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Rome conference: Turkeys 5 conditions to play a major role in Lebanon peace force |
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Written by AB Haber
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Wednesday, 26 July 2006 04:53 |
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FM Gul will express Turkey's readiness to do its utmost to contain Mideast crisis, including playing major role in new peacekeeping force. According to Turkish officials, Ankara has following conditions: Immediate cease-fire, consensus within parties of conflict on mission, composition of force, intl legitimacy with strong UN mandate. While Israel says it can accept NATO deployment, which would include combat teams with disarmament mission, Turkish officials point out possible problems. 'We should bear in mind strong anti-Western ideas here, which puts possible NATO mission under great risks,' official says.
The Turkish foreign minister will ask for an immediate cease-fire between Israel and Lebanon at the Middle East conference in Rome today and stress the need for a strong United Nations mandate to deploy an international peacekeeping force in which Turkey will consider playing a major role. Foreign Ministry officials told the ABHaber.com on Tuesday that Turkey will today express its readiness to do its utmost to contain the Middle East crisis, including a significant contribution to the peacekeeping force but will raise conditions which they described as necessary elements for that mission to be successful. "Still many things are unclear; we expect them to be clarified at the conference. Before talking about the details of a peacekeeping force, we have to have an immediate cease-fire," a high-level Turkish official told ABHaber yesterday on condition of anonymity. "I can tell you that Turkey is ready to make a major contribution to a force provided that it has international legitimacy with a relevant strong UN decision," he said. Although Israel, in its early response, showed that it could accept a NATO deployment, which would include combat teams on a disarmament mission, Turkish officials have expressed concern over possible problems. "It's evident that we need a consensus among all parties in the conflict before deploying such a force. There could be different modalities but a strong UN mandate seems to be inevitable for a successful mission. We should bear in mind that there are strong anti-Western ideas here which put a possible NATO mission in jeopardy," a Turkish official said. Turkey has close ties with both Israel and Arab countries and wide-ranging experience in international peacekeeping. It has led peacekeeping forces in Afghanistan and participated in missions in Bosnia, Kosovo and Somalia. The UN already has a peacekeeping force of 2,000 military personnel in Lebanon -- called Unifil -- whose mission is to patrol the border. That force, deployed since 1978, has been ineffective in stopping violence in the zone it patrols. Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul will meet with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other top officials from Europe and the Middle East today and discuss ways to stop warfare between Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas, the humanitarian needs of some 600,000 Lebanese people displaced by Israel's offensive, along with ideas for a new peacekeeping force that could be deployed on the Israeli-Lebanese border. Gathering at the Foreign Ministry in Rome today will be the following countries and organizations: Britain, Canada, the European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Turkey, the UN, the U.S. and the World Bank. |