Recently,
Saudi Arabia announced it was creating a coalition of Muslim countries
to fight terrorism. Such a plan was initiated by Riyadh's intention to
restore its position in the Middle East.
Saudi
Arabia’s call to arms has gained supporters. As of now, 34 nations have
expressed their interest in joining the anti-terrorist Muslim coalition
Riyadh is forming.Among them are countries with a majority of Shiite or
Sunni population, including Jordan, the UAE, Palestine, Tunisia, Libya,
Egypt, Qatar, Yemen, Turkey, a number of African Muslim nations as well
as Pakistan, Bangladesh and Malaysia. Another 10 nations said they
would be ready to join the coalition in the future.
Saudi
Arabia’s Defense Ministry Mohammad bin Salman did not elaborate on what
measures would be taken against terrorists. He only said that a
headquarters will be established in Riyadh to "coordinate military
operations."
ISIL Ringleader's Mobile Phone Speaks Loud of Turkey's Support for Terrorism
TEHRAN
(FNA)- A commander of the Iraqi volunteer forces (Hashd al-Shaabi)
revealed that a mobile phone found with one of the killed ISIL
ringleaders proved the Turkish spy agency's support for the terrorist
group.
"The mobile phone
was found with one of the killed ISIL leaders in the Northern parts of
Salahuddin province two days ago," Jabbar al-Ma'mouri told Soumeriya
news on Monday.
He said that the mobile set and
history files contain messages from the Turkish intelligence agency
which show that Ankara supports the ISIL terrorist group through
providing security at the points of entry used by ISIL militants from
Turkey to Iraq.
"The mobile phone also contains
other important information which cannot be disclosed now, and it has
been delivered to the specialized security groups for further scrutiny,"
Ma'mouri said.
Published: 04:10 EST, 11 December 2015 | Updated: 19:04 EST, 11 December 2015
Ted
Cruz believes the Middle East was a safer place before the US helped to
overthrow tyrants Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Muammar Gaddafi in Libya,
it has been reported.
The Texas
senator, a Republican presidential candidate, said America should focus
on its own security rather than toppling dictators abroad.
He
said it was 'not even a close call' when asked whether the Middle East
was more secure when Gaddafi and Hussein were dictators of their
respective countries.
Ted
Cruz believes the Middle East was a safer place before the US helped to
overthrow Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, it has
been reported
Cruz said the toppling of the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi had shown the US has not learned lessons from history
In an interview with MSNBC,
Cruz told Joe Scarborough: 'Now, what has been a mistake - and we’ve
seen a consistent mistake in foreign policy - is far too often, we’ve
seen Democrats and a lot of establishment Republicans in Washington get
involved in toppling Middle Eastern governments.
'And it ends up benefiting the bad guys. It ends up handing them over to radical Islamic terrorists,'
He
described Syrian president Bashar Assad as a 'monster' but warned that
ISIS extremists would sweep further across the country were he to be
overthrown.
He said: 'My view, instead
of getting in the middle of a civil war in Syria, where we don’t have a
dog in the fight, our focus should be on killing ISIS. Why? Because ISIS
has declared war on America. They’re waging jihad.'
TEHRAN
(FNA)- The Russian Air Force has conducted 59 combat missions hitting
200 ISIL targets in 7 Syrian provinces over the past 24 hours, the
Russian Defense ministry said.
"Over
the past 24 hours Russian warplanes have conducted 59 sorties, hitting
212 ISIL targets in the Syrian province of Aleppo, Idlib, Lattakia,
Hama, Homs, al-Hasakah an Raqqa," the Defense Ministry spokesman told
journalists
.
Aircraft from Russia’s Aerospace
Forces in Syria have also destroyed more than 300 militants and scores
of armored vehicles over the last 24 hours, Russian Defense Ministry
spokesman Igor Konashenkov said Wednesday, Sputnik reported.
"More
than 320 militants and 34 armored vehicles of terrorists, including two
tanks, one infantry fighting vehicle, 15 jeeps equipped
with large-caliber guns were destroyed," Konashenkov told journalists
in Syria’s Lattakia.
In the past 24 hours,
Russian jets have also destroyed a column of tanker trucks and more
than 100 fuel-transfer stations used by terrorists, Maj. Gen. Igor
Konashenkov added.
"In order to disrupt
terrorists' sources of income, Russian Su-34 bomber jets destroyed 94
fuel-transfer stations near Deir Ezzur," he said.
EU warns of visas for US citizens if Washington implements visa waiver reforms
Published time: 17 Dec, 2015 14:59Edited time: 17 Dec, 2015
The
EU says it may retaliate if the US goes ahead with plans to impose
visas for some members of the bloc who are currently part of the Visa
Waiver Program. Brussels says it will not increase security and that US
nationals may require visas to enter the EU.
A
letter signed by 28 European member state ambassadors to the US was
published in The Hill after Europe reacted furiously and with disbelief
to plans by Washington to tighten-up the Visa Waiver Program (VWP),
which currently lets millions of citizens from the bloc travel to the US
each year without a visa.
Last
week, the US House of Representatives adopted a bill to reform the visa
program that would ban certain EU nationals from entering the US
without a visa if they had visited Iran, Iraq, Syria or Sudan after
March 2011. Some US politicians want the legislation introduced to
tighten security following the November 13 Paris terror attacks.
“A
blanket restriction on those who have visited Syria or Iraq, for
example, would most likely only affect legitimate travel by
businesspeople, journalists, humanitarian or medical workers while doing
little to detect those who travel by more clandestine means overland,” the letter signed by the 28 ambassadors stated.
At
present, 23 of the EU’s 28 member states enjoy visa-free travel to the
US, with the remaining five nations keen to join the VWP. The bloc says
it is imperative to keep the visa waiver program intact for business and
tourism purposes, while the current system does not mean that it is “a license to enter the US with nothing more than the wave of a passport of an allied country.”
The
US Navy’s brand new littoral combat ship, the Milwaukee, broke down on
Friday and had to be towed for emergency repair just three weeks after
commissioning. The warship’s troubles came after several days of
propulsion system problems.
The
USS Milwaukee was traveling from Halifax, Canada to Mayport, Florida,
on its way to its homeport in San Diego when it suffered an engineering
failure, the Navy Times reported.
The
salvage ship Grapple towed it more than 40 nautical miles to the Joint
Expeditionary Base in Little Creek, Virginia, where the cause of the
failure will be traced and repairs carried out.
Initial
indications point to metal filings in the lube oil filter as the cause
of the shutdown, the report said. The ship experienced propulsion
problems after leaving Halifax. Engineers cleaned out the metal debris
and locked the port shaft as a precaution, but it appears the fix wasn’t
enough to keep the Milwaukee running.
‘Turkey acts like ISIS ally, should not be EU member’– Czech president
Turkey should not become an EU member, said Czech President Milos Zeman, adding that Ankara sometimes behaves like an Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) ally, even though Turkey is part of NATO.
"I think Turkey is indeed a member of NATO, but sometimes behaves as if it’s more an ally of Islamic State. It removes oil from Syria which finances Islamic State," Zeman said, as quoted by Czech newspaper Parlamentni Listy.
By shooting down Russian jet, Turkey exposed as more than terrorist accomplice
The president’s remarks came on Tuesday while addressing voters at the end of a three-day visit to the Czech town of Kadan, North Bohemia, local media reported.
Zeman suggested Turkish policy stems from the principle “the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” referring to Turkey’s suppression of the Kurds, “who are the only ones who have fought effectively with IS,” the newspaper reported.
The president maintained this is the reason why Turkey should be approached with caution and has no reason to be an EU member.
Turkey has signed an agreement with the EU at a summit in Brussels in which the country will help stem the flow of migrants to Europe in return for €3 billion ($3.18bn) of support and the reestablishing of talks on EU accession.
1. The EU agrees to provide "an initial" €3 billion ($3.18bn) over two years for Turkey to better cater for the needs of 2.2 million Syrian refugees in the country.
2. The EU promises to open a new chapter in negotiations regarding Turkey's EU ascension and to bring the country's standards in economic and financial policies up to scratch.
3. The EU pledges to lift visa requirements for Turkish citizens in the Schengen zone by October 2016 once all the requirements set forth in the EU roadmap are met.
The European Union, struggling with the flow of refugees coming from the war-torn Middle East and North Africa, will allocate €3 billion of initial aid to Turkey that will help with managing the crisis by taking in some 1.5 million migrants, Chancellor Merkel has confirmed, Reuters reports. The sum can be adjusted with time depending on circumstances.
Apart from that, the EU has promised to renew talks on Turkey’s EU membership that haven’t seen much progress since 2005. The new chapter of discussions will open in December while further chapters are expected to come in the first three months of 2016.
“We agreed that [Turkey's] accession process needs to be re-energized,” European Council President Donald Tusk told a news conference after the summit, Reuters reported.
President
Barack Obama addresses the nation from the Oval Office at the White
House in Washington, Sunday night, Dec. 6, 2016. In a rare Oval Office
address, Obama vowed the United States would overcome a terror threat
that has entered a "new phase" as he sought to reassure Americans shaken
by recent attacks in Paris and California. (Photo: Saul Loeb, AP)
In
the many strategies proposed to defeat the Islamic State (IS) by
presidential candidates, policymakers, and media pundits alike across
the American political spectrum, one common element stands out: someone
else should really do it. The United States will send in planes,
advisers, and special ops guys, but it would be best -- and this varies
depending on which pseudo-strategist you cite -- if the Arabs, Kurds,
Turks, Sunnis, and/or Shias would please step in soon and get America
off the hook.
The idea of seeing other-than-American boots on the ground, like Washington’s recently deep-sixed scheme
to create some “moderate” Syrian rebels out of whole cloth, is
attractive on paper. Let someone else fight America's wars for American
goals. Put an Arab face on the conflict, or if not that at least a
Kurdish one (since, though they may not be Arabs, they’re close enough
in an American calculus). Let the U.S. focus on its “bloodless” use of
air power and covert ops. Somebody else, Washington’s top brains
repeatedly suggest, should put their feet on the embattled, contested
ground of Syria and Iraq. Why, the U.S. might even gift them with nice,
new boots as a thank-you.
Is this, however, a realistic strategy for winning America’s war(s) in the Middle East?
The Great Champions of the Grand Strategy
Recently, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton openly called for
the U.S. to round up some Arab allies, Kurds, and Iraqi Sunnis to drive
the Islamic State’s fighters out of Iraq and Syria. On the same day
that Clinton made her proposal, Bernie Sanders called
for “destroying” the Islamic State, but suggested that it “must be done
primarily by Muslim nations.” It’s doubtful he meant Indonesia or
Malaysia.
Among the Republican contenders, Marco Rubio proposed that the U.S. “provide arms directly to Sunni tribal and Kurdish forces.” Ted Cruz threw his support behind arming the Kurds, while Donald Trump appeared to favor more violence in the region by whoever might be willing to jump in.
The Pentagon has long been in favor of arming both the Kurds and whatever Sunni tribal groups it could round up in Iraq or Syria. Variouspundits across the political spectrum say much the same.
They may all mean well, but their plans are guaranteed to fail. Here’s why, group by group.
While much of the media has focused on the recent violence in Paris, Georgia, and San Bernardino, as well as the escalating conflicts in Iraq and Syria, another profound and troubling domestic issue seems to have been overlooked.
Indeed,
the issue at hand was first reported on November 24th — and covered for
roughly a day — before it was quickly forgotten in the daily barrage of
news stories. But we should not be so quick to dismiss the possibility
of a future president (maybe one with fascist leanings?)
choosing to exercise “targeted killings” against the American public.
This practice, of course, is embodied by the Obama administration’s
program of assassinating individuals suspected of terrorism, also known
as the “disposition matrix.”
Over
the past two years, the Obama administration has been secretly
developing a new blueprint for pursuing terrorists, a next-generation
targeting list called the ‘disposition matrix.’
The matrix
contains the names of terrorism suspects arrayed against an accounting
of the resources being marshaled to track them down, including sealed
indictments and clandestine operations. U.S. officials said the database
is designed to go beyond existing kill lists, mapping plans for the
‘disposition’ of suspects beyond the reach of American drones.
Although
the matrix is a work in progress, the effort to create it reflects a
reality setting in among the nation’s counterterrorism ranks: The United
States’ conventional wars are winding down, but the government expects
to continue adding names to kill or capture lists for years.
For the last four years, New York Times
journalist Charlie Savage has waged a legal battle against the Obama
administration, seeking to reveal the government’s legal justifications
for assassinating terror suspects without a trial. Specifically, Savage
sued the Obama administration in an attempt to obtain details about the
murder of al-Qaeda affiliated cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki. Al-Awlaki was
born in New Mexico and eventually found himself on the U.S. government’s
radar under suspicion of terrorism.
Monday, December 7th, 2015 | Posted by WorldTribune
Russia accuses U.S. of cover-up over ISIL-Turkey oil smuggling
Special to WorldTribune.com
The
United States is involved in a “cover-up” over Turkey’s alleged
smuggling of Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) oil, Russia’s
defense ministry said on Dec. 5.
“When U.S. officials say they
don’t see how the terrorists’ oil is smuggled to Turkey… it smells badly
of a desire to cover up these acts,” the ministry said in a statement
on its Facebook page.
An oil convoy was destroyed when it was hit by a Russian air strike in Syria. /Twitter
ISIL’s
sales of captured oil assets on the black market is credited with
making it the best-funded terror organization in history.
“The
declarations of the Pentagon and the State Department seem like a
theater of the absurd,” the statement said, adding that Washington
should “watch the videos taken by its (own) drones which have recently
been three times as numerous over the Turkey-Syria border and above the
oil zones.”
Popular Forces' Commanders: Ramadi Liberation Operation Blocked by US
TEHRAN
(FNA)- Commanders of Iraq's popular forces complain that the US is
hindering the start of final phase of the operation to free Ramadi, the
capital of Anbar province, from ISIL control.
"The
US bargains and pressures on the Baghdad government have prevented
accomplishment of Ramadi liberation operation," Abu Yousef al-Khazali, a
commander of Seyed al-Shohada battalion, told FNA on Thursday.
"The
US has long been seeking to force the government to stop using the
popular forces in military operations against ISIL, specially in the
liberation operations conducted in different Iraqi regions," he added.
Also,
Karim al-Nouri, the spokesman of Iraq's popular forces, told FNA that
the "the Americans' interference has distorted plans to free Ramadi".
He added that "the Americans are not serious about bringing the battles to an end".
A
commander of Iraq's volunteer forces (Hashd al-Shaabi) complained in
similar remarks that the US meddling in the fight against the ISIL has
impeded their victory over the Takfiri terrorist group and prevented
them from winning back the strategic cities of Ramadi and Fallujah.
"The
US meddling prevents the Iraqi army and popular forces from concluding
their battles against the ISIL in Ramadi and Fallujah cities," Commander
of Imam Khamenei Battalion Haidar al-Hosseini al-Ardavi told FNA on
Sunday.
He noted that the US is doing its best to prevent mop-up operations by the popular forces in Anbar province.
Suspicion
that the US is collaborating with Daesh (also known as ISIL/The Islamic
State), instead of fighting the military group, is spreading among
Iraqis, primarily due to the country's minimalist approach toward the
crisis.
To
Americans, accusations that the US government is helping Daesh may seem
ludicrous. However, many Iraqi fighters and civilians claim they have
seen evidence of collusion between the US and the notorious terrorist
group citing, for instance, videos allegedly showing US helicopters
airdropping weapons to the militants, The Washington Post reported.
The
idea that the US is supporting Daesh is being persistently promoted
via social media and voiced in parliament by Shiite politicians in Iraq,
US military officials claim. In one popular video, recently released
on a Shiite militia group's Facebook page, a lawmaker with the country's
biggest militia group, the Badr Organization, waves seemingly new US
military MREs (meals ready to eat), allegedly found at a recently seized
Daesh base in Baiji, saying it is proof that the US supports
terrorists.The US military's Baghdad-based spokesman Colonel Steve
Warren said the charges are "beyond ridiculous."
"The
Iranians and the Iranian-backed Shiite militias are really pushing this
line of propaganda, that the United States is supporting ISIL," he
said. "There's clearly no one in the West who buys it,
but unfortunately, this is something that a segment of the Iraqi
population believes."
Israel has become the main buyer for oil from ISIS controlled territory, reports "al-Araby al-Jadeed."
Kurdish
and Turkish smugglers are transporting oil from ISIS controlled
territory in Syria and Iraq and selling it to Israel, according to
several reports in the Arab and Russian media. An estimated
20,000-40,000 barrels of oil are produced daily in ISIS controlled
territory generating $1-1.5 million daily profit for the terrorist
organization.The oil is extracted from Dir A-Zur in Syria and two
fields in Iraq and transported to the Kurdish city of Zakhu in a
triangle of land near the borders of Syria, Iraq and Turkey. Israeli and
Turkish mediators come to the city and when prices are agreed, the oil
is smuggled to the Turkish city of Silop marked as originating from
Kurdish regions of Iraq and sold for $15-18 per barrel (WTI and Brent
Crude currently sell for $41 and $45 per barrel) to the Israeli
mediator, a man in his 50s with dual Greek-Israeli citizenship known as
Dr. Farid. He transports the oil via several Turkish ports and then onto
other ports, with Israel among the main destinations.
In August,
the "Financial Times" reported that Israel obtained 75% of its oil
supplies from Iraqi Kurdistan. More than a third of such exports go
through the port of Ceyhan, which the FT describe as a “potential
gateway for ISIS-smuggled crude."
Russia's and Turkey's objectives in fighting the Islamic State group are diametrically opposed.
It's absolutely impossible to understand why the Turkish government would engage in the suicidal strategy of downing a Russian Su-24 over Syrian territory - technically a NATO declaration of war on Russia - without putting in context the Turkish power play in northern Syria.
President Vladmir Putin said the downing of the Russian fighter jet was a "stab in the back." So let's see how facts on the ground allowed it to happen.
Ankara uses, finances, and weaponizes a basket case of extremist outfits across northern Syria, and needs by all means to keep supply line corridors from southern Turkey open for them; after all they need to conquer Aleppo, which would open the way for Ankara's Holy Grail: regime change in Damascus.
At the same time Ankara is terrified of the YPG - the Syrian Kurd People's Protection Units - a sister organization of the leftist PKK. These must be contained at all costs.
So the Islamic State group - against which the United Nations has declared war - is a mere detail in the overall Ankara strategy, which is essentially to fight, contain or even bomb Kurds; support all manner of Takfiris and Salafi-jihadis, including the Islamic State group; and get regime change in Damascus.
Unsurprisingly, the YPG Syrian Kurds are vastly demonized in Turkey, accused of at least trying to ethnic cleanse Arab and Turkmen villages in northern Syria. Yet, what the Syrian Kurds are attempting - and to Ankara's alarm, somewhat supported by the U.S. - is to link what are for the moment three patches of Kurdish land in northern Syria.
A look at an imperfect Turkish map at least reveals how two of these patches of land (in yellow) are already linked, to the northeast. To accomplish that, the Syrian Kurds, helped by the PKK, defeated The Islamic State group in Kobani and environs. To get to the third patch of land, they need to get to Afryn. Yet on the way (in blue) there is a collection of Turkmen villages north of Aleppo.
The strategic importance of these Turkmen lands cannot be emphasized enough. It's exactly in this area, reaching as much as 35 km inland, that Ankara wants to install its so-called "safe zone," which will be in fact a no-fly zone, in Syrian territory, ostensibly to house Syrian refugees, and with everything paid by the EU, which has already unblocked 3 billion euros, starting Jan. 1, via the European Commission (EC).
The now insurmountable obstacle for Turkey to get its no-fly zone is, predictably, Russia.
David L. PhillipsDirector of the Program on Peace-building and Rights, Columbia University’s Institute for the Study of Human Rights
Posted: Updated:
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
IN THE CITY OF NEW YORK
INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF HUMAN RIGHTS
Research Paper: ISIS-Turkey Links
By David L. Phillips
Introduction
Is Turkey collaborating with the Islamic State (ISIS)? Allegations range from military cooperation and weapons transfers to logistical support, financial assistance, and the provision of medical services. It is also alleged that Turkey turned a blind eye to ISIS attacks against Kobani.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu strongly deny complicity with ISIS. Erdogan visited the Council on Foreign Relations on September 22, 2014. He criticized "smear campaigns [and] attempts to distort perception about us." Erdogan decried, "A systematic attack on Turkey's international reputation, "complaining that "Turkey has been subject to very unjust and ill-intentioned news items from media organizations." Erdogan posited: "My request from our friends in the United States is to make your assessment about Turkey by basing your information on objective sources."
Columbia University's Program on Peace-building and Rights assigned a team of researchers in the United States, Europe, and Turkey to examine Turkish and international media, assessing the credibility of allegations. This report draws on a variety of international sources -- The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Daily Mail, BBC, Sky News, as well as Turkish sources, CNN Turk, Hurriyet Daily News, Taraf, Cumhuriyet, and Radikal among others.
Allegations
Turkey Provides Military Equipment to ISIS
• An ISIS commander told The Washington Post on August 12, 2014: "Most of the fighters who joined us in the beginning of the war came via Turkey, and so did our equipment and supplies."
• Kemal Kiliçdaroglu, head of the Republican People's Party (CHP), produced a statement from the Adana Office of the Prosecutor on October 14, 2014 maintaining that Turkey supplied weapons to terror groups. He also produced interview transcripts from truck drivers who delivered weapons to the groups. According to Kiliçdaroglu, the Turkish government claims the trucks were for humanitarian aid to the Turkmen, but the Turkmen said no humanitarian aid was delivered.
• According to CHP Vice President Bulent Tezcan, three trucks were stopped in Adana for inspection on January 19, 2014. The trucks were loaded with weapons in Esenboga Airport in Ankara. The drivers drove the trucks to the border, where a MIT agent was supposed to take over and drive the trucks to Syria to deliver materials to ISIS and groups in Syria. This happened many times. When the trucks were stopped, MIT agents tried to keep the inspectors from looking inside the crates. The inspectors found rockets, arms, and ammunitions.
• Cumhuriyet reports that Fuat Avni, a preeminent Twitter user who reported on the December 17th corruption probe, that audio tapes confirm that Turkey provided financial and military aid to terrorist groups associated with Al Qaeda on October 12, 2014. On the tapes, Erdogan pressured the Turkish Armed Forces to go to war with Syria. Erdogan demanded that Hakan Fidan, the head of Turkey's National Intelligence Agency (MIT), come up with a justification for attacking Syria.
• Hakan Fidan told Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, Yasar Guler, a senior defense official, and Feridun Sinirlioglu, a senior foreign affairs official: "If need be, I'll send 4 men into Syria. I'll formulate a reason to go to war by shooting 8 rockets into Turkey; I'll have them attack the Tomb of Suleiman Shah."
• Documents surfaced on September 19th, 2014 showing that the Saudi Emir Bender Bin Sultan financed the transportation of arms to ISIS through Turkey. A flight leaving Germany dropped off arms in the Etimesgut airport in Turkey, which was then split into three containers, two of which were given to ISIS and one to Gaza.
Turkey Provided Transport and Logistical Assistance to ISIS Fighters
• According to Radikal on June 13, 2014, Interior Minister Muammar Guler signed a directive: "According to our regional gains, we will help al-Nusra militants against the branch of PKK terrorist organization, the PYD, within our borders...Hatay is a strategic location for the mujahideen crossing from within our borders to Syria. Logistical support for Islamist groups will be increased, and their training, hospital care, and safe passage will mostly take place in Hatay...MIT and the Religious Affairs Directorate will coordinate the placement of fighters in public accommodations."
• The Daily Mail reported on August 25, 2014 that many foreign militants joined ISIS in Syria and Iraq after traveling through Turkey, but Turkey did not try to stop them. This article describes how foreign militants, especially from the UK, go to Syria and Iraq through the Turkish border. They call the border the "Gateway to Jihad." Turkish army soldiers either turn a blind eye and let them pass, or the jihadists pay the border guards as little as $10 to facilitate their crossing.
• Britain's Sky News obtained documents showing that the Turkish government has stamped passports of foreign militants seeking to cross the Turkey border into Syria to join ISIS.
• The BBC interviewed villagers, who claim that buses travel at night, carrying jihadists to fight Kurdish forces in Syria and Iraq, not the Syrian Armed Forces.
• A senior Egyptian official indicated on October 9, 2014 that Turkish intelligence is passing satellite imagery and other data to ISIS.
The shooting down of the Russian Su-24 bomber was a planned attack and a trap set by the Turkish Air Force, Dr. Mark Galeotti, the Professor of Global Affairs at the New York University, told Radio Sputnik.
"What it in fact seems to be, as many are saying, it was more of an ambush than anything else," Galeotti told Sputnik.
By downing the Russian plane, Turkey had two things in mind. First of all, Ankara wants to assert itself as a powerful regional actor, especially considering Russia's active participation in Syria. The Turkish government thought that by shooting down its plane Turkey would make Russia take Ankara more seriously in the future.
Secondly, the Turkish government wanted to protect its allies, whom Russia's currently bombing in Syria, Galeotti, an expert in Russo-Turkish relations, explained.
Turkey intends to protect ISIL, as it has direct financial interests involved in the delivery of oil extracted from ISIL-controlled territories. Various estimates place oil revenues generated by ISIL somewhere between $40 and $50 million a month. A day prior to the downing of the Su-24, Russian airstrikes destroyed over 1,000 semi-truck tankers carrying crude oil to ISIL refineries, a large oil storage facility and an oil refinery in Syria.
Syrian Turkmen commander who 'killed' Russian pilot turns out to be Turkish ultranationalist
A Syrian rebel commander who boasted of killing a Russian pilot after Turkey downed Russian jet on Tuesday appeared to be Turkish ultranationalist and a son of former mayor in one of Turkish provinces.
Alparslan Celik, deputy commander of a Syrian Turkmen brigade turned out to be the son of a mayor of a Keban municipality in Turkey’s Elazig province.
He also turned out to be the member of The Grey Wolves ultranationalist group, members of which have carried out scores of political murders since 1970s.
In the space of a few hours, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan went from running scared to defiant belligerence over the shooting down of the Russian fighter jet. It would appear that someone had a stiff word in his ear.
Tough-talking Turkish President? No. More like somebody’s message boy.
When the news first broke on Tuesday that Turkish F-16s had downed a Russian Su-24 bomber near the Syrian border, the Erdogan government in Ankara immediately called for an emergency NATO summit.
Ankara rushed to explain that it was the party that had incurred an act of aggression from Russia. Erdogan was running scared because the facts were such that it was the Turks who had actually carried out an act of aggression against Russia, not the other way around.
And they knew it.
Suspiciously, Ankara did not contact Moscow about the incident, which would have seemed a normal thing to do in the aftermath of a serious incident in which a Russian aircrew was forced to eject and one of the pilots was subsequently killed.
Recall that Turkey claimed that it did not know the identity of the Russian warplane as it allegedly approached Turkish airspace. So if, as it turned out, the Turks shot down a Russian jet in a rapid encounter of uncertainty about its “national security”, then why didn’t Ankara make subsequent attempts to resolve the matter with the Russians as an urgent matter when the circumstances soon became clear? That would have been the expected behavior if the incident was simply an unfortunate, unforeseen confrontation.
Again, the inference is that Ankara knew full well that it was committing a sinister deed.
Finian Cunningham (born 1963) has written extensively on international affairs, with articles published in several languages. Originally from Belfast, Ireland, he is a Master’s graduate in Agricultural Chemistry and worked as a scientific editor for the Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, England, before pursuing a career in newspaper journalism. For over 20 years he worked as an editor and writer in major news media organizations, including The Mirror, Irish Times and Independent. Now a freelance journalist based in East Africa, his columns appear on RT, Sputnik, Strategic Culture Foundation and Press TV.
847 shotguns seized in Italy en route from Turkey to Belgium
A large cargo of shotguns without transportation permits has been seized by the Italian police at the Port of Trieste. The 847 Turkish-made Winchester shotguns worth about €500,000 were on their way to Belgium.
The weapons were declared along with other cargoes destined for Germany and the Netherlands on a Dutch-registered truck driven by a Turkish citizen. Gun shipments from Turkey are nothing new in Trieste, but this time the shipment was missing a key document: authorization for transportation in the EU.
The shipment consisted of 847 pump-action Winchester shotguns: 781 SXP 12-51 and 66
SXP 12-47 models, La Stampa reports.
The Haddad I departed from the Turkish port of Iskenderun and was heading to the Libyan city of Misrata. After intelligence services informed the Greek coastal guards about the ship’s cargo of guns, the vessel was intercepted south of Crete by the Open Sea Coast Patrol.
Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) speaks during a press conference following talks with French President Francois Hollande (L) in the Kremlin, Moscow, Russia, 26 November 2015.
Published 09:14 November 27, 2015
Updated 09:14 November 27, 2015
Russian President Vladimir Putin said that he expected from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to simply apologise, but the latest ruled out such a move
President Vladimir Putin said that Russia had given prior information to the United States of the flight path of the Su-24 downed by the Turkish Air Force on the Syrian border. The US leads the anti-Daesh coalition, in which Turkey is member.
“The American side, which leads the coalition that Turkey belongs to, knew about the location and time of our planes’ flights, and we were hit exactly there and at that time,” Putin said at a joint press conference with French counterpart Francois Hollande in the Kremlin. ”Why did we give this information to the Americans if they did not pass it along to the rest of the coalition?
Translated from Russian by Tom Winter With additional photos supplied by Fort Russ
Last
night (November 25) the first photos and video came up of the destroyed
Turkish convoy that arrived in the militant-controlled city of Azaz.
First, some photos:
Well,
all in the same spirit, some information about what kind of city is
this, and why is this news you need to focus on. The town Azaz is
located in the north of Syria, almost on the border with Turkey. The
city is a hub, where Turkish aid (weapons, ammunition, drugs, rations
etc.) are dumped off. Then with all his "help" they begin to disperse it
to other cities under militant control, as well as camps and fortified
places.
Map. Azaz is circled in red:
As
you can see, it's about five km from the Turkish border. Speaking of
buffer zones, Turkey was expecting to make this city an absolute
springboard, out of reach of Syrian army strikes. It did not happen. But
until today, due to the remoteness of the Syrian army from it, as well
as a number of geopolitical reasons, attacks were not mounted on this
city.
Lavrov said during a joint press conference with his Syrian counterpart Walid Muallem that Russia would suspend the visa-free regime with Turkey.
"The Russian government reached a decision to suspend the free-visa regime between Russia and the Turkish Republic. The decision will come into effect on January 1 2016," Lavrov said at a press-conference after talks with his Syrian counterpart Walid Muallem.
The Russian minister added that threats coming from Turkey were "not artificial."
If you like President Obama’s “plan” to fight ISIS, you’ll just love Hillary Clinton’s.
Clinton wants to defeat the jihadis by relying pretty much on the same lame steps Obama has — only more so.
The
Democratic presidential front-runner laid out her ideas Thursday at the
Council on Foreign Relations in what was billed as a major policy
speech. Alas, it offered far more rhetoric than substance.
Even
Hillary herself admitted, in a question-and-answer session afterward,
that her proposal is but “an intensification, an acceleration” of the
failed Obama strategy.
Yes, she called for more airstrikes, a
no-fly zone over Syria and boots on the ground. But it’s plain she’d
have non-US forces do the heavy lifting in many of these areas.
US
Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton’s plan to destroy
the Islamic State, announced last Thursday, is a reheat of
neo-conservative rhetoric and lacking any strategy whatsoever, former US
Ambassador Chas Freeman told Sputnik.
WASHINGTON
(Sputnik) — On the same day Clinton offered her proposed strategy
to fight the Islamic State, her chief challenger for the nomination, US
Senator Bernie Sanders, offered a different plan advocating close
cooperation between the United States, Russia and major Muslim nations.
"‘Hillary's
plan’ is all rhetoric and no strategy. As such, it is hard
to distinguish it from the bellicose pronouncements of our nation's
neo-conservative pundits," Freeman, former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia
and a past president of the Middle East Policy Council, said.
Clinton
wanted to repeat over Syria the policies she adopted as secretary
of state to topple Libya’s long-time leader Muammar Gadhafi, not
realizing that conditions were very different, Freeman argued.
"Ms.
Clinton essentially proposes a replay of Libya, an example of the use
of force that few, if any other than she, find inspiring. As she did
in Libya, she proposes airstrikes and a ‘no-fly zone’ — a purely
military approach aimed at regime change with a proven record
of producing disasters," he said.
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