Ahmet Davutoğlu

However, I will today dwell upon Professor Ahmet Davutoğlu as the new foreign minister because foreign politics is my area of interest, and I am interested in Davutoğlu’s different personality.

It is a fact that Davutoğlu is an intellectual and makes a great deal of conceptual contributions to foreign policy as an academic as well as an effective and eligible adviser to Turkish foreign politics.

I am delighted to have conversations with him on occasions. Davutoğlu’s approach to questions that are quite outrageous for him is extremely moderate.

***

If I may express this through his notions, Turkey follows a "multi-center" foreign policy and has a "central" position in its region in a way to have individual and direct contacts with each country.

It is voiced quite often that such policy has saved Turkey from the U.S. furrow so to speak. I, in the new period, will follow Davutoğlu especially on some points that I have trouble understanding.

***

I am a "result-oriented" person. And I look at things in this perspective.

1) I think "multi-center" foreign policy has become a foreign policy with no direction. I am having a hard time understanding which direction our foreign policy is taking Turkey. Of course, Turkey should have friendly ties with its neighbors, but we should still drop an anchor to the European Union membership. What kind of a foreign policy does Davutoğlu follow? For instance, will he encourage the opening of Turkish sea and airports to ships and airplanes from southern Cyprus?

2) We often hear of Turkey’s role as a broker between Syria and Israel, but we see nothing. What kind of solid results do we expect in the upcoming term?

3) The objective has been set as to transform Hezbollah and Hamas in order to include them in the international community. For that, these two organizations should lay down arms and stop terror. But so far we have supported them to have benefits in the West. There is no solid result in the end. Will we see a transformation in Hezbollah and Hamas similar to that of al-Fatah in the new period?

4) Iran and Syria want to have direct relations with the United States. Saudi Arabia and Egypt have ties with U.S. and the EU already. So what does "being a central country" in the Middle East mean other than being a mediator between Hamas-Hezbollah and the West?

5) Establishing friendly ties with Armenia should be at the cost of losing Azerbaijan. How will Turkey set the balance?

6) Both Russia and the United States have different Caucasus policies. To whom will Turkey be closer in the Caucasus?

7) Will be Davutoğlu willing to involve the Turkish Armed Forces, or TSK, to assist the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq? Will the TSK become a protector in northern Iraq? For such protection, how will we re-gain "our Kurds" that the AKP has lost already? For instance, will we declare "partial amnesty" for the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, terrorists in order to make them lay down arms?

8) Afghanistan and Pakistan are about to be lost. To what degree will Turkey support the United States in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region?

9) Since we are to follow a foreign policy independent from the United States, why is Davutoğlu’s U.S. visit being praised so much?