Cindy Sheehan in Turkey February 25, 2007
Posted by cpapuschak in News.add a comment
American anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan is in Turkey this week to attend a conference in Istanbul sponsored by a Turkish anti-war group called the Global Peace and Justice Coalition (BAK). On Friday, she spoke out against the possibility of an American attack on Iran. Appealing for a grass-roots campaign against possible military action, she stated that “I think we need to join together to stop that, to stop the impending invasion of Iran.”
On Monday, Sheehan will speak in Ankara. I have meetings that day, and won’t be able to attend, but I’m quite certain she will be attended by a receptive audience.
Random Update February 25, 2007
Posted by cpapuschak in Travel.add a comment
It seems like it has been a long time since I last updated this blog, but it doesn’t feel like much has happened in the last week. Orientation for the new exchange students has come to an end and the second semester has at last begun. I am only taking three courses this semester – Turkish language, a graduate sociology course on social movements, and a directed readings course (roughly equivalent to an honours thesis) in the international relations department. Some say I’m lazy, but the directed readings course, on post-conflict reconstruction in the Balkans, is going to require some effort. I have joined the fencing team and now find myself training three nights a week. In a month or two they will let me use a weapon – for now it is just footwork.
I have at last posted some photos from my trip to eastern Turkey. There’s a whole lot of white in them 
A Turkish Invasion of Iraq? February 12, 2007
Posted by cpapuschak in News, Politics.add a comment
I delayed posting this story mostly because I haven’t had time lately, and as such it is not a new development, but is no less important. This is taken from Al Jazeera and the Washington Post.
It seems unfathomable, but a Turkish incursion into northern Iraq is very much on the table for discussion, has been for the last couple weeks, and is looking more like a political football leading into the presidential elections in May.
The ostensible reason for any incursion in northern Iraq would be to deal with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which again poses a threat since the end of a self-imposed cease-fire in 2004. The Turkish government insists that PKK militants are using refugee camps in northern Iraq as bases from which they launch cross-border attacks. With American forces in Iraq, they want the Americans to do something about the PKK. The Americans, however, are unlikely to pick a fight in the one region where they aren’t actually be shot at. With the Americans unwilling to create havoc, there are calls from some for Turkey to intervene.
The potential blowback from such an adventure could be severe, and the only ‘peaceful’ part of Iraq would turn into a war zone. Furthermore, previous hot-pursuits across the Turkish-Iraqi border have yielded little fruit, so there is little to suggest the Turkish military would achieve their tactical, let alone strategic, goals.
For those in the military and government who believe the real threat to national security is in Iraq—unrelated to conditions within Turkey—a military invasion is favored. Use of the military for such a task—“defending the Turkish republic”—stirs up nationalist fervor. In light of upcoming elections, it could also be used to appeal to an increasingly vocal ultranationalist spirit in this country.
I believe (and hope) cooler heads will prevail. Those who support the military option do not hold the mainstream opinion, but one has to recognize that in Turkey, national security is conceived in purely militaristic terms, absent of other dimensions such as economics and development. I believe Turkey’s interests are better served by economic development and integration in both southeast Turkey and northern Iraq, binding the Kurds to the Turks for mutual benefit. Military solutions have not solved the problem in the past, and will not solve it now.
Gaziantep February 4, 2007
Posted by cpapuschak in Travel.2 comments
I am in Gaziantep now and will leave for Ankara this afternoon. Gaziantep is a very nice city with an interesting history. There are still buildings standing that show the marks of the War of Independence, in which the French bombarded the city. The city’s defenders held the siege for ten months before surrendering in February 1921. Later, the epithet Gazi (War Hero) was added to the city’s name Antep.
There is so much snow in the east (except at the ski centers) that I haven’t really been able to do anything that I wanted. In Kars, I did not get to see Ani. In Doğubeyazıt, İşak Paşa was closed and Ağra Dağı (Mt Ararat) unapproachable. In Van, I didn’t see Hoşap Kalesi nor did I see Van Kalesi or Akdamar Island. It has been a bust, but at least I have a dirty beard to show for it.
Lessons so far:
1. Sexual repression is strong, even among men. I had the unfortunate luck to share an Internet cafe in Doğubeyazıt with a 50-something married Kurdish man who enjoyed watching gay pornography (I wonder if his wife knew where he was spending his Tuesday afternoons). ‘Bak! Bak!’ (Look! Look!) he yelled at me, while asking how Canadian girls (and boys) are. The remainder of the questions he asked of me aren’t appropriate even for a trashy sailor bar on the docks.
2. The only way to make a Steven Segal movie worse is to add Turkish dubbing and play it in a bus with a crying baby and a meowing cat in a box.
3. Apparently fuel smuggling is a problem in Turkey. After leaving Van, our bus was stopped by a Jandarma checkpoint for over an hour. I was confused, but was later told it was because the bus had illegal fuel. I rode on four separate buses that day, because of that mess.
4. Turkish people are realy hospitable. I was invited into the home of a group of students while in Kars. They took great care of me.
That is about all I can think of for the moment. Orientation for the new students begins in a couple days. Can’t wait.
