It is inappropriate for a leader of a small neighboring nation, who has been officially pronounced by Moscow as a "political corpse," to remain in power. As the Georgian opposition was gathering force, the Russian military were already on the move. The Russian Black Sea Fleet left Sevastopol, Crimea in force, lead by its flagship missile cruiser "Moskva." The Georgian Foreign Minister Grigol Vashadze accused Russia of "continuing aggressive policies" by deploying warships and reinforcing its troops in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Vashadze expressed the hope that Russia "will not dare a new aggression against Georgia, since this will put it against the entire civilized world" (Novosti-Gruzia, April 11). Russian military officials said that the deployment of troops and warships was part of routine military exercises, while the Georgian reaction was described as "hysterical and provocative" (RIA-Novosti, April 11, 13).
It is important that the Russian military acknowledges its mobilization and forward deployment of troops and ships. At present, it is impossible to know precisely how many additional army units have been moved within striking distance of Georgian territory. However, the composition of the naval force that disembarked from Sevastopol is not secret, since the Ukrainian authorities must be informed. It seems to be larger than the force that was deployed against Georgia last August. Four large amphibious landing craft left Sevastopol last week, while in August 2008 only two were reportedly deployed to insert a regiment of marines into Abkhazia in the small port of Ochamchira, close to the border with Georgia (Vlast, August 18). The marines were later deployed in the invasion of Western Georgia.
Before the war in August, the Georgian navy was small, armed only with old ships and not ready for serious action. First Deputy Defense Minister Batu Kutelia (now Georgia's ambassador in Washington) told EDM last November that all seaworthy Georgian navy ships were moved at the start of the war from their main base in Poti, and relocated south to Batumi. The Russian navy announced it sunk a Georgian "missile ship" during a naval encounter after it attempted to attack the Black Sea flotilla (Interfax, August 10).
Kutelia says the Georgian Defense Ministry denies knowledge of such an encounter. Georgia did have two small guided missile ships: an old Soviet vessel "Tbilisi" and an even older French-build ship "Dioskuria." Both were left stranded in Poti and sunk in port by the occupying Russian army. Recently the wreckage of these ships has been auctioned off for $61,000 for salvage as scrap metal to clear the Poti harbor (Interfax, April 3). In the view of the Georgian Ministry of Defense, the naval encounter reported by the Russian navy last August was either a propaganda ploy, or simply a delusion.
After the war, Georgia disbanded its navy, handing over its surviving ships to the local coast guard. The Russian naval flotilla lead by "Moskva" will not find any opposition at sea, but the deployment of a large amphibious force formed of thousands of marines armed with heavy weapons on board is a threatening sight. The low capacity narrow roads leading from Russia into Georgia (one into Abkhazia and another leading into South Ossetia) create immense logistical problems in rapidly deploying large military contingents into Georgia if Moscow opts for a "humanitarian intervention" to bring about "regime change." The insertion of a sizable marine force with heavy weapons was used last August to bypass the clogged up overland routes and this could prove important again. The Russian military knew beforehand the exact timing of its pre-arranged invasion and fully controlled the pre-war armed provocations by the South Ossetian forces, whereas in the present crisis the situation is much more volatile.
Saakashvili and his ministers have been expressing confidence that the present Russian military deployments are a game of bluff, and that Moscow will not risk an attack that hinders the "resetting" of its relations with Washington (Novosti-Gruzia, April 2). But from Moscow's perspective only a tacit acceptance by the United States of Russia's dominance of the South Caucasus and control of energy transit routes from the Caspian and Central Asia is a prerequisite of any "reset." Washington's acceptance of Russia's dominance over these regions might be the unspoken precondition for a genuine improvement in bilateral relations.
--Pavel Felgenhauer
Moldovan authorities have handled the situation unprofessionally, at times in panic, and often in ways damaging to their own case. Dozens of youths were severely injured in beatings -with two death cases reported- while in police custody after the riots. Police arrested at least 200 demonstrators irrespective of whether they had participated in the violence and arson or not; the identification process was slow and remains far from complete.
Police and law enforcement agencies revealed their lack of professionalism on four counts: an absence of advance intelligence about the protests (although the authorities now assume that the riots were pre-planned) and had no contingency plans to deal with such a situation. The authorities displayed a lack of modern training in crowd-control. Wrongly positioned during the assault on the parliament and presidency buildings, and ordered by Voronin to refrain at all cost from using force, the police allowed themselves to be stoned and beaten by rioters, then simply left the scene when the fires were raging. According to official data 272 injured policemen required medical assistance, including 56 who were hospitalized (42 were still in hospital as of April 13), 37 of whom required surgery (Moldpres, April 14). Some of the injured policemen's comrades then vented their outrage by beating some of the arrested youths during the following days. Even post-factum, the law enforcement and internal intelligence agencies failed to provide Moldova's political leadership with adequate information and analysis, leaving the leadership to speculate about hidden factors behind these events.
In several addresses to the country and officially reported government meetings, President Vladimit Voronin has characterized the riots as an anti-state putsch aiming to derail Moldova from its European orientation and undermine its statehood. Significantly, Voronin has stopped short of charging that the goal was to seize power; rather, he interprets the riots as designed to provoke disproportionate repression, thwart the opening of the new parliament, and divide Moldova and the EU (Moldovan TV, Moldpres, April 8 - 14).
Voronin and other Moldovan officials have greatly exaggerated the Romanian irredentism factor in the riots. Nevertheless, Romanian President Traian Basescu's April 14 speech in the Romanian parliament unwittingly supplied some grist to Voronin's mill in that regard. More tactlessly even than on previous occasions, Basescu characterized all Moldovans in blanket fashion as Romanians (although only few identify themselves as such); promised further state support by for boosting Romanian national sentiment in Moldova; and offered (despite long-standing EU objections) to initiate mass-distribution of Romanian passports for Moldova's citizens (Rompres, April 14). Responding in a relatively more measured tone the next day, Voronin was able to claim that he now felt somewhat vindicated in his belief that Bucharest had helped orchestrate the riots (Moldpres, April 15).
The authorities maintain that the April 7 assault and arson had been planned in advance as an anti-state putsch (Moldpres, Moldovan Public TV, April 7 - 15). They have not adduced any evidence of it thus far; and their thesis seems implausible, given what looked like the spontaneous dynamics of the events on the ground. But the opposition leaders are involuntarily playing into the authorities' hands with even more implausible accusations that agents of the authorities invaded and set fire to the presidency and parliament buildings.
Voronin's orders to the police to yield to rioters if necessary for avoiding bloodshed, "lives are more precious than buildings," he said, is consistent with two major decisions he had taken earlier in his career. In November 1989, as internal affairs minister of Soviet Moldova, Voronin refused to shoot demonstrators who were attacking and setting fire to several floors of the Internal Affairs Ministry in Chisinau. On that occasion Voronin overruled the orders to shoot, relayed from the USSR Internal Affairs Ministry to the Moldovan Ministry. In March 2002 as president of Moldova, Voronin allowed the Christian-Democrat People's Party (CDPP) full freedom to hold daily demonstrations for several consecutive weeks in central Chisinau against Communist-proposed legislation on language policy and related issues. Led by CDPP chairman Iurie Rosca, those protests were well organized and entirely peaceful; and Voronin took pride publicly in the fact that the police did not interfere with those demonstrations.
The political crisis seems narrowly confined to downtown Chisinau with its state institutions, political party headquarters, and those colleges and lyceums that supply protest demonstrators from time to time. Beyond Chisinau's center, however, the countryside, "the profound Moldova," remains apathetic and seemingly uninterested. There, opinion surveys consistently find Voronin and other leaders of the nominally Communist authorities topping the popularity ratings. Political parties as such are ranked at the very bottom in terms of public confidence.
Nevertheless, the Voronin and "Communist" brands no longer constitute a sufficient basis for durable stability in Moldova. Almost 40 percent of voters supported explicitly "anti-communist" parties in these elections (the three opposition parties that entered the new parliament received a total of 35 percent of the votes cast -Moldpres, April 12). New generational cohorts are coming of age, to whom Soviet nostalgia is irrelevant and its icon, Voronin, rather an irritant. In Chisinau itself, Romanian identity (not necessarily synonymous with Romanian "unionism") can only gain ground, relative to the Moldovan identity, among the young and educated.
The Moldovan mass-media, highly diverse politically but not independent, covered the riots and the political crisis in ways that range from the tendentious to the crudely partisan to inflammatory. Television channels controlled by the authorities reach the largest audiences with the official interpretation of events. The president and government are positioning themselves as guardians of order and stability against the threat of chaos. This tactic may well increase their already high popularity in the countryside. Meanwhile the opposition leaders tend to use circumlocution and understatement, instead of full and unambiguous condemnation of the April 7 assault. Thus the mantle of guardians of stability remains with the authorities by default.
The Moldovan president and government seek to resolve the crisis by working closely with the European Union and its institutions. Moldovan authorities, however, are handicapped in terms of communicating with international public opinion and media. The panicked authorities have interdicted the access of foreign journalists to the country after the April 7 riots. Partly for this reason, international media coverage of the riots and the political crisis is often informed by yesteryear's stereotypes ("color revolution" versus communists, West versus Russia) or their latest pop-style adaptation ("twitter revolution").
The European Union's Special Representative, Kalman Mizsei, has been working continuously in Chisinau to broker a political solution. Elements of such a solution would include cessation of abuses and criminal prosecutions by law-enforcement authorities and the opening of the new parliament. The three opposition parties -Liberal, Liberal-Democrat, and Our Moldova- would hold a respectable 41 seats out of 101 in the parliament.
Following his latest meeting with Mizsei on April 15, Voronin has announced an amnesty for those being detained or investigated in connection with the riots, excepting only those with prior criminal records. Voronin further announced that "self-styled politicians," presumed to have incited the riots, would not be prosecuted; instead, "voters would give their verdict." He has instructed the authorities to conduct a "transparent and correct investigation" in cooperation with a fact-finding team of the European Union, which Voronin has already invited to Chisinau and which is expected to arrive imminently (Moldovan TV, Moldpres, April 15).
Voronin had taken the initiative to invite such an EU team in his April 10 telephone conversation with the EU's High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, Javier Solana; and the EU responded positively three days later (European Council press release, April 13). The president has also invited Czech Acting Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek -representing the EU's incumbent Czech presidency- to arrive in Chisinau.
With these developments, and on the basis of the internationally recognized electoral outcome, Mizsei is calling on all the parties represented in the new parliament to engage in a conciliation process through dialogue. The EU's Special Representative will continue facilitating this process. The three opposition parties' leaders vacillate between this option and the alternative, which would be for them to force the holding of repeat elections, at unaffordable costs for crisis-hit Moldova and with an obvious risk of chaos.
--Vladimir Socor
Turkey's Chief of the General Staff, General Ilker Basbug, delivered a speech at the War Academies Command in Istanbul on April 14, addressing key issues including civil-military relations, national identity, the role of religion, and the fight against terrorism (EDM, April 15). The most surprising part of the speech was his progressive approach toward Turkey's Kurdish question. He redefined Turkey's long term exclusionist and nationalist outlook by referring to the founder of the modern Turkish state Mustafa Kemal Ataturk: "Turkey was founded by the peoples of Turkey, who are called the Turkish nation." He explained his reasons for selecting this lesser known quote: "Ataturk is not saying Turkey is founded by Turks but peoples of Turkey" (NTV, April 14). In addition, Basbug also stated that "terrorists are human too, we should find a way to reach out to their families...the state should consider finding new ways to bring the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) militants home by changing its existing legislation" (www.tsk.mil.tr, April 14).
Turkish commentators welcomed this new inclusive approach towards recognizing Kurdish identity as a separate group -though he avoided using the term "ethnic." Furthermore, his progressive attitude towards the necessity of an amnesty plan for PKK members in the mountains to return home, might facilitate the government's efforts to adopt positive policies on the Kurdish question (Milliyet, April 16).
The Turkish press reported that General Basbug's request for amnesty legislation is part of an existing plan first outlined during the last National Security Council meeting in March. According to this plan, the government wants to target the PKK's training camps in northern Iraq and then implement a new amnesty law (Aksam, April 16).
One possible element in this planning might be linked to the Turkish police operation on April 14, which detained around 40 suspected members of the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP). During the operation 27 addresses were raided by the police, including the homes of leading members of the DTP and the private Kurdish Gun TV channel in Diyarbakir. Among those taken into custody were: DTP former vice-chairman Selma Irmak, DTP vice-chairmen Kamuran Yuksek, Bayram Altun, Selma Irmak and the PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan's lawyers Seracettin Irmak, Ebru Gunay and Sinasi Tur, and the Batman municipality building director Heval Erdemli (www.bianet.org, April 14). The Turkish press also reported that the operation aimed at severing the ties between the imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan with the DTP and the PKK (Milliyet, April 16).
Responding to the operation, the DTP accused the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) of taking revenge over the recent local elections, in which the it inflicted a heavy defeat on the AKP -its only rival in the Kurdish region. One DTP Member of Parliament stated that the AKP had not been able to accept the local election results and was attacking the will of the Kurdish people (www.bianet.org, April 15).
In response the DTP and PKK launched a counter offensive strategy against these arrests. The mayor of Diyarbakir joined a demonstration in Diyarbakir where close to 10,000 people called on the prosecutors to release the detainees (24 TV, April 14, Yeni Safak, April 16). On the other hand, the PKK has attacked the military on April 15 and 16 and killed one soldier and wounded four others (Yeni Safak, Sabah, April 16).
In conjunction with these developments, Iraqi Vice President Tarik el-Hasimi released a surprising statement saying: "we either should stop the PKK's activities on Iraqi territory or we should allow Turkey to set up a temporary military base on Iraqi territory to let them do the job of cleansing the PKK militants from the Iraqi mountains" (Haberturk, April 16).
Interestingly, the pro-PKK news agency ANF reported earlier this month that Turkey has been preparing to build two military bases in Iraq: one in Diana, northern Iraq situated close to the PKK's strategically important camps of Hakurke and Hinere and another close to Ranya near the PKK's main camp in the Kandil Mountain (ANF News Agency, April 7).
Similarly, Kurdish leaders within northern Iraq have been preparing to organize a Kurdish conference in May calling for the PKK to end its campaign of violence. The PKK and the DTP has opposed the conference because they believe it aims to exclude the PKK from Kurdish politics (Taraf, April 14).
All these developments suggest this might be a critical year for Turkey's fight against the PKK. Despite the fact that Turkey has already successfully established an international coalition against the PKK and gained the support of the United States, the EU, Iran, Iraq, and even the Iraqi Kurdish Regional Government, military solutions have proven ineffective. Turkey not only needs a comprehensive and internationally acceptable plan but crucially it requires support from its Kurdish minority, in order to deny the PKK's continued grassroots platform.
--Emrullah Uslu
