Sunday, December 11, 2016

The Choice: Repent or Betray?

translated by Vox Populi Evo
Investigation by journalists of German newspaper “Contra Magazin” give some food for thought. The title of the article “Relations between Russia and Turkey: Is Ankara playing a double game?” is quite transparent.

Another investigation sheds light on connections between Turkish establishment with “Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People”, organization with extremist leanings. Despite that chilly period in Russo-Turkish relations has seemingly come to an end, support by Turkey of this (among others) extremist organization continues.
Journalists of “Contra Magazin” state that members of this exact organization “were the main driving force during blockade of Crimea in November of 2015, when power transmission lines delivering electricity to Crimea were blown up. Dzhemilev and his Bashi-bazouk have also taken part in terrorist acts and were also supported by Ankara for this long. Last year, the transatlantic relations of the Crimean Tatars, which also had cross-connections with Germany, became known.”
As proof, journalists provide documents, which confirm that “Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People” was financed by Turkish establishment. Some of the documents have already been translated to Russian, some are still in the process.


Besides all this, one has to ponder about the trajectory of strategic Russo-Turkish relations. We all remember how many times have Erdogan said, “My dear fried Vladimir” during his visits to Moscow. Besides the reputation of R. Erdogan, the relations with Europe, which are also not in the best shape, are also at the stake.

Contra Magazin: “Now we have to ask ourselves a question. How far is Erdogan willing to go to improve his relations with Moscow, given Ankara’s support of these forces? Today, relations with the West have reached the lowest point in history, and not a day goes by without Western mass media heavily criticizing Erdogan and his course of action. This was not the case before relations with Moscow were soured. Even though human rights abuses and restrictions on the freedom of the press have been criticized on multiple occasions, support of Crimean Tatars and “Grey Wolves” were not really a problem in the eyes of Western media, and continue to be ignored to this day”.
Can one expect some reaction from Moscow and hope that Russian media will pick up on the documents provided by German journalists?

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