MANUAL DE FUNCIONES Y PROCEDIMIENTOS

The source of the difficulties in achieving a real improvement in relations between Turkey and Syria up to 1991 undoubtedly lies in the dichotomy of Turkey's membership of NATO and Syria's reliance on support from the former Soviet union. In other words, the confrontation between East and West is reflected in the Middle East in general and in Turkish-Syrian relations in particular. Even though this tension has been reduced by the world-wide softening of the Cold War, it has not completely disappeared.

Relations between the two countries have not been cordial since 1939, when France, then the mandatory power in Syria, handed the area around Alexandretta (Iskanderun in Turkish, Hatay in Arabic) over to Turkey as a bribe to enter World War II on the side of the allies. Turkey accepted, but then stayed neutral. Syria has never accepted this territorial loss and Syrian maps still show the territory as part of Syria. Damascus has never been able to hide the fact that it considers Turkish sovereignty over the Hatay as illegitimate. Ali Mustafa, the Syrian consul general in Istanbul, argued, in 1985, that Syrian maps still included Hatay region within Syrian borders because ''Syria does not accept the present frontiers which were drawn up in Hatay through a referendum, because that referendum was conducted following an agreement between Turkey and France. In those days there was no independent Syrian state". In addition to this, the consul declared that Syria's hostility was at least partly due to Turkey's GAP project, and the construction of the giant Ataturk Dam that would harm Syrian interests. He added that the controversy concerning the sharing of the Euphrates waters should be solved according to the rules of international law governing the joint use of rivers and other waterways (Bolukbasi, 1990, 27). Until the late 1970s diplomatic relations remained

"correct", yet both sides knew that the state of affairs could best be described as "peaceful coexistence". Perhaps because of this background, Syria has been willing to permit anti-Ankara Kurds and leftist opposition groups to use its territory as a base for operations, and Ankara has sometimes angrily admonished Damascus on the issue (MEI,

16 February, 1990, 13; Bolukbasi, 1990, 3). The subject of Syria's helping Turkish

opposition groups during the 1970s by aiming them and sending them back secretly into Turkey has aroused the most severe displeasure in the Turkish administration. Evidence has also been put forward suggesting that Syria had helped Armenian terrorists, and during the 1980s had similarly provided arms for Kurdish terrorists. In particular, Syria was held responsible for the fact that Abdullah Ocalan (APO), the leader of the Marxist- oriented Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which was founded in Turkey in 1978, had moved his headquarters to Damascus and, from 1984 on, had sent Kurdish terrorists, trained in the Bekka valley of Lebanon, (under Syrian control), into Southeast Anatolia. Syria has refused to admit training and arming members of the PKK, or providing facilities for them.

In December 1986, Turkish police claimed that they had discovered Syrian-backed terrorists operating to blow up the Ataturk dam (The Middle East, October 1987, 27). The Turks reported that there were three training camps in northern Syria housing militants belonging to the "Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia" (ASALA) and the PKK, and that Syrian agents, disguised as diplomats, had delivered arms to ASALA militants in various European countries. On 17 September 1986 the PKK Central Committee held a meeting in Damascus where it decided on more increasing its operations, especially its crossings of the Turko-Syrian border into Turkey

(Bolukbasi, 1990, 24;41). The Syrian Prime Minister Abed al-Rauf al-Kasm stated in

1986, that Damascus was unable to prevent PKK incursions into Turkey because Syria, with a long frontier, had no army in the north, since it was needed to watch the enemy in the south. Thus, although Syria was doing its best to avoid friction with Turkey, they could not keep the border under strict control (Bolukbasi, 1990, 34).

In July 1987 the Turkish Prime Minister Ozal went to Damascus and two months later Kadurra, the Vice-Prime Minister of Syria, went to Turkey. At these meetings, a protocol for "Cooperation on Security Problems" was signed, bringing up a number of bilateral matters dealing with the prevention of the smuggling of goods across the common border, the cross-border trade in counterfeit money and the return of fugitives to the country from which they were escaping (Lewis, 1991, 73).. In addition discussions were held on the prevention of terrorism (from Turkey's point of view- the PKK, and from Syria's, certain elements of the Syrian Moslem Brotherhood). Particular attention was given to the important problem of regulating the water of the Euphrates. As a result of his visit Ozal proposed Turkish help in the prospecting for gas and oil in Syria, presented a project to supply electricity to Syria if Damascus needed it, and suggested

that increased trade and economic cooperation would benefit both countries. His major proposal was, however, the installation of the Peace Pipelines (Bolukbasi, 1990, 43). According to Briefing (1989), the result of this protocol was that the Syrian government moved the PKK camp out of Syria into the Bekka valley in Lebanon. Turkish officials felt that such a move was not sufficient in itself because there was evidence of Syrian territory still being used for many of the PKK attacks. They did not accept the Syrian excuse that the PKK camps were in sovereign Lebanese territory and therefore beyond their reach for, in fact, the Bekka Valley was under Syrian control (Briefing, 10-17 July,

1989, 5). Many questions were left unanswered such as the fate of the PKK terrorists in

the Bekka Valley, and Syria's attitude towards the extradition of the PKK leader, Abdullah Ocland, about whose presence in Syria Turkey had documentary proof but about whom Damascus claimed complete ignorance (Briefing, 20 July, 1987,15).

On 21 October, 1989, two Syrian MIG-21 fighter planes entered Turkey's airspace near Samandag, Hatay, and shot down a Turkish plane killing two pilots and three technicians. Syria argued that its pilots had disobeyed orders and Ankara accepted Damascus' explanation, but many suspected that Damascus was in fact trying to scare Ankara so that Ozal would not dare to use the "water weapon". In November 1989, Jamil al-Assad, the Syrian president's brother, made a statement that a Kurdish state should be established in the region and should also encompass Southeast Anatolia, adding that the Syrian government was providing every kind of political and logistical support to the PKK. Later on in December 1989 the Syrian Minister of Information, Mohammad Salman, claimed that his country did not recognize the Hatay region as part of Turkey. All these were perceived by Ankara as a Syrian attempt to build up tension between the two countries in order to force Ankara to revise its "water policy", and agree to Damascus' demand to sign a treaty to formally share the water of the Euphrates

(Bolukbasi, 1990, 50).

In a sense Turkey was taking a "wait-and-see" stance towards Syria to see if Syria would, in fact, take serious steps to broaden the scope of its relationship with Turkey, especially its economic and commercial relations. However, there was a certain reticence on the part of Syrian officials about the prospect of coming too close and thus becoming more dependent on Turkey, as had already happened in the matter of water (Briefing, 10-

17 July, 1989, 6). Turkish exports to Syria in 1989 (first 8 months) reached 110 million

US dollars, of which nearly half were agricultural products (Erengul, 1990, 15). According to Ozal, Syria was a very important "key country" in the Arab world and relations with it would further increase its importance in the region. Ankara's close ties with Arab and Islamic countries also had a great importance for Turkey's relations with the west (Briefing, 20 July, 1987,15).

The visit of Syrian Foreign Minister, Farouq A1 Shara, to Ankara in March 1991, marked a new phase in the relations between the two countries. These relations, often

strained in the past because of the issues of the water of the Euphrates and cross-border security, have vastly improved since the two countries found themselves on the same side of the fence during the Gulf crisis; but according to The Sunday Times (1991), Hafez al-Assad, the Syrian president, ordered his soldiers in Lebanon to leave the PKK base alone because he wanted the camp as a bargaining chip against Turkey which he feared could use the Euphrates dams to cut off Syria's water (The Sunday times, 13

October 1991,24).

According to The Guardian (1992), the Turkish Interior Minister, Ismet Sezgin, visited Damascus on 17 April 1992 and, as a result, Turkey and Syria have drawn up two protocols aimed at improving joint border security and removing the PKK from the Bekka (The Guardian, 18 April 1992, 12). According to Briefing (1991), there was a visible desire on both sides to overcome the traditional problems which had beset bilateral relations in the past (Briefing, 25 March, 1991, 9). When it came to discussing bilateral issues, the Syrian's again brought up the topic of the water of the Euphrates. Neither side harbours the illusion that the water issue will not be a focus of discussion again and again in future contacts between the two capitals, but there appears to be a recognition, that water could become the cause of fresh tensions in the region as it seeks to recover from the Gulf crisis; and therefore, cooperation is needed to prevent this

(Briefing, 25 March, 1991,10).