a lot of success. The European news broadcaster EuroNews reported on Thursday, 18 August, that Assad declared he had terminated his campaign . . . but the reality on the ground in Syria is still very far from clear. An Adjunct Professor, American University’s School of International Service Dr. Josef Olmert summarised that “Bashar Assad promised the UN General Secretary just yesterday [Wednesday, 17 August] that his security forces are out of the main cities of Syria. Hours later more Syrian civilians were murdered by “their” army. The same happened after the visit of Turkey’s Foreign Minister in Damascus. Bashar promised to have the army out of Hama, but in reality the massacre continued unabated”.[15] Maybe concentrating on Somalia will bring Turkey some much-deserved international recognition after all . . . . Over the past months Turkey has tried to mediate between Israel and the Palestinians, between Iran and the rest of the world, between Syria and Israel, and following the outbreak of the Arab Awakening, the state founded by Mustafa Kemal was quick to present itself as a future role-model for Arab nation states yearning for freedom and democracy . . . Egypt, Yemen, Libya, and Syria have all continued their course without taking any account of the Turkish road to prosperity, so that the Turkish humanitarian intervention in the Horn of Africa might just prove to do the trick and turn Turkey into an international player of some importance . . . Or, will the world decide that starving Africans are not their main concern after all and lavish her attention on other, more pressing issues such as the U.S. downgrade, the looming Euro crisis, and next year’s American elections??? Will Turkey turn out to be the “guide, [the] mentor, [the] patron” the Third World needs to get out of poverty and into prosperity???
The Russian state-sponsored international news broadcaster RT reports that ‘[l]eaders of social protests in Israel are calling for people to bolster demonstrations across the country. Over the last month up to three hundred thousand people in Tel Aviv have been demanding cheaper housing and social justice. But as RT’s Paula Slier reports there are outsiders in the Jewish state fighting a much tougher battle’.
The topic of African and other non-Jewish refugees in Israel is not very media-friendly, but still in 2004, a refugee from Ethiopia, Yohannes Bayu, was able to set up the African Refugee Development Center (ARDC), a non-profit organisation seeking to help those forgotten victims . . . How could a refugee be able to do such a thing??? The ARDC’s dedicated website informs that Mister Bayu, who is at present still the Center’s Executive Director, is ‘a recognized refugee, [who] received his undergraduate degree in Social Sciences from the University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, specializing on HIV/AIDS prevention and counselling. Before he was forced to leave Ethopia in 1997 because of political persecution and government harassment, he worked for various non-governmental organizations in HIV/AIDS counselling and prevention programs. He also worked two years for Doctors without Borders as a special advisor on a HIV/AIDS prevention project in Addis Ababa. Mr. Bayu was only granted political asylum in Israel, however, some five years after his arrival following a 23-day hunger strike on the steps of the Refugee Commissioner’s office and an order of Israel’s Supreme Court. Driven by such experiences, Mr. Bayu resolved to help the thousands of other asylum seekers escaping to Israel and founded ARDC the following year in 2004’.[1]
In 2008, the then-head of the Interior Ministry’s Population Administration, Yaakov Ganot, who has recently been appointed Director General of the Ministry of Public Security in Bibi’s government, declared openly that “The refugees must be stopped, or Israel will be overrun”.[2] In the paper Haaretz, Bari Weiss opines that “[m]ost of the time, these asylum seekers, nearly all from the African continent, are portrayed as a burden on Israeli society, yet [constitutes] another demographic problem the Jewish state must face. Not wanting them here, [Israel] treats them as criminals. At best, this position smacks of paranoia. At worst, it’s cruel”. [3] In general, these unwanted refugees come “from southern Sudan, Eritrea, the Ivory Coast, Somalia, Ghana and Nigeria”.[4] In other words, the Jewish nation state proves to be just another nation state, after all nation states are entities prone to endow their citizens with feelings of xenophobia, racism (now also known as Islamophobia in the West), and plain old chauvinism.
Drone Wars
Drone warfare has increased dramatically since 2008 and there are over 60 bases across the globe engaging in a US drone missions. US drones are currently deployed in the skies of over 14 different countries, some for surveillance and others for attacking ground targets. The area of Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan, known as Waziristan is the locus of much of the drone operations. But are these weapons keeping us safe, or do they just incite further terrorist attacks? And is their use a violation of the Geneva Conventions?
THE DRONE LANDSCAPE
THE DRONE ECONOMY
THE DRONE MORALITY
As a bonus, here is Al Jazeera’s People & Power talking about the Attack of the Drones: The US government’s growing reliance on aerial drones to pursue its war on al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Yemen, Afghanistan and elsewhere is proving controversial. As governments are increasingly relying on drones, what are the consequences for civil liberties and the future of war? (18 July 2012).
Category:
Af-Pak Theatre, Afghanistan, Americana, Bush, Current Affairs, Current History, Democracy, Military-Industrial Complex, Obama, Pakistan, Political Commentary, Propaganda, Somalia, United Nations, Yemen