International news agencies reported that at least ninety Afghan civilians and thirteen American soldiers were killed in the two explosions outside Kabul airport. Video shot by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies strewn around a canal on the edge of the airport. The death toll may rise as dozens of severely wounded have been hospitalized. ISIS, the English acronym for the Islamic State (Daesh), took responsibility for the double attack, claiming that one of its suicide bombers targeted “translators and collaborators with the American army”. Surely, the jihadists target ‘collaborators of the West’, however they kill indiscriminately. The severity of the situation prompted Antonio Guterres, the UN Secretary General, to express his ‘grave concern’ and to call an emergency meeting of the Security Council.

What is really worrying is the prospect of more deadly terrorist attacks. U.S. commanders are on alert for more attacks by ISIS, including possibly rockets or vehicle-borne bombs targeting the airport, where Western powers’ hectic evacuation operations have been forced to come to halt. General Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, appeared apologetic in saying that ‘some intelligence is being shared with the Taliban’ which led him to believe that the latter ‘thwarted some of the [Daesh-planned] attacks’. In other words, at this dire juncture, the US military intelligence is engaged in an operation of damage control. A horrified and distressed American President vowed for revenge saying: “We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay.” Joe Biden has already ordered the Pentagon to draft operational plans on how to strike ISIS-K, the ISIS affiliate which claimed responsibility for the carnage at Kabul airport.

But is it not too little too late? Any lessons learnt from the most costly and deadly US foreign and security policy operation in the 21^st century? The numbers speak volumes. The twenty-year long American ‘War on Terror’ in Afghanistan has had mind-boggling costs and huge negative results as the new carnage adds up to an already abominable record. The figures in economic cost and human suffering and loss of life (published in Forbes) are phenomenal!

The US spent a total of two trillion dollars on the two decades long war terror. This figure translates to $300 million per day or $50,000 per Afghan citizen – in a country with a population of forty million people. American governments have been financing this war on loans. Researchers at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, have calculated that $500 million in interest has already been paid. Their estimate is that by 2050, the interest cost on the Afghan War debt alone will reach $6.5 trillion, equivalent to $20,000 for every US citizen.

About $800 billion related to direct war fighting costs. In addition, Washington spent $750 million per year for Afghan soldiers’ salaries.

Furthermore, eighty-five billion dollars were spent on training the Afghan military and security forces. The latter folded and surrendered to the Taliban in the weeks following the closure of the Bagram US Air Force Base in July. The closure of this important airbase effectively signaled the beginning of the end of the US-backed regime in Afghanistan: Afghan government armed forces could no longer count on decisive US air support to win the battle against the Taliban.

In comparative terms, as we are speaking about the world’s leading military power but also the world’s leader in corporate capitalism, let us remark that successive American administrations from George Bush to Joe Biden have spent more on the failed attempt to defeat the Taliban than the net wealth of Jeff Bezos (Amazon owner), Elon Musk (Tesla), Bill Gates (Microsoft) and the thirty richest billionaires in the US.

Sadly, the human cost of the War on Terror Operation is also phenomenally high: 47,000 Afghan civilian deaths; 69,000 Afghan security forces deaths 3,500 Coalition troops died of which 2,500 American military personnel; 4,000 US contractors’ deaths; 51,000 is the estimate of deaths of opposition fighters.

Moreover, three hundred billion dollars is the cost so far for medical treatment of about 20,000 wounded American soldiers and civilians. As one can imagine, this medical care cost is expected to shoot up to $500 billion in the years to come.

All in all, the Afghanistan affair amounts to a debacle: a huge failure of US foreign policy burdened with huge costs that American people will still be paying for years to come…

Much as there can be personal likes or dislikes between world leaders there is one prime factor that determines the level of bilateral relations between countries: this is the convergence or divergence of political and economic interests.

Harping on medieval history, the Turks claim that their Ottoman ancestors gave the French ‘the most privileged state’ status under the terms of capitulations as early as 1535. The same year, the French dispatched Jean de la Forest as their first ambassador to Constantinople. Nevertheless, it took almost two hundred years for the Ottomans to reciprocate with sending their own envoy to Paris: The Ottoman Empire government appointed its first ambassador Yirmisekiz Mehmet Çelebi to France in 1721.

Nowadays, economic relations between the two countries are not insignificant. Currently 1.366 French companies are operating in Turkey. France ranks 10th country in terms of number of foreign companies operating in Turkey. In the years 2002-2015, French direct investments to Turkey have reached 6.759 billion US dollars. France ranks 10th in terms of foreign direct investments.

Beyond trade, Erdogan envisions the biggest role for Turkey: to become the region’s ‘law and order provider’. “There are also measures that we can take together … against terrorist organisations” Erdogan told Macron at the said videocall (2 March 2021), insinuating at his fervent desire to eliminate the PKK freedom fighters. The Turkish President added that Turkey and France ‘can contribute significantly to stability and peace in Europe, the Caucasus, the Middle East and Africa’.

However, in practical terms Erdogan offered nothing: he did not mention anything on the fate of more than a dozen French teachers at Istanbul’s Galatasaray University whose work permits have been held up and who face the threat of expulsion due to last year’s diplomatic spat.

Recently, the Turkish leadership has been uttering some conciliatory words towards the EU in view of the latter’s summit later in the month. The European Council meeting is due to discuss further sanctions on Turkey as a reaction to Ankara’s provocative exploration moves in Greek and Cypriot waters. Such a big decision was postponed  at the last European Council meeting (10-11 December 2020). Erdogan’s overture to Macron targets at weaning France from the hardline ‘in-favour-of-sanctions club’ where Greece and Cyprus stand and placing it within the moderates’ camp where Germany, Italy and Spain exhibit reluctance on the prospect of further antagonizing Turkey. The latter block’s cautionary stance has been explained by their significant commercial interests in Turkey and its anticipation that any measures leading to a Turkish economic crisis would, in turn, severely harm the European banking sector.

To be sure, sanctions or no sanctions, the Turkish leadership has over the last few years shown excessive zeal in promoting an assertive and expansionist foreign policy aimed at establishing a regional Pax Turca in the entire region that Erdogan mentioned in his videocall to Macron. It is highly unlikely that it will back down, for whatever reason, from this long-term goal.

Idlib is bleeding. Radical Islamists, who lost the war in Syria, are trying to retain power in the country’s north-western province at the cost of civilian lives. This is the final obstacle to attaining peace in the country.

Brett McGurk, US Special Presidential Envoy to the Coalition fighting the Islamic State speaking at the American Institute of the Middle East, three years ago, said: Idlib Province is the largest Al-Qaeda safe haven. It borders with Turkey and it is Ankara whom we should talk to about it.

McGurk was as much right as he cut corners: he is perfectly aware how the Islamists found themselves in Idlib. It all began in 2011 with the attacks of Al-Qaeda terrorists on Syrian government forces which held the line in the northern part of the province next to Jisr ash-Shugur. The Syrian-Turkish border existed then only on paper. In fact, it was utterly permeable resembling a block of Swiss cheese. Uncontrolled crossing points were a common occurrence. The most important of which was located near the Turkish border town of Reyhanli. Over time, this porous border turned into a real transit camp, through which Islamic militants from all over the world penetrated into Syria. Moreover, loads of weapons were supplied via the ports of the Hatay Province, also on Turkish soil.

A year later, the US entered the frame under the CIA operation codenamed Timber Sycamore. The Americans, supported by the special services of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and Jordan, illegally sent military advisers, equipment and funds to Syria – with the consent of neither the Syrian government nor of any body of the international community. By 2013, Washington satisfying, inter alia, the wishes of Tel Aviv, gave the go-ahead for the supply of weapons to several thousand Islamic militants. The latter operated under the clear order of overthrowing the Syrian government.

Throughout this time we have been reading reports in Western media calling those Islamic militants ‘rebels’. It was clear to everyone, however, they were just abandoned villains planning to turn Syria into a theocratic state. They set up their training camp between Mount Zāwiya and the small town of Maarrat al-Nu’man, south of Idlib. From there, these atrocious jihadists penetrated into other parts of Syria.

In the following couple of years, 2014 and 2015, the Islamists, who by now possessed state-of-the-art weapons including anti-tank missile systems, pursued a hard-fought offensive on the province’s capital, the very city of Idlib, which was then controlled by the Syrian government forces. Alas Idlib fell. Damascus troops sustained losses. They retreated far inland. At this very moment, Bashar Al Assad sought military aid from Russia.

After the fall of the province’s major city, thousands of militants of the Islamist Army of Conquest aided by Turkey and the Gulf states advanced further, to Aleppo. They were stopped by the Syrian Army at great sacrifice of life. The turning point of the war occurred in late 2016 with the complete liberation of Aleppo from the armed gangs. The scattered militias made their way back to Idlib: first from eastern Aleppo, then from the Damascus suburbs of Ghouta, later from Yarmouk and Al-Hajar al-Aswad located further south, and finally from Daraa and Quneitra. All the survivors flocked to Idlib – groups of foreign mercenaries and a metley of local jihadists from the ranks of Al-Qaeda and Jabhat al-Nusra.

Meanwhile, a new bloody drama was unfolding in Idlib – a struggle for power between various gangs. The “moderate Syrian opposition”, closely connected with Turkey and the Gulf countries, started creating its own political structures – the “Salvation Government” with its own security services and police. Those “moderates” decided to establish a new command system to dismember the country and cut off Idlib from Syria in the future.  In turn, Jabhat al-Nusra jihadists, renamed by that time Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), suggested that the new territory be under their patronage. Nobody wanted to share power. Quite a natural thing, because at stake there was money, weapons, assistance from the allies, control over pivotal routes and border crossing points. By the beginning of 2019, HTS militants managed to resolve the conflict for their own benefit.

The US, Great Britain and Germany took a wait-and-see approach. As for Syria itself, its government troops had planned a military operation to liberate Idlib since the summer of 2018, but calls coming from the West “to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe” forced Assad to postpone the offensive. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian made clear what Europe really feared. Many militants in Idlib have European countries’ citizenship. In case of a military operation, they would flee to Europe posing a threat to the entire continent. In this context, Le Drian confirmed McGurk’s words about Idlib’s becoming a haven for al-Qaeda’s international recruits.

At this point, we need to revisit Turkey’s role. Already a year ago, in September 2018, an agreement was reached within the Astana process on a ceasefire in Idlib coupled with the creation of a twenty-kilometre de-escalation zone. The Russian military police prepared humanitarian corridors for all those civilians wishing to leave the province. Moreover, under Turkish supervision all heavy weapons had to be taken away from the area.

Ankara had six months to fulfill its part of the deal. Things turned out in a different way. Before the Turkish military’s very eyes the HTS militants intruded the buffer zone with weapons consolidating their position. They increased the number of attacks across the dividing line, including the shelling of populated localities. The Russian Khmeimim military base in Latakia suffered drone attacks. But the Turkish military command on the ground condoning of the new militants’ intrusion turned into a boomerang: at the end jihadists attacked the stronghold of the Turkish Army itself, forcing the latter to ask for Russian air power assistance. Like the sorcerer’s apprentice from Goethe’s ballad, the perfidious Turks had to admit their blunder: Wrong I was in calling spirits, I avow, for I find them galling, cannot rule them now.

Obviously, the problem of Idlib requires an urgent solution. The situation is rapidly deteriorating. Both sides are already preparing for an offensive. The Syrian Army against the militants who took refuge in Idlib and the militants against the government troops’ positions. A compromise can be found only by means of joint action guaranteed under the Astana process parties with the involvement of those Western countries whose citizens are fighting in Syria on the side of jihadists. Then the question arises: does such a big number of players have enough political will to reach an understanding?

Sadly, as long as this issue remains unresolved, Idlib will maintain its status of the new-found haven for terrorists. In such a case, Syria will continue to be in the state of endless war.

The accusations against Damascus and Moscow about alleged regular air strikes by Syrian government forces and/or the Russian Air Forces on civilian targets continue, although corroborating proof of such claims seems to be lacking. Against this background, calls voiced in Washington as well as several Western capitals to end the counter-terrorist operation in Eastern Aleppo, resemble more to a last and desperate attempt to shield and rescue the defeated terrorists and extremists on Syrian soil.

Why the current US administration due to step down in three weeks’ time is so sensitive to the evolving situation in Syria? Let us tackle this pertinent question.

First, it is imperative for the ruling in the US elite Democratic Party to save its political reputation: to justify the failure of the military-diplomatic efforts to overthrow the legitimate government in Syria and to eliminate the political influence of Russia in the Middle East, depriving the latter of the possibility of a permanent military presence in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. In other words, at this juncture, we witness an uncompromising clash of the global interests of the United States and of Russia now in Syria.

Second, the new American President Donald Trump in his campaign speeches promised to stay away from previous interventionist courses pursued by past US administrations which saw numerous interference in the internal affairs of other countries aimed at the overthrow of unwanted to the US regimes. Moreover, Trump named “moderate” Syrian armed opposition terrorists and called for international efforts, including Russia, for the destruction of international terrorism on the planet.

Third, before leaving the White House, Barack Obama faces the challenging task of concealing the direct or indirect US involvement in creating and nurturing terrorist and other equally odious extremist Muslim organizations that left behind rivers of blood in Syria, Iraq, Libya and other countries. Obama needs do everything to evacuate from the war zone in Syria advisers and military trainers from the US, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and several other countries of Western Europe. One can imagine what an international scandal may break out in case of seizure or capture of American and/or other foreign nationals who fought on the side of terrorists.

Last but not least, the ruling elite of the outgoing President is frantically in a hurry to create for Donald Trump new challenges and external blockages by pushing in the US Senate legislation that will hinder the fulfillment of his campaign promise to correct political mistakes of the previous administration. Sadly, decrees providing for the possibility of extending sanctions against Iran, start of deliveries of lethal weapons worth $350 million to Ukraine and transfer of portable anti-aircraft rocket launchers to the armed Syrian opposition have already been adopted.

Such a peculiar situation with the transfer of power in the White House occurs, perhaps, for the first time in American history.

The Russian Foreign Ministry has issued statements in which it points to the Americans as being excessively emotional. Moreover, it has accused US of supporting terrorism while pointing out the unwillingness of Obama’s administration to fulfill its part of the deal. Such a deal was achieved with great difficulty; it required great efforts exercised from different quarters.

In Moscow it was quickly noticed that after reaching the Geneva agreement on the ceasefire in Syria different approaches for cooperation with Russia from the part of the US State Department, the Pentagon and the CIA have been identified.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner said that Washington was considering various options for action with regard to Moscow in case of failure of the agreements on Syria, including sanctions. The Washington Post reported that the White House in early October held a meeting with representatives of the State Department, the CIA and the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the US Armed Forces. The meeting discussed the issue of air strikes on positions of the Syrian Government Forces. According to the paper, the meeting proposed to conduct the operation in secret, in order to circumvent White House objections. Obviously, President Obama reaching the very end of his term in office does not want to get involved in such a risky operation without the approval of the UN Security Council.

US Secretary of State John Kerry explained the US problem during a meeting with the Syrian opposition. He said: “Our international law experts tell us that we have no grounds for sending troops, unless the UN Security Council adopts a resolution. Such a resolution can be interposed by Russian or Chinese veto. We cannot do it if those people do not attack us or if we are not invited to Syria. Russia was invited by the legal regime.”

Legally Moscow is Syria’s ally and actually is a party to the conflict. But the United States and its allies in the framework of the international coalition, formed to combat ISIS, operate in Syria without a mandate of the Security Council or an invitation by Damascus. Clearly, by the yardstick of international law, the international coalition members are the aggressors. Turkey belongs to the same aggressors’ category: Ankara, without prior consultations with the Syrian Government sent in troops to Northern Syria in August.

But Washington, being too long at the receiving end of diplomatic defeats in the Middle East, seeks to shift all the blame on Moscow, accusing her that she is allegedly already militarily present in Syria, refuses diplomacy, and ‘seeks to achieve its goals through military means’.

The US went as far as blocking the Security Council resolution drafted to condemn the mortar shelling of the Russian Embassy in Damascus. The US attitude demonstrates flagrant disregard for the Vienna Convention on diplomatic relations. When similar crimes were committed earlier against the diplomatic missions of Western countries, Russia had always unreservedly lent its support to the Security Council condemnation of these acts.

Recently Tehran decided to publicize Washington’s attempts to sway her to their side in the Syrian conflict. In the last few months, the Americans tried to persuade the Islamic Republic of Iran or even sought to force Tehran to accept in a diplomatic way, that Bashar Assad should not play any role in the political future of Syria. However, Ayatollah Khamenei has forbidden to conduct parallel negotiations with the US on regional and Syrian issues, because the history has proven that the American officials do not deserve their confidence at all.

On the other hand, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan criticizes Americans as well: “we see the United States have been carrying out a duplicitous policy in Syria – one part of the US leadership works with terrorists, while another part is pursuing a policy that supports the self-defense forces of the Syrian Kurds”.

All of this means that Washington has completely exhausted its diplomatic resources. The US leadership feels that the consequences of its military and diplomatic failures in the Middle East region are to be expected. Rushing from the table of negotiations to the military maps and vice versa, trying to change the impending future, the United States only narrows the space to maneuver.

Ο δραστήριος νέος Δήμαρχος της Πάφου Φαίδωνας Φαίδωνος, ο οποίος αντικατέστησε τον καταδικασθέντα για το σκάνδαλο ΣΑΠΑ Σάββα Βέργα, κρούει ανελλιπώς τον κώδωνα του κινδύνου για κακώς κείμενα σε μια σειρά Δημοτικές Αρχές. Περί τις αρχές του μήνα ο κος Φαίδωνος κατήγγειλε ότι ιθύνοντες του Δήμου Αραδίππου δωροδοκήθηκαν από τα ενεργειακά μεγαθήρια Halliburton και Schlumberger για έκδοση αδειών οικοδομής εξπρές … χθες κατά παράβαση και παρέκκλιση των ισχυόντων κανονισμών. (Παρενθετικά ας μας επιτραπεί να τολμήσουμε μια αρμόζουσα αντιπαραβολή: για μια πολεοδομική άδεια μικρής μονοκατοικίας στην φθίνουσα – ως σχεδόν εξαληφθείσα από τον Κυπριακό χάρτη ημιορεινή κοινότητα Λάγιας της επαρχίας Λάρνακας αναμένουμε πέραν των έξι μηνών χωρίς ακόμη έκδοση).

Κατόπιν των καταγγελιών Φαίδωνος, η αστυνομία παρέλαβε από το Δημαρχείο Αραδίππου, προς εξέταση υπόθεσης διαφθοράς, σχετικούς φακέλους αφορούντες τις εταιρείες Halliburton, Schlumberger αλλά και Krysanera Ltd – η τελευταία με δραστηριότητες επεξεργασίας χρυσού. Ο Δήμαρχος Πάφου ανέφερε σε δημόσιες δηλώσεις του ότι μέλη του Δημοτικού Συμβουλίου Αραδίππου ζήτησαν μίζες προς εξυπηρέτηση της Αμερικανικής εταιρείας η οποία άρχισε την ανέγερση μεγάλων εγκαταστάσεων δυο χρόνια πριν.

Το θέμα είχε συζητηθεί και στην Βουλή των Αντιπροσώπων όπου σε συνεδρία στις 23 Οκτωβρίου 2014, αποκαλύφθηκε ότι το Δημοτικό Συμβούλιο Αραδίππου παραχώρησε εσκεμμένα άδειες σε Haliburton και Schlumberger δύο μέρες πριν η Βουλή εγκρίνει νέα επικαιροποιημένη νομοθεσία η οποία θα προέβλεπε υποβολή περιβαλλοντικής μελέτης για τέτοιου είδους αναπτύξεις γης βαριάς βιομηχανίας οι οποίες ενδεχομένως να επιβαρύνουν το περιβάλλον. Εξάλλου, λίγο αργότερα σε εκτεταμένο ρεπορτάζ της η αγγλόφωνη Sunday Mail (9 Νοεμβρίου 2014) απεκάλυψε πως τοπικοί αλλά και κρατικοί αξιωματούχοι εξέδωσαν πολεοδομικές και οικοδομικές άδειες σε Halliburton και Schlumberger σε χρόνο ρεκόρ κατά παράβαση ισχυουσών κανόνων.

Με τους δημότες να καλούνται να εκλέξουν νέα ηγεσία στον Δήμο Αραδίππου – αλλά και στους υπόλοιπους μας Δήμους – σε λιγότερο από δύο μήνες επιβάλλεται η εξακρίβωση της αλήθειας γύρω από τη σχέση των δύο Αμερικανικών μεγαθηρίων με τις Δημοτικές και Κρατικές μας Αρχές. Άλλωστε για τους κατέχοντες η Halliburton έχει βεβαρημένο μονοπωλιακό παρελθόν σε σχέση με την μακρόχρονη αμερικανική επέμβαση στο Ιράκ για την ανατροπή Σαντάμ Χουσεΐν το 2003. Για την ιστορία να αναφέρουμε ότι κατά την χρονική περίοδο της προετοιμασίας της Αμερικανικής εισβολής, η Washington κατακύρωσε στην Haliburton συμβόλαιο ύψους 7 δις δολαρίων για έργα στο υπό κατάληψη Ιράκ …

This step will allow the Russian aircraft to fight against militants more effectively because the flight time of bombers to targets in Syria from Iran is less than two times the flight time needed flying from Russian airports.

Moreover, large-scale naval exercises involving vessels equipped with the modern strike systems Caliber were carried out in August in the Caspian and Mediterranean Seas. This powerful weapon system has already passed ‘the baptism of fire’ in early October 2015, during a massive strike on ISIS positions. The Russian Defense Ministry also stated that Iran and Iraq have both allowed Russia to use their airspace to carry through cruise missiles Caliber-NK.

Meanwhile, this ‘military activity’ once again aroused serious concern of the US administration. Washington’s statements about the dangers allegedly posed by Russia to the countries of the Caspian Sea region make this US concern evident. According to the White House, the Kremlin is conducting maneuvers of combat ships with the purpose of showing neighbours in the region – Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Iran and Turkmenistan – its military superiority and strengthening the status of regional leader. In this regard, the American politicians with the assistance of the media began to blow up another story about ‘aggressive Russia’ which allegedly ‘threatens the security of its neighbors and seeks to bear all sorts of pressure and forces them to obey her will’.

Once again, the USA is trying to present Russia as an ‘aggressor’, considering that the whole world does not notice their double standards, those ‘unilateral interpretations’ they are trying to impose to achieve their goals. If suitable to US interests, Washington shamelessly ignores international treaties, laws and regulations. The US does not have ‘permanent enemies or permanent friends’, they have only solid ‘permanent interests’. For serving US interests Washington is ready to ignore the entire world community.

 Losing positions on the international stage, the United States is anxiously watching the strengthening of Russia’s position in the Caspian Sea region, the Middle East and around the world in general. Consequently, Washington is seeking to stall this development. But to their great regret, in recent years many countries have begun to understand that Russia is not ‘the aggressor’. Unlike Washington, Russia has proved to be a serious, reliable political and economic partner.

We shall not engage with the English syntax and grammar mistakes (of which there are plenty) that Donald Tusk, President of the European Council, committed in the above statement while in Turkey. However, we ought to address the substance of his words, uttered a day before the date the whole world set – not least the European Union of which Tusk is the prime speaker – to commemorate the Armenian Genocide of 1915, which Ankara never admitted. If anything, the Turkish government criminalized reference to this atrocious war crime, which it conveniently terms as ‘forced population movements’.

It is very ironic that the President of the European Council chose this particular day to pay a visit and praise Turkey unequivocally for its ‘best record in treating refugees’. Let us remind Mr. Tusk that the European Parliament a year earlier on the anniversary of the centennial of the Armenian Genocide noted in its relevant resolution, inter alia, the following:

1. 2015 marks the centennial of the Armenian Genocide perpetrated in the Ottoman Empire;
2. An increasing number of Member States and national parliaments recognize the Armenian Genocide perpetrated in the Ottoman Empire;
3. One of the main motivations for the European unification movement is the will to prevent the recurrence of wars and crimes against humanity in Europe;
4. Turkey and Armenia have embarked on a process of diplomatic normalisation, signing protocols in 2009 in Zurich on establishing and developing relations;
5. The importance of keeping alive the memories of the past is paramount, since there can be no reconciliation without truth and remembrance;

“The EP pays tribute, on the eve of the centenary, to the memory of the one-and-a-half million innocent Armenian victims who perished in the Ottoman Empire; joins the commemoration of the centenary of the Armenian Genocide in a spirit of European solidarity and justice; calls on the Commission and the Council to join in the commemoration.”

Ankara has not as yet normalized diplomatic relations with Armenia neither has it recognized the genocide, despite the importance of doing so being clearly marked by the most democratic of institutions in the European Union.

To the contrary, Turkey has dedicated the time, that lapsed since the signing of the Zurich protocol of 2009, not in promoting good neighbourly relations but in destabilizing its neighbours Syria and Iraq, which she invaded several times. Both Damascus and Baghdad denounced Turkish aggressive actions multiple times referring Ankara’s interventionist policy and creeping invasion to the UN Security Council.

Moreover, Tusk’s statement is an affront to the hundreds of thousands of Syrian victims as well as the tens of thousands of Turkish and Syrian Kurdish victims that the five year old Turkish interference and expansionism has created in the region. The Turkish Armed Forces pound inhabited areas in the southeast of the country nonstop, killing innocent Kurds, citizens of the Republic of Turkey. Turkey’s Kurds cry out every single day: “This is genocide”.

The EU should not support Turkey’s creeping invasion in Syrian and Iraq, neither should it condone the genocidal war within Turkey against its own Kurdish population. One should ask the real questions: What did the EU do for promoting the peace process in Syria? What did the EU do to curb Turkey’s daily attacks on its own civilian population?

As these lines are drawn, Martin Schulz, the Speaker of the European Parliament, sets foot on the island invited by Yiannakis Omirou, Cyprus’ House of Representatives Speaker, whose party EDEK, strongly opposes the Bizonal Bi-communal Federation as the negotiated form of political settlement. Certain interesting observations are in place in this regard: Martin Schulz has been the leader of the Socialist Group in the EP since 2004, the pivotal year that saw the overwhelming rejection of the UN plan for a comprehensive settlement of the Cyprus problem. Seventy six per cent of the Greek majority population turned down the proposed plan which would have turned Cyprus, yet again, de jure, a vassal state, subordinate to Ankara’s whims.

Schulz has not done well his homework before accepting the invitation to visit the island republic. According to press reports, the EP Speaker will devote more time meeting Mustafa Akinci, ‘President’ of the illegal ‘TRNC’ regime than for his meeting with President Nicos Anastasiades, Head of the internationally recognized government, and fellow member state of the EU! This fact speaks volumes as to Schulz’s intentions.

Second, Martin Schulz fails to take into account the robust views on the Cyprus problem of his fraternal EDEK socialist party. In a recent meeting with Marinos Sizopoulos, EDEK party chairman, the latter complained to the author that relations with the European Socialists, chaired by Schulz, are strained because of EDEK’s Cyprus policy questioning the wisdom of implementing a BBF solution. Twelve years of frozen relations between the European socialists and their Cypriot counterparts should have been long enough a period of time for Martin Schulz, if he considers himself a statesman, to show leadership by seeking to engage with his Cypriot socialist colleagues listening to their legitimate concerns rather than shunning them off.

Instead, Europe’s Socialist leader places more emphasis on listening to Akinci, who aligns himself with Ankara’s fresh threats against the Republic of Cyprus, in response to the latter’s third licensing round for exploration in its legitimate Exclusive Economic Zone. (Akinci already started making complaints about the licensing whereas Cypriot government spokesman Christodoulides cleared the ground stating that the energy policy of the RoC is not under negotiation).

In failing to fairly put his ears on the Turkish-pillaged Cypriot ground, Herr Schulz unwisely made noises about an all-time ‘golden opportunity for a settlement’ before even setting foot on the violently-yet-forgotten raped island. He should have been better advised to fill his forerunner public statement with a call for Ankara to pull out all its troops from the island and restitute the tens of thousands of Greek properties which she has confiscated through its puppet regime.

If Martin Schulz insists on condoning Turkey’s attempt to get away with the huge compensation bill, he should tell us where the money will come from to settle the forty two year old bleeding Cyprus wounds.

On the other hand the situation in the eastern provinces of the country is dreadful. Tens of thousands of repressed ethnic Kurds are forced to flee their ancestral homes in search for relative safety. The modus operandi, the goals, and the results of the Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) operations in Turkey’s Southeast targeted against the courageous Kurdish population are reminiscent of the Turkish ‘Peace Operation’ in Cyprus in July-August 1974. Code-named Attila, a two-phase operation in violation of a relevant Security Council ceasefire resolution (22 July 1974) achieved ‘remarkable’, from the Turkish rulers point of view, results: displacement of 165,000 Greeks of Cyprus from their 3000 years old ancestral homes, rape of Greek women by members of the TAF that remain unpunished to this date. The Greek population incurred also 5,000 deaths and 1500 missing persons, the large majority of which remain unaccounted for, 42 years after the Turkish ‘peace operation’. Numbers are round figure estimates: however, according to UNFICYP estimates 2 in 5, or 40% of the Greek Cypriots became internally displaced persons (IDPs). Turkey, so far, has got away with the above outlined war crimes. The northern part occupied by the TAF, 36 per cent of the total area of the island, became ethnically cleansed from a three millennia long historical Greek presence. In 1974, Greeks constituted 80% of the population of what is coined in recent years as Northern Cyprus. Moreover, through the years of ‘peaceful’ occupation, Ankara implanted no less than 120,000 of backward Muslim settlers from Anatolia, a critical mass at least equal in numbers to the Turkish Cypriot indigenous population and importantly of completely different outlook and mentality to the Cypriot Turks.

The far reaching consequences of the 1974 Attila operation are visible today in the self-styled TRNC, Ankara’s puppet state. A historical Greek civilization heartland for thousands of years has been turned into a Muslim chaos: 500 Greek Orthodox churches have disappeared (looted, pillaged, demolished, turned-into-stables and the like) whereas mosques are mushrooming in an effort to forcibly Islamize the predominantly secular Turkish Cypriot society.

Ironically, the Cyprus Turkification operation was ordered by a left-of-centre Turkish Prime Minister, the late Bulent Ecevit. In other respects, Ecevit was a socialist and a secular poet. Unlike Erdogan, Ecevit had not ever cited Koran verses in public. However, his decision to order the execution of the Attila operation, laid the solid foundation for a long term plan: the chauvinist Turkish expansion to the strategically located island of Cyprus. A generation later, Erdogan builds on the Ecevit-organized military occupation of northern Cyprus, turning it into a creeping Islamization. Continuity or change in the top echelon of Turkish polity, left or right, secular or religious, the policy aim is the same: displacement of the different, of the other.

A close look at events in Southeast Turkey today reveal remarkable similarities: the TAF launching a massive operation that terrorizes the other population out of their ancestral homes. The perpetrator is the same: the powerful Neo-Sultan, the victim is the same: the weak side that forms an obstacle to the grandiose plans of a Neo-Ottoman empire; in this case in real time the poor Kurds.

As confirmed by a most recent European Parliament fact finding mission: 50,000 Kurds fled Nusaybin, Mardin Province, near the Syrian border, 50,000 run away from Sirnak Province, while another 40,000 departed from Yuksekova, Hakari Province in search of safe heavens in western parts of the country. The fleeing civilian Kurds are desperately seeking to protect themselves from becoming human shields. The TAF indiscriminately bombard densely Kurdish populated urban areas. Their numbers are roughly equal, their fate is identical: Greek Cypriot IDPs in 1974, Turkey’s Kurdish IDPs in 2016: Ecevit-Erdogan policy draws a dreadful analogy!