The basic question was simple, Are We at War? Will Russia win? What’s the consequence for Europe if Russia wins? What is the European Union willingness to defend the Ukraine and willingness to mobilize Europe to go to war? If we are at war, then what is the strategy? How do we win?

The illustrious group agreed, if we are at war that than in cyber, we are at war. Cyberwars have no beginning and no end. Cyber has no boundary.

But besides cyber the war in the trenches continues, casualties on both sides are piling up. A culture of strategic exhaustion is adopted by both sides. This is neither new nor revolutionary. New is the tactical glass battlefield. Both sides see what the other side is planning. Deception does again become important. The killing becomes routine sort of a mechanical, tragic but a sideshow. We are at war.

Since we are now accepting war is the currency of today, what is the strategy for the near-term future? The lunch group conclusion is that four main strategies apply.

We Are At War!

Accepting Europeans facing a peer adversary with a history of violence, brutality, violations of human rights and disregard for the protection of culture and its humanity. The consequence of Russia beating the Ukraine is a strategic defeat for the European idea. The concept of war is abstract for Europeans. It’s bizarre. It is violent, destructive, and revolting to the senses. However, it must be done. As it was done to destroy the German war machine the Russian needs defeating. A war of attrition must be applied.

Beat Russia!

…and its allies near and far. Decisive and strategic. The strategy is simple. The objective out of textbooks. The attacker must be defeated. On all fronts. Wherever the Russians are a threat, the Russians must be defeated. The Russian nuclear fleet must be scuttled. The Airforce must be destroyed. Strategic commando operations must cripple the defense industry. No more hiding behind the Ural, out of reach. The Russian army is within reach!

The Ukrainian foreign minister said recently, ‘Every city, village, town the Ukrainian army surrenders is closer to your homes. Peace in Europe is over!’ The Russians must be beaten!

Russian Surrenders!

We except the surrender of the Russian forces. Unconditionally and immediate. A process of returning the territories occupied will be agreed on. A conditional process of surrendering of the war cabinet and incorporation of a peaceful transition will be initiated. Peace returns. But Russia must be defeated!

What’s Next?

The current conditions are closely watched by near peer rising challengers to the new hegemon, the European Union. The United States is largely a subservient client state of Europe and in the orbit of China, Turkey, with emerging Africa and states in Asia.

The United States are embroidered in an ideological dispute between the Republican and the Democratic parties for years to come. The political climate is a mouth service and serves the U.S. interest first and foremost. The newly rise of a new player on the scene is seen with mistrust within Washington power circles and Russians playbook operations. To off balance the distrust for Kyiv is bizarrely matched with Russian ambitions to bring the U.S. power circles closer to Moscow. If the Trump administration beliefs he brings ‘peace in our times’ he is mistaken.

However, the power brokers in Washington forget foreign relationships are born out of necessity rather than ambitions. Hence regardless of who is on the lever of power in the U.S. congress the long term relations with the Russian Federation are determined in a bilateral fashion.

We are on the verge of a multi-conflict ranging across Europe, embattling Asia, unhinging Africa. The evil forces may not be as evident as they are present, but the ideological battle is present. For years forces of moderation in the Islamic world gave lip services to the moderate European or American forces. Now a battle between good and evil is emerging.

by Marc Dubois

The post War in Europe: Reading the tea leaf’s, hearing the warnings & ignoring the obvious appeared first on Ankara Haftalik.

Türkiye ranks first in the world with 17.1 cigarettes per capita per day, followed by its neighbor Greece with 15.7 cigarettes, while this rate is 15.5 in Israel, 15.5 in Japan and 15.4 in Austria, the report said.

Meanwhile, a “Tobacco Control Plan 2018-2023” report highlights that at least one out of every four people in the total population aged 15 years and above in Türkiye smokes. According to this ratio, nearly 20 million people in the country are regular smokers.

This sobering statistic sheds light on the pervasive smoking culture in the country and emphasizes the importance of promoting a healthier lifestyle to society.

Around 2 billion people worldwide are addicted to cigarettes and other tobacco products. While trends show smoking to be on the decline globally, electronic cigarettes and vapes, advertised as an alternative to smoking regular cigarettes, are on the rise, especially among those of younger ages.

Experts warn that the chemicals in electronic cigarettes, which are perceived to be less harmful than cigarettes, are at least as harmful as those found in cigarette smoke and advise quitting rather than seeking different methods to stop smoking.

Consequently, the World Health Organization (WHO) has called for urgent action to control the use of electronic cigarettes in order to minimize harm to public health.

Source: Hurriyet Daily News

The post Türkiye ranks first in cigarettes smoked: Report appeared first on Ankara Haftalik.

The European Union and Aga Khan Foundation Partner for Rural Development in Tajikistan

High in the mountains of Central Asia, villagers can only dream of easy access to water for drinking and irrigation, as the river waters glisten in the snaking valleys below.  That dream is about to become a reality as the European Union and the private, not-for-profit Aga Khan Foundation team together to promote agricultural development and improve access to clean and safe drinking water in Tajikistan’s Zarafshonvalley, a region characterized by mountain ranges with peaks reaching 4,000 – 5,000 meters high. The EU and Aga Khan Foundation have provided €16.6 million to support the INVEST Rural Development Program, which aims to address the challenges faced by the residents of the Zarafshonvalley, one of the poorest regions in Central Asia.

Situated in the Sughd region of far western Tajikistan, the picturesque Zarafshon valley features a unique geography with one of Central Asia’s longest glaciers, and a history of human habitation going back far into antiquity. This topography presents significant challenges in terms of infrastructure development, access to essential resources, and agricultural productivity.

The INVEST Rural Development Program focuses on enhancing agricultural productivity, promoting sustainable land management practices, and improving access to essential resources such as water and energy. The program is designed to foster economic growth, social inclusion, and environmental sustainability in the region.

One of the primary challenges faced by the residents of the Zarafshon Valley is the lack of access to clean and safe drinking water. The region’s water resources are limited, and many households do not have direct access to reliable water supply systems. This issue is further exacerbated by aging infrastructure, the impacts of climate change, and the region’s mountainous terrain.

The Aga Khan Foundation has played an instrumental role in the implementation of the INVEST Rural Development Program, working closely with local communities and authorities to ensure the project’s success. The AKF has a long history of engagement in Central Asia, focusing on community-driven development initiatives that address the unique challenges faced by the region.

Drawing on AKF’s long-standing relationships with mountain communities through its Mountain Societies Development Support Programme, as well as the targeted expertise of the Aga Khan Agency for Habitat (AKAH) and Aga Khan Health Services (AKHS), the INVEST program will take a multi-sectoral approach to strengthen the sustainable management and protection of natural resources, boost food security and nutrition, and improve living standards. Through a partnership with a non-commercial, local cooperative, Sarob, the program will also provide specialized agricultural support. Together, the project aims to reach more than 380,000 people in Zarafshon Valley over five years.

Throughout the first year of the project, INVEST will introduce and implement a variety of locally led development activities, including forest and pastureland restoration, organizing permaculture activities for local schools, constructing greenhouses and chicken coops, distributing seeds, connecting homes with drinking water and building public toilets.

“The implementation of this project, covering more than €16.6 million, is a significant incentive for us to develop rural areas, in particular improving the living conditions of the population and the economic and social progress of the Zarafshon Valley,”Anwar Yakubi, Deputy Governor of the Sughd Province, said.

AKF, the EU, and partners will work closely with the Government of Tajikistan to implement the project, supporting its recent reforms in the agricultural and water sectors. Representatives from the government, AKF, AKAH, AKHS and the EU inaugurated the program on February 8, 2023 at the launch meeting in Dushanbe.  “The EU is honored to be working with the government in supporting national efforts towards developing the rural area and supporting agrarian reforms,” saidZulfiyaDavlatbekova, representative of the EU. “Increasing the performance of agriculture and building the resilience of rural populations will contribute to better incomes of the most vulnerable rural households, especially women and children. The European Union has provisioned €94 million in support to Tajikistan’s local communities, to be implemented in 2016-2025.”

Source : Asia-Plus

The post Tajikistan Villages Receive Water Relief appeared first on Ankara Haftalik.

It falls 100 years after the foundation of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk’s secular republic and, if Erdoğan wins, he will be empowered to put even more of his stamp on the trajectory of a geostrategic heavyweight of 85 million people. The fear in the West is that he will see this as his moment to push toward an increasingly religiously conservative model, characterized by regional confrontationalism, with greater political powers centered around himself.

The election will weigh heavily on security in Europe and the Middle East. Who is elected stands to define: Turkey’s role in the NATO alliance; its relationship with the U.S., the EU and Russia; migration policy; Ankara’s role in the war in Ukraine; and how it handles tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean.

The May 14 vote is expected to be the most hotly contested race in Erdoğan’s 20-year rule — as the country grapples with years of economic mismanagement and the fallout from a devastating earthquake.

He will face an opposition aligned behind Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, nicknamed the “Turkish Gandhi,” who is promising big changes. Polls suggest Kılıçdaroğlu has eked out a lead, but Erdoğan is a hardened election campaigner, with the full might of the state and its institutions at his back.

“There will be a change from an authoritarian single-man rule, towards a kind of a teamwork, which is a much more democratic process,” Ünal Çeviköz, chief foreign policy adviser to Kılıçdaroğlu told POLITICO. “Kılıçdaroğlu will be the maestro of that team.”

Here are the key foreign policy topics in play in the vote:

EU and Turkish accession talks

Turkey’s opposition is confident it can unfreeze European Union accession talks — at a standstill since 2018 over the country’s democratic backsliding — by introducing liberalizing reforms in terms of rule of law, media freedoms and depoliticization of the judiciary.

The opposition camp also promises to implement European Court of Human Rights decisions calling for the release of two of Erdoğan’s best-known jailed opponents: the co-leader of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party Selahattin Demirtaş and human rights defender Osman Kavala.

“This will simply give the message to all our allies, and all the European countries, that Turkey is back on track to democracy,” Çeviköz said.

Even under a new administration, however, the task of reopening the talks on Turkey’s EU accession is tricky.

Anti-Western feeling in Turkey is very strong across the political spectrum, argued Wolfango Piccoli, co-founder of risk analysis company Teneo.

“Foreign policy will depend on the coherence of the coalition,” he said. “This is a coalition of parties who have nothing in common apart from the desire to get rid of Erdoğan. They’ve got a very different agenda, and this will have an impact in foreign policy.”

“The relationship is largely comatose, and has been for some time, so, they will keep it on life support,” he said, adding that any new government would have so many internal problems to deal with that its primary focus would be domestic.

Europe also seems unprepared to handle a new Turkey, with a group of countries — most prominently France and Austria — being particularly opposed to the idea of rekindling ties.

“They are used to the idea of a non-aligned Turkey, that has departed from EU norms and values and is doing its own course,” said Aslı Aydıntaşbaş a visiting fellow at Brookings. “If the opposition forms a government, it will seek a European identity and we don’t know Europe’s answer to that; whether it could be accession or a new security framework that includes Turkey.”

“Obviously the erosion of trust has been mutual,” said former Turkish diplomat Sinan Ülgen, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Europe think tank, arguing that despite reticence about Turkish accession, there are other areas where a complementary and mutually beneficiary framework could be built, like the customs union, visa liberalization, cooperation on climate, security and defense, and the migration agreement.

The opposition will indeed seek to revisit the 2016 agreement with the EU on migration, Çeviköz said.

“Our migration policy has to be coordinated with the EU,” he said. “Many countries in Europe see Turkey as a kind of a pool, where migrants coming from the east can be contained and this is something that Turkey, of course cannot accept,” he said but added. “This doesn’t mean that Turkey should open its borders and make the migrants flow into Europe. But we need to coordinate and develop a common migration policy.”

NATO and the US

After initially imposing a veto, Turkey finally gave the green light to Finland’s NATO membership on March 30.

But the opposition is also pledging to go further and end the Turkish veto on Sweden, saying that this would be possible by the alliance’s annual gathering on July 11. “If you carry your bilateral problems into a multilateral organization, such as NATO, then you are creating a kind of a polarization with all the other members of NATO with your country,” Çeviköz said.

A reelected Erdoğan could also feel sufficiently empowered to let Sweden in, many insiders argue. NATO allies did, after all, play a significant role in earthquake aid. Turkish presidential spokesperson İbrahim Kalın says that the door is not closed to Sweden, but insists the onus is on Stockholm to determine how things proceed.

Turkey’s military relationship with the U.S. soured sharply in 2019 when Ankara purchased the Russian-made S-400 missile system, a move the U.S. said would put NATO aircraft flying over Turkey at risk. In response, the U.S. kicked Ankara out of the F-35 jet fighter program and slapped sanctions on the Turkish defense industry.

A meeting in late March between Kılıçdaroğlu and the U.S. Ambassador to Ankara Jeff Flake infuriated Erdoğan, who saw it as an intervention in the elections and pledged to “close the door” to the U.S. envoy. “We need to teach the United States a lesson in this elections,” the irate president told voters.

In its policy platform, the opposition makes a clear reference to its desire to return to the F-35 program.

Russia and the war in Ukraine

After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Turkey presented itself as a middleman. It continues to supply weapons — most significantly Bayraktar drones — to Ukraine, while refusing to sanction Russia. It has also brokered a U.N. deal that allows Ukrainian grain exports to pass through the blockaded Black Sea.

Highlighting his strategic high-wire act on Russia, after green-lighting Finland’s NATO accession and hinting Sweden could also follow, Erdoğan is now suggesting that Turkey could be the first NATO member to host Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Maybe there is a possibility” that Putin may travel to Turkey on April 27 for the inauguration of the country’s first nuclear power reactor built by Russian state nuclear energy company Rosatom, he said.

Çeviköz said that under Kılıçdaroğlu’s leadership, Turkey would be willing to continue to act as a mediator and extend the grain deal, but would place more stress on Ankara’s status as a NATO member.

“We will simply emphasize the fact that Turkey is a member of NATO, and in our discussions with Russia, we will certainly look for a relationship among equals, but we will also remind Russia that Turkey is a member of NATO,” he said.

Turkey’s relationship with Russia has become very much driven by the relationship between Putin and Erdoğan and this needs to change, Ülgen argued.

“No other Turkish leader would have the same type of relationship with Putin, it would be more distant,” he said. “It does not mean that Turkey would align itself with the sanctions; it would not. But nonetheless, the relationship would be more transparent.”

Syria and migration

The role of Turkey in Syria is highly dependent on how it can address the issue of Syrians living in Turkey, the opposition says.

Turkey hosts some 4 million Syrians and many Turks, battling a major cost-of-living crisis, are becoming increasingly hostile. Kılıçdaroğlu has pledged to create opportunities and the conditions for the voluntary return of Syrians.

“Our approach would be to rehabilitate the Syrian economy and to create the conditions for voluntary returns,” Çeviköz said, adding that this would require an international burden-sharing, but also establishing dialogue with Damascus.

Erdoğan is also trying to establish a rapprochement with Syria but Syrian President Bashar al-Assad says he will only meet the Turkish president when Ankara is ready to completely withdraw its military from northern Syria.

“A new Turkish government will be more eager to essentially shake hands with Assad,” said Ülgen. “But this will remain a thorny issue because there will be conditions attached on the side of Syria to this normalization.”

However, Piccoli from Teneo said voluntary returns of Syrians was “wishful thinking.”

“These are Syrians who have been living in Turkey for more than 10 years, their children have been going to school in Turkey from day one. So, the pledges of sending them back voluntarily, it is very questionable to what extent they can be implemented.”

Greece and the East Med

Turkey has stepped up its aggressive rhetoric against Greece in recent months, with the Erdoğan even warning that a missile could strike Athens.

But the prompt reaction by the Greek government and the Greek community to the recent devastating earthquakes in Turkey and a visit by the Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias created a new backdrop for bilateral relations.

Dendias, along with his Turkish counterpart Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, announced that Turkey would vote for Greece in its campaign for a non-permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council for 2025-26 and that Greece would support the Turkish candidacy for the General Secretariat of the International Maritime Organization.

In another sign of a thaw, Greek Defense Minister Nikos Panagiotopoulos and Migration Minister Notis Mitarachi visited Turkey this month, with Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar saying he hoped that the Mediterranean and Aegean would be a “sea of friendship” between the two countries. Akar said he expected a moratorium with Greece in military and airforce exercises in the Aegean Sea between June 15 and September 15.

“Both countries are going to have elections, and probably they will have the elections on the same day. So, this will open a new horizon in front of both countries,” Çeviköz said.

“The rapprochement between Turkey and Greece in their bilateral problems [in the Aegean], will facilitate the coordination in addressing the other problems in the eastern Mediterranean, which is a more multilateral format,” he said. Disputes over maritime borders and energy exploration, for example, are common.

As far as Cyprus is concerned, Çeviköz said that it is important for Athens and Ankara not to intervene into the domestic politics of Cyprus and the “two peoples on the island should be given an opportunity to look at their problems bilaterally.”

However, analysts argue that Greece, Cyprus and the EastMed are fundamental for Turkey’s foreign policy and not much will change with another government. The difference will be more one of style.

“The approach to manage those differences will change very much. So, we will not hear aggressive rhetoric like: ‘We will come over one night,’” said Ülgen. “We’ll go back to a more mature, more diplomatic style of managing differences and disputes.”

“The NATO framework will be important, and the U.S. would have to do more in terms of re-establishing the sense of balance in the Aegean,” said Aydıntaşbaş. But, she argued, “you just cannot normalize your relations with Europe or the U.S., unless you’re willing to take that step with Greece.”

Source: POLITICO

The post 2023’s most important election: Turkey appeared first on Ankara Haftalik.

Brussels (22/2 – 50)

The European Union’s plan to implement the EU Hybrid Toolbox (EUHT), which was launched last year, has received supports from the EU Parliament and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

The EUHT was launched in June 2022 with the intention to gather all civilian and military instruments that can be employed to counter hybrid threats. Hybrid threats combine military and non-military as well as covert and overt means, including disinformation, cyber-attacks, economic pressure, deployment of irregular armed groups and use of regular forces.

In 2016, the elections in the United States were manipulated by a foreign state actor through targeted propaganda and the leaking of hacked material that compromised one of the presidential candidates. In the same year, the British referendum on remaining in the European Union was also targeted by sophisticated propaganda efforts.

The recent European Parliament resolution supports the implementation of the common security and defence policy – annual report 2022, was issued on January 18. The parliament meeting’s notes state that there is a new urgency to boosting EU security and defence capabilities, including building on the unprecedented support for Ukraine which was most notably through the European Peace Facility (EPF) and ensuring complementarity with NATO. The European Parliament noted that on December 12, 2022, the Foreign Affairs Council decided to increase the overall financial ceiling of the EPF by EUR 2 billion in 2023, with the possibility of a further increase at a later stage.

The EU Council has initially intended to have the EUHT operationalization by the end of 2022 as the conflict in Ukraine demonstrated the importance of having a coordinated reaction capability to counter hybrid campaigns and is likely to provide the momentum to bring the development of the EUHT to fruition.

Russia’s hybrid aggression makes it necessary to design the defence of a free Europe in a comprehensive and multifaceted manner incorporating all critical areas, from the improvement of traditional military capacities to the protection of critical civilian infrastructure, supply chains and energy facilities, as well as the active fight against disinformation and cybersecurity threats. Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has also underlined the lack of investment in security and defence in numerous EU and NATO Member States.

Having deployed thousands of additional defensive land, air, and maritime forces to its eastern flank, NATO also supports the issuance of the EU Hybrid Toolbox, stating that its allies face threats and challenges from both state and non-state actors who use hybrid activities to target political institutions, influence public opinion and undermine the security of NATO citizens. NATO is also helping to coordinate requests for assistance on behalf of Ukraine, where the explosion damaging the Nord Stream gas pipelines was a targeted attack against the EU’s critical infrastructure.

NATO cited that hybrid methods of warfare, including propaganda, deception, sabotage and other non-military tactics, have been used to destabilize adversaries. However, in the recent years, the attacks have seen more speed, scale and intensity, due to the rapid technological change and global interconnectivity.

The EU already have many options for the EU Hybrid Toolbox implementation, such as the Cyber Diplomacy Toolbox, but the main challenge will be to enable a fast and coherent response. The EU Hybrid Toolbox would allow hybrid threats to be dealt with in a coordinated fashion with the full force of the EU’s power as soon as possible rather than when they have turned into a full-fledged crisis. This would also position the EU more strongly as a global partner for countering attacks on the international order.

The post European Parliament, NATO supports Hybrid Toolbox appeared first on Ankara Haftalik.

After a year since it invaded Ukraine, now Russia is in the brink of massive loss. On February 7, 2023, Kyiv claimed that Russian forces have suffered their deadliest day so far. Ukrainian military increased running tally of Russian military deaths from 1,030 overnight to 133,190. On the other side of the war, Russia claimed they had inflicted 6,500 Ukrainian casualties in January. Although this figure cannot be independently verified, it gives widespread skepticism of significant Russian success. 

The fatalities proved that NATO and the western countries’ assistance to Ukraine worked. Not only were they sending heavy weaponry and ammunition in end 2022, European Union (EU) countries also injected 52 billion euros into military, financial and humanitarian aid. Germany has become the largest donor country in Europe to the Ukrainians.  

“Until now, the EU’s support to Ukraine since the start of the war has always lagged behind that of the United States. This has changed in recent weeks, as the total value of EU commitments now exceeds those of the U.S. The large new EU pledges are a welcome development, given the major role of this war for European security,” says Christoph Trebesch, head of the team producing the Ukraine Support Tracker.  

EU supports also came in the form of sanctions against Russia. Since the invasion on 24 February 2022, EU has adopted nine packages of sanctions, which included individual sanctions, economic sanctions and diplomatic measures. Major Russian banks also have been removed from the international financial messaging system Swift (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) which in turn impacted and delayed payments to Russia for its oil and gas exports. 

Growing support provided by EU for Ukraine exacerbates Russia’s current situation. Mikhail Zvinchuk, a former Kremlin military press official and creator of Rybar Telegram channel stated on a Russian TV show, shared on his Twitter account @wartranslated at the end of January, that the Airborne Forces lost “40-50 percent of its staff” between February and September 2022.

As a follow up to massive loss and current failures, it is predicted that Russian President Vladimir Putin is preparing for second part of mobilization to be deployed in major offensive around spring-summer 2023. Based on the report signed by Vadym Skibitsky, deputy head of Ukrainian military intelligence, 300,000 to 500,000 Russian troops would be in addition to the hundreds of thousands of conscripts drafted during the fall campaign in late 2022. 

According to Ukrainian news portal, Pravda, Russian total loss until 9 February includes: 

• approximately 135,010 military personnel, 
• 3,255 tanks, 
• 6,468 armored combat vehicles, 
• 2,244 artillery systems, 
• 463 multiple-launch rocket systems, 
• 232 air defence systems, 
• 295 fixed-wing aircraft, 
• 285 helicopters
• 1,967 operational-tactical UAVs, 
• 796 cruise missiles  

Unfortunately, there is no sign that the war is coming to an end and Moscow certainly will do whatever it takes for victory on the battlefield. It also has an objective to pit NATO members against each other. Turkey already rejects the idea to accept Sweden’s NATO membership bid for harboring Kurdish millitants after bloody coup attempt against President Erdogan in 2016. And Russia sees this as an opportunity to stir discord. 

Sweden believed that Moscow is behind the Quran-burning stunt committed by Rasmus Paludan. Swedish foreign minister insisted this played directly into Russia’s hands while, Finland’s former prime minister, Alexander Stubb suggested that Russia might have been behind the Quran burning incident and warned of hybrid warfare tactics. Paludan, an anti-Islam activist who is holds both Danish and Swedish citizenship also reportedly burnt the Quran in April 2022. He repeated his vile act in front of Turkey’s embassy in Stockholm on January 21, 2023.  

Paludan later confirmed to Swedish media that the idea to burn the Quran was proposed to him by Chang Frick, a 39-year-old pro-Putin Russian journalist who also guaranteed that any damage costs that Paludan could sustain as a result of this protest will be covered. Frick confirmed that he paid for Paludan but claimed he did not believe that the protest had jeopardised Sweden’s NATO application. 

The post Russia’s Futile Attempt to Defeat Ukraine appeared first on Ankara Haftalik.