BFF-67 Experts urge Western response to Turkish ‘hostage diplomacy’

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Experts urge Western response to Turkish ‘hostage diplomacy’

WASHINGTON, May 31, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Turkey is using foreign prisoners in
its jails as diplomatic bargaining chips and Western governments should adopt
a coordinated response, US-based experts warned Thursday.

According to a new report, more than 30 Western nationals have spent time
in Turkish jails since President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government launched a
crackdown in the wake of a July 2016 coup attempt.

At least six of these, including two US citizens, are still in custody.
Others have been released, but Turkey has not paid a price for what the
report’s authors call “Erdogan’s hostage diplomacy.”

Thursday’s report, which tracks the cases of 55 prisoners with Western
ties, was written by former Turkish parliamentarian Aykan Erdemir and a
former US ambassador to Turkey, Eric Edelman.

Erdemir, an internationally renowned advocate for religious freedom, is
now a fellow at Washington think tank the Foundation for Defense of
Democracies, which published the 36-page report.

Edelman, a senior associate of the International Security Program at the
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University,
advises the foundation’s Turkey program.

In an interview with AFP, Erdemir said that in the aftermath of the failed
coup, which Turkey has blamed on US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, several
North American and European Union nationals were arrested.

In many cases the detainees faced secretive investigations and charges
alleging ties to Gulen’s “terrorist” organization or to Kurdish guerrillas,
often on apparently flimsy evidence.

This may not have been an organized, centralized effort to sweep them up –
– in many cases local issues combined with anti-Western sentiment drove the
arrests — but the government sought to exploit the situation.

“There really seems to be a systematic attempt, through these bogus
political charges to go after Western nationals, often based on secret
witness testimony or arbitrary and long detention,” Erdemir said.

“Our argument is this is part of an overall policy of hostage diplomacy.
There seems to be an attempt to use these individuals as bargaining chips, as
pawns, often to extract concessions from Turkey’s counterparts.”

Turkey has, for example, more or less explicitly links demands for the
release of detainees to its own calls for alleged Gulenists to be extradited
from the West and in some cases for arms sales.

– ‘Concerted strategy’ –

The report notes that so far, Western governments have attempted to secure
the fair treatment of their nationals in quiet bilateral negotiations with
Turkey, with varying degrees of success but little cost to Ankara.

Two US citizens have been in jail for the past two years: Andrew Brunson,
a Christian pastor based in Turkey, and Turkish-American NASA physicist
Serkan Golge, who was picked up while he was on holiday there.

Both have been accused of supporting terrorism.

US officials regularly protest their detentions, but Thursday’s report
calls for tougher action in coordination with other targeted allied nations.
The author’s praise the stance of Germany, which has issued travel advisories
to its citizens and limited economic investment.

“Berlin’s policy of no normalization as long as there are German political
prisoners would be more effective if implemented by its Western partners,”
the report argues, calling for a “concerted trans-Atlantic strategy.”

The Turkish embassy was not immediately available to comment on the
report, but Turkish officials have previously insisted that their country’s
laws and court system must be respected.

BSS/AFP/RY/1938 hrs