Michael Rubin | @mrubin1971 10.13.2011 – 12:35 PM<\/p>\n
Early on in Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan\u2019s premiership, he bent over backwards not only to repair Turkey\u2019s traditionally dicey relations with Syria, but also to promote Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. Erdo\u011fan, for example, invited Bashar to vacation in Turkey as Erdo\u011fan\u2019s personal guest, and when tensions rose between Syria and Lebanon during Lebanon\u2019s Cedar Revolution, Erdo\u011fan put Turkey more in Syria\u2019s camp than in Lebanon\u2019s.<\/p>\n
Things appeared to turn, however, as Bashar al-Assad\u2019s crackdown on demonstrators accelerated and grew steadily bloodier. Erdo\u011fan on several occasions gave Syria ultimatums to stop and reform or face a cut-off of Turkey\u2019s ties. Too often in Western capitals, Turkey seeks benefit from such rhetoric no matter what the reality of its policy. There was the case, for example, of the forcible return allegedly by Turkey of a Syrian opposition defector to Syria. Now, despite the crackdown and Turkish ultimatums, a Turkish minister is assuring the public that trade with Bashar al-Assad\u2019s regime in Syria is actually increasing. According to a Turkish wire service:<\/p>\n
Turkish Economy Minister Zafer \u00c7a\u011flayan has said Turkey\u2019s trade with Syria continues to increase. Commenting on Syria\u2019s decision to ban import of products that have more than a 5 percent customs duty, \u00c7a\u011flayan said yesterday that Syria has lifted the ban, and thus, Turkey\u2019s exports to Syria maintained the same level with last year. \u201cWe have a serious amount of products shipping to the Arabian Peninsula via Syria,\u201d he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
One of the reasons why it is so important the United States stands up for principle is so few other countries are willing to do so.<\/p>\n
via Has Turkey Distanced Itself From Syria? \u00ab Commentary Magazine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Michael Rubin | @mrubin1971 10.13.2011 – 12:35 PM Early on in Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan\u2019s premiership, he bent over backwards not only to repair Turkey\u2019s traditionally dicey relations with Syria, but also to promote Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. Erdo\u011fan, for example, invited Bashar to vacation in Turkey as Erdo\u011fan\u2019s personal guest, and when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":32532,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[7190,3348],"class_list":["post-45432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-syria","tag-syrian-opposition","tag-zafer-caglayan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}