Seeking peace and the future together in the "so-called" country

The 18th Stop of the Abant Platform, which has for some time acquired a roving character, was Erbil. Erbil is the capital of the Kurdistan entity in Northern Iraq, which is referred to as "so-called" in the discourse of Turkey's official foreign policy, which has diminished but has not yet been completely abandoned. When you come to Erbil you realize how ridiculous, how childish this designation is. Erbil and the Kurdistan entity around it are as real as day.

It is very hard to attribute to the horizon of a country that has ruled an empire a foreign policy that has ignored such a reality for so long by calling it "so-called." The worse side of the matter is that the "so-called" designation, beyond merely not recognizing a state politically or expressing a political stance against a particular state formation, can after a while point to a sociological blindness concerning the social and cultural structure of the region that threatens one's own security horizon. The ideological molds that have been in force for nearly a century in Turkey's domestic politics and that have blinded the state to the country's sociological realities have determined Turkey's Northern Iraq policy to the same degree. Yet this sociological blindness not only does not change the facts in the direction you want, but the insensitivity to the facts to which it condemns you brings no benefit, national or economic. Turkey's view of Northern Iraq has been shaped to a great extent under the pressure of its own Kurdish question, which has become a Gordian knot because of its own style of approach and its lack of politics. It relies on assessments that the establishment of a Kurdish state in Northern Iraq would also seduce the Kurds among us. When one thinks about it a little, one can see that for any center of power harboring hostility to both Turkey and the Kurds, no other weapon is needed to neutralize them at the same time; to see this, it is enough to travel for a day or two to Erbil, Sulaymaniyah, Dahuk.

Those who produced from Erbil and Sulaymaniyah a discourse of separatist threat to Turkey should in fact by all means be tried for making Turkey, and, not enough, even Turkishness, look ridiculous and for demeaning it. And of course those who, for so long, made their people adopt this needless phobia and prevented the acquaintance and solidarity of these societies, which are a true treasury of possibilities and values, should also be called to account for the material and moral damage of unimaginable proportions they have caused. A hundred years of experience should have taught well enough that building foreign policy (and indeed domestic policy) on a phobia of enmity flowing from all four sides will by its nature summon enmity from all four sides, and that in this way one later turns around and justifies oneself.

In fact, what teaches this better is the reality of how the concept of problem-free and dialogical relations with all four sides, adopted in recent years, has turned into a great source of power. Merely by changing its point of view, Turkey is living vivid examples of how looking with friendly eyes at neighbors, which until yesterday consumed its energy because they were enemies, turns them into a source of energy and power. Of course, the most important dimension of the point of view that needs to be changed is for everyone to honestly set out their own interests and to declare that they are willing to trade.

Trade is no shame; looking after one's own interest in trade is no shame at all.. On the contrary, every trade, as an economic transaction, increases the total economic product in favor of both sides. The increased product also increases the total power of both sides. For this, the sides need to understand one another, to talk, to listen to and hear one another.

In the Kurdistan region, which Turkey ignores by saying "so-called," Iran has opened its second consulate, and all countries are competing to establish de facto contact. From Erbil, by car, one reaches the Turkish border gate in two hours. But the Turkish border is regarded as closed because of Turkey's very heavy visa conditions.

In this region, where Turkish businessmen also have serious investments, the official point of view still lags far behind the rational horizon reached by civil and economic enterprise.

The Turkish schools operating here since 1994 have made Turkey a true center of attraction in terms of education. Since the quality of the schools is accepted by everyone, every kind of facility is provided by the administration. To the schools, whose number in two cities is ten, a university has recently been added too. For Işık University, opened this year, the state has allocated land, and great facilities are also being provided in its construction. In addition, a Turkish Language department has been opened within Salahaddin University, which also hosted the Abant meeting. We found a gap and visited. We had the chance to chat with Kurdish and Arab students learning Turkish. The students have a request to come to Turkish universities within the framework of an Erasmus-like agreement and improve their Turkish. A subsequent exchange program from Turkey within the same scope could be very meaningful. We promised to convey it to the YÖK officials. We are conveying it from here. If need be, we can also work together on the details, which would be very functional.

Interesting dialogues and discussions took place at Abant's meeting in Erbil. There is not much room left to relay the details, but let me convey an impression that I think most of those who attended from Turkey gained. The Turks are experiencing the clumsiness of perhaps entering into such a dialogue for the first time. When the naivety contained in expressions here and there of the "Turk's propaganda to the Kurd" kind, such as "we are brothers," "there is no difference between us," "we are like flesh and nail, like flesh and bone with each other," was met with a few critical questions, it appeared in all its nakedness that one cannot speak to the people of Northern Iraq as one speaks to the Kurds in Turkey. In Northern Iraq there is currently a formation that has made the central government accept its federative identity, whose existence is already recognized in the constitution, and which in this state can negotiate with the central government how the Iraq of the future will be shaped. These are not people who are still waiting from us for the right to speak Kurdish; for this reason they cannot make sense of the Turks' persistence in continuing to use the expression "Northern Iraq."

But thanks to these dialogues, languages are mutually corrected and mature, and the blessing of acquaintance seeps perceptibly into our world