Editorial of the “World”. What does Recep Tayyip Erdogan play? While the Turkish president’s relations with his NATO partners and with European Union (EU) countries are already quite tumultuous, he is running the risk of further deterioration by threatening to expel ten ambassadors in post in Ankara, including those from France, Germany and the United States.
On Saturday 23 October, Mr. Erdogan declared that he had “ordered” his foreign minister to declare persona non grata the ambassadors of ten countries – United States, Germany, France, Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, Sweden , Canada, Norway, New Zealand. He accuses these countries of having signed, on October 18, a joint appeal for the release of businessman and philanthropist Osman Kavala, accused of having sought to overthrow the government and kept in pre-trial detention for four years.
Mr. Erdogan sees this call as interference in Turkish internal affairs. However, the signatories only echoed a decision of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) which, in December 2019, ordered the “Immediate release” of Mr. Kavala, improperly detained according to her. Turkey is a founding member of the Council of Europe, from which the ECHR emerged.
Currency crisis
If Recep Tayyip Erdogan goes through with this threat, formulated for the second time on Sunday, the ambassadors will be forced to leave Turkey. Would the Turkish president shoot himself in the foot? Decide to dismiss ten ambassadors at once, seven of whom represent countries allied to his in NATO, it is to risk opening a diplomatic crisis in the run-up to the G20 summit in Rome, where he hoped to meet with US President Joe Biden.
Anxious to promote Turkey’s geopolitical role, Mr. Erdogan has never been so isolated. Mr. Biden, who divides the world into democracies against autocracies, does not have the enthusiasm of his predecessor, Donald Trump, for him, and has instead avoided it so far. Its relations with the EU, and in particular with France, which has just concluded a defense pact with Greece, are complicated; the tensions caused by Ankara in the Eastern Mediterranean in 2020 and its role in Libya, where Turkey brought in mercenaries from Syria, have not improved the image of the president. And his rapprochement with Vladimir Putin, who provided him with S-400 air defense systems, much to NATO’s chagrin, seems to be cut short: their last meeting, in Sochi, in September, was brief and ended. without a joint press conference.
Such a diplomatic crisis, in particular with its European trading partners, would also risk precipitating Turkey further into the monetary crisis. The national currency, which has lost nearly 25% of its value against the dollar since the start of the year, depreciates a little more every day. Three governors of its central bank were sacked between 2019 and 2021. Inflation is on the rise, household purchasing power is collapsing.
It is perhaps there that one must seek the source of this latest madness of President Erdogan: the opposition suspects him of seeking, by playing on antagonism with the United States and the EU, to create a diversion on the internal economic crisis and its growing unpopularity, as confirmed by polls. This would be a very short-sighted calculation. Mr Erdogan can no longer afford the luxury of multiplying crises.