BRUSSELS: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday that a revival of dialogue with fellow NATO member Greece to resolve long-standing disputes will serve “stability and prosperity” in the region.
Speaking on the sidelines of a NATO summit, Erdogan also lamented what he said was a lack of support by Turkey’s NATO allies in its fight against terrorism.
It was a veiled reference to Turkey’s disappointment with US military support for Syrian Kurdish fighters, who Ankara argues are inextricably linked to a decades-long Kurdish insurgency in Turkey.
Erdogan, who is vying to mend Turkey’s battered relations with its Western partners, is holding a series of one-on-one meetings with NATO leaders, including US President Joe Biden.
The Turkish strongman has recently toned down his anti-Western rhetoric as he seeks foreign investments for his country, which has been troubled by a currency crisis and an economic downturn made worse by the coronavirus pandemic.
“Turkey is on the frontline in the fight against terrorism in all relevant international platforms, especially NATO,” Erdogan said, adding that some 4,000 Daesh group fighters were “neutralized” in Turkish cross border operations.
“Turkey is the only NATO ally which has fought face-to-face and gave its young sons as martyrs for this cause,” Erdogan said. “Unfortunately, we did not receive the support and solidarity we expected from our allies and partners in our fight against all forms of terrorism.”
Last summer, a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece over boundaries and rights to natural resources in the eastern Mediterranean flared anew after Ankara sent research vessels into waters where Greece asserts jurisdiction.
Diplomats from the two countries have held two rounds of talks in recent months for the first time in five years, while the foreign ministers of Greece and Turkey also held reciprocal visits.
“I believe that reviving the channels of dialogue between (Turkey) and our neighbor and ally, Greece, and the resolution of bilateral issues will ... serve the stability and prosperity of our region,” Erdogan said, in a video address to a think tank event on the sidelines of the summit.
Erdogan’s talks with Biden are expected to focus on US support for Syrian Kurdish fighters, as well as a dispute over Ankara’s acquisition of a Russian air defense system, which led to Turkey being removed from the F-35 fighter program and sanctions on defense industry officials.
Washington says the S-400 missiles, which Turkey purchased in 2019, pose a threat to NATO’s integrated air defense and has demanded that Ankara abandons the $2.5 billion system.
In April, Biden infuriated Ankara by declaring that the Ottoman-era mass killing and deportations of Armenians was “genocide.” Turkey denies that the deportations and massacres that began in 1915 and killed an estimated 1.5 million Armenians amounted to genocide.
In Brussels, Erdogan met with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
After his meeting with Erdogan, Macron tweeted that he wants to “move forward” with Turkey.
It was their first meeting since a dispute between the two countries reached its peak in October, after Erdogan questioned Macron’s mental health.
Both men discussed Libya and Syria issues, the Elysee said. Macron has accused Turkey of flouting its commitments by ramping up its military presence in Libya and bringing in jihadi fighters from Syria.
During the discussion with Johnson, the two leaders agreed to “work toward the resumption of travel between the UK and Turkey,” according to a Downing Street statement. Turkey has been pushing for a relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions to allow British tourists to come to Turkey this summer.
At NATO, Turkey hails its revival of dialogue with Greece
https://arab.news/jyzy2
At NATO, Turkey hails its revival of dialogue with Greece
- Turkish President is holding a series of one-on-one meetings with NATO leaders, including U.S. President Joe Biden
- Erdogan recently toned down his anti-Western rhetoric as he seeks foreign investments for his country
Sites that remind Syrians of Assad brutality become sets for TV series
- Show to be aired in February during Ramadan, primetime viewing in the Arab world
DAMASCUS: At a Damascus air base once off-limits under Bashar Assad, a crew films a TV series about the final months of the ousted leader’s rule as seen through the eyes of a Syrian family.
“It’s hard to believe we’re filming here,” director Mohamad Abdul Aziz said from the Mazzeh base, which was once also a notorious detention center run by Assad’s air force intelligence branch, known for its terrible cruelty.
The site in the capital’s southwestern suburbs “used to be a symbol of military power. Now we are making a show about the fall of that power,” he said.
Assad fled to Russia as an opposition-led offensive closed in on Damascus, taking it without a fight on Dec. 8 last year after nearly 14 years of civil war and half a century of Assad dynasty rule.
The scene at the Mazzeh base depicts the escape of a figure close to Assad, and is set to feature in “The King’s Family” filmed in high-security locations once feared by regular Syrians.
The series is to be aired in February during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, primetime viewing in the Arab world, when channels and outlets vie for the attention of eager audiences.
Dozens of actors, directors and other show business figures who were opposed to Assad have returned to Syria since his ouster, giving the local industry a major boost, while other series have also chosen to film at former military or security sites.
“It’s a strange feeling ... The places where Syria used to be ruled from have been transformed” into creative spaces, Abdul Aziz said.
Elsewhere in Damascus, his cameras and crew now fill offices at the former military intelligence facility known as Palestine Branch, where detainees once underwent interrogation so brutal that some never came out alive.
“Palestine Branch was one of the pillars of the security apparatus — just mentioning its name caused terror,” Abdul Aziz said of the facility, known for torture and abuse.
Outside among charred vehicles, explosions and other special effects, the team was recreating a scene depicting “the release of detainees when the security services collapsed,” he said.
Thousands of detainees were freed when jails were thrown open as Assad fell last year, and desperate Syrians converged on the facilities in search of loved ones who disappeared into the prison system, thousands of whom are still missing.
Assad’s luxurious, high-security residence, which was stormed and looted after he fled to Russia, is also part of the new series.
Abdul Aziz said he filmed a fight scene involving more than 150 people and gunfire in front of the residence in Damascus’s upscale Malki district.
“This was impossible to do before,” he said.
The series’ scriptwriter Maan Sakbani, 35, expressed cautious relief that the days of full-blown censorship under Assad were over.
The new authorities’ Information Ministry still reviews scripts but the censor’s comments on “The King’s Family” were very minor, he said from a traditional Damascus house where the team was discussing the order of scenes.
Sakbani said he was uncertain how long the relative freedom would last, and was waiting to see the reaction to the Ramadan productions once they were aired.
Several other series inspired by the Assad era are also planned for release at that time, including “Enemy Syrians,” which depicts citizens living under the eyes of the security services.
Another, “Going Out to the Well,” directed by Mohammed Lutfi and featuring several prominent Syrian actors, is about deadly prison riots in the infamous Saydnaya facility in 2008.
Rights group Amnesty International had called the facility a “human slaughterhouse.”
“The show was written more than two years ago and we intended to film it before Assad’s fall,” Lutfi said.
But several actors feared the former authorities’ reaction and they were unable to find a suitable location since filming in Syria was impossible.
Now, they plan to film on site.
“The new authorities welcomed the project and provided extensive logistical support and facilities for filming inside Saydnaya prison,” Lutfi said.
As a result, it will be possible “to convey the prisoners’ suffering and the regime’s practices — from the inside the actual location,” he said.
