News on Turkey

State's Fried Says U.S, Turkey Cooperating on Kurd Terrorists

World Bank's Wolfowitz says reforms will enhance Turkey's prosperity

By Vince Crawley
Washington File Staff Writer

May 24, 2006

Washington – Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Fried says the United States is increasing its cooperation with Turkey against a Kurdish terrorist group, the PKK, and “we want to increase it still more.”

And in separate remarks, World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz urged Turkey to undertake reforms that would prove a Muslim-majority country also can be a prosperous democracy.

Fried, who heads up the State Department’s Europe bureau, said May 18 that it is up to the Turkish government to determine how to deal with the threat of PKK terrorists on its border with Iraq. But he also said Turkey and the new government of Iraq share a common goal of eliminating safe harbors for militants.

“Without getting into intelligence issues, I’m very happy to report to you that our cooperation with Turkey against the PKK is increasing,” Fried said in a roundtable discussion with Turkish diplomats co-hosted by CNN Türk’s Mithat Bereket in Istanbul, and America Abroad Media’s Judy Woodruff in Washington.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, visiting Ankara on April 25, urged Turkey to work with the newly formed Iraqi government to address cross-border terrorism by the PKK -- Kurdistan Workers Party -- a Kurdish separatist group that has sought refuge in neighboring Iraq. (See related article.)

Thousands of PKK fighters reportedly have found refuge in ethnically Kurdish northern Iraq, taking advantage of what Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Gul has called “a vacuum of authority,” to train and conduct cross-border attacks against Turkish forces. Turkey and Iran both have sizable minority Kurd populations, and both countries reportedly have massed military forces near their borders with northern Iraq.

In the television roundtable, a Turkish student asked Fried how the United States would react if Turkish armed forces conducted cross-border operations against PKK fighters in northern Iraq.

The United States considers the PKK to be a terrorist group that “has no place in Iraq” and “has no place anywhere,” Fried said.

One of the most effective ways for Turkey to eliminate the PKK’s threat “is to support the development of a stable, secure Iraq in which terrorist groups have no place,” Fried said.

“The question for Turkey is what sort of tactics will best promote that kind of an Iraq in which the PKK has no place?” he added. “And it seems to me, that Turkey and the Iraqi government that is now coming into being have a mutual interest in seeing the PKK gone, in seeing Iraq's Kurdish population participating in a national government, in an Iraq which is a federal state -- a democratic state and a stable state.”

For that reason, Fried said, Turkey needs to balance its short-term tactical goals with longer-term strategic goals.

“Americans understand Turkey's frustration. Turkey faces attacks from the PKK,” Fried said.  U.S. cooperation with Turkey against the PKK is increasing, he said, and “we want it to increase still more against PKK finances in Western Europe, against PKK operations.”

Fried acknowledged differences between Washington and Ankara, but he also reiterated his belief that Turkey can play a pivotal role in the Muslim world because of its long history of secular tolerance and its ambition to join the European Union.

“Turkey's success economically, politically, its deepening democracy, is a demonstration that the ‘clash-of-civilizations’ theory is dead wrong,” he said.

Turkey’s democratic government refutes the notion that “mostly Muslim societies cannot generate democratic political systems,” Fried said. “I think that's false. I think it's harmful and basically bigoted, and I think Turkey could be the leading example of a country which … proves the opposite. That would be a tremendous benefit for the 21st century and it would be a great Turkish contribution … to civilization.” (See related article.)

WOLFOWITZ PRAISES TURKEY, CALLS FOR FURTHER REFORMS

Stressing similar themes, World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz May 23 praised Turkey as a county “embracing the best of both worlds” by taking pride “ in its rich civilization and Islamic heritage” while also “moving toward becoming a part of modern Europe.”

He gave a speech entitled to a U.S. and Turkish audience at an event sponsored by the Brookings Institution, a Washington policy research center.

Wolfowitz was deputy secretary of defense before President Bush nominated him to the World Bank post in 2005. He said Turkey has made great progress in the past three decades but still must continue with economic and education reforms. Since 1976, he said, per capita income has climbed from $1,900 to more than $4,500. Life expectancy has climbed from 58 years to 70 years, and infant mortality rates have dropped from 15 percent to below 3 percent. High-school enrollments have risen from 20 percent of teenagers to 80 percent.

“For the past four years, the Turkish economy has been growing an average of 8 percent a year,” he said, “which puts it among the fastest growing economies in the world.” (See related article.)

On the other hand, unemployment rates remain high. On average, 65 percent of adults in the European Union (EU) were employed in 2004, compared to just 44 percent of Turkish adults, Wolfowitz said.

“That gap poses one of the biggest challenges to Turkey’s aspirations to joining the European Union,” he said. “To bring employment rates up to the EU average, Turkey would have to create 10 million new jobs.” Also, he said, only a quarter of Turkey’s women are employed, compared with 57 percent of women in the European Union.

Wolfowitz urged Turkey to continue improving its education and university system so that its young people can compete worldwide. In addition, Turkey needs to “cultivate a healthy private sector to create much-needed jobs,” he said.

Turkey ranked 93 out of 155 countries in the World Bank’s Doing Business report in 2005, Wolfowitz said. Turkish entrepreneurs need an average of 28 percent of their annual income to start a new small business, compared with zero in Denmark or 5 percent in Romania, he said. It then takes 232 days to get a business license, nearly 100 days longer than average for countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). And Turkish entrepreneurs need 10 official signatures to export goods and 20 signatures to import goods, compared with three signatures for OECD countries.

“By World Bank estimates,” Wolfowitz said, “if Turkey were to improve its business environment, it could reduce unemployment by anywhere between a full percentage point and as much as 4 percentage points.”

A transcript of the television roundtable on which Fried appeared is available on the State Department Web site. 

The text (PDF, 26 pages) of Wolfowitz’s speech is available on the Web site of the Brookings Institution.