Obama's formerly close relations with Erdoğan a source of problems

US President Barack Obama, whose formerly close relationship with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has come under question by American senators, might be distancing himself from the Turkish prime minister following an increase in anti-Semitic and anti-American rhetoric in Turkey, analysts have said.

Obama called his Turkish counterpart, Abdullah Gül, to extend his condolences for the victims of Turkey's deadliest mining disaster in Soma, which killed 301 people on May 13. The US president's call to Gül came on May 16, along with other world leaders who extended their condolences as well. Obama told Gül the US was ready to offer its assistance if needed.

After the call, the White House issued a statement saying that during the call with President Gül, Obama offered his “heartfelt condolences on behalf of the American people to the Turkish people on the tragic accident at the Soma mine.”

Erdoğan, however, did not receive a phone call from Obama following the disaster, though Russian President Vladimir Putin called the prime minister to extend his condolences over Soma on the same day that Obama spoke to Gül.

Officially, Washington rejects the claim that the fact that Obama did not call Erdoğan is meaningful.

An American official who asked to remain anonymous told Sunday's Zaman: “Presidents call presidents as heads of state. I would not read too much into it,” commenting on Erdoğan not receiving a call from Obama.

But Obama and Erdoğan spoke on the phone 18 times during the Arab Spring in 2011, with Obama reportedly saying at the time that Erdoğan was one of the five world leaders he spoke to most often.

Obama had called Erdoğan after a twin car bombing attack in the town of Reyhanlı in Hatay province in Turkey last May. The attack killed 51 people and injured 140 others, making it the single deadliest act of terrorism on Turkish soil.

The same American official told Sunday's Zaman that Reyhanlı and Soma are two different incidents. The one in Reyhanlı was a terrorist attack, the official said, and the prime minister is the head of the government and controls law enforcement and intelligence, while Soma was an accident. “It has more to do with the nature of the incident,” the official added.

The last phone call between Obama and Erdoğan on Feb. 20 following the first-ever White House rebuttal regarding Erdoğan's remarks attributed to Obama may provide more insight into the White House's approach to the Turkish prime minister.

Obama has already been receiving criticism from senators in the US over his compliments of Erdoğan and his close relations with the Turkish prime minister, especially after reports in the Western press on terrorist al-Qaeda affiliated groups using Turkey's southern border to travel into Syria and back again into the country and Europe.

On his most recent phone call to Erdoğan on Feb. 19, Obama noted the “importance of sound policies rooted in the rule of law to reassure the financial markets, nurture a predictable investment environment, strengthen bilateral ties, and benefit the future of Turkey,” the White House said in a statement issued after the call. The conversation was the first phone call between Obama and Erdoğan in six months.

The US administration has also been critical of Ankara over recent developments in the country, such as the restructuring of Turkey's judicial system to give more powers to the executive, creating concerns over the separation of powers; a new Internet law which restricts freedom of expression; and the government's tight control over the media, blocking social media sites.

In an unusual statement, the White House also accused Prime Minister Erdoğan of misrepresenting the content of his conversation with Obama on Feb. 19 regarding the extradition of Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, who lives in Pennsylvania.

Erdoğan, speaking on a program aired on ATV on March 8, said that during a phone call with President Obama on Feb. 19, he had asked for Gülen to be extradited as he was a threat to Turkey's national security. Erdoğan claimed that Obama had viewed this request “positively” and replied by saying, “I got the message.”

“The response attributed to President Obama with regard to Mr. Gülen is not accurate,” the White House later clarified in an emailed statement to various press organizations, including Today's Zaman. The statement marks a first in Turkish-American relations as a denial of the Turkish prime minister's version of events.

Gülen is in self-imposed exile in the US, though there is no legal hurdle preventing him from returning to Turkey. Shortly after he went to the US in 2000, he was charged with establishing an illegal organization in Turkey, but he was eventually acquitted in 2008.

After a corruption and bribery investigation became public on Dec. 17 of last year, around 50 people were detained, including businesspeople, bureaucrats and the sons of three ministers, and allegations arose that several ministers were also implicated in the illegality. Shortly afterwards, Erdoğan reassigned prosecutors and thousands of police officers, claiming they were under the control of Gülen and trying to create a “state within a state.”

The previous phone conversation between the two leaders took place in August 2013 in which Sunday's Zaman learned that Erdoğan had criticized Obama on his administration's policies in Egypt, ending the conversation on a not-so-good note.

“It is not wrong to say that relations between Turkey and the US are not in the best shape,” said a diplomatic source speaking to Sunday's Zaman on the condition of anonymity. “It is only natural for Obama to call Erdoğan after Reyhanlı because Obama has always been alongside Erdoğan when it comes to fighting terrorism. But since the Gezi Park protests [in Turkey last year] Obama has been in a difficult position, having to defend his close relations with Erdoğan to US senators due to issues of freedom of expression,” the diplomatic source stressed, adding that “Obama's close relations with Erdoğan are being questioned more and places pressure on him, especially after the anti-American, anti-Semitic rhetoric in the country.”

A US State Department report in February described the developments following the Dec. 17 anti-corruption operation in Turkey as a “scandal” and pointed out that despite the reports of corruption in parts of the government, the number of arrests and prosecutions are low and convictions remain rare while impunity continued to be a problem.

“Of particular note, law enforcement and the judiciary were subject to executive branch influence as the government reassigned thousands of police and prosecutors during the December 17 anti-corruption operation and subsequent scandal,” said the annual human rights report issued by the US Department of State.

“Impunity remained a problem. The government investigated reports of abuse by security forces as well as reports of corruption in other parts of the government, but the number of arrests and prosecutions was low, and convictions remained rare,” the report added.

Published on Today's Zaman, 24 May 2014, Saturday