EDITOR'S NOTE
The Turkish Yearbook of International Relations for the year 1994, printed in 1997, is being offered to the perusal for experts and students of world affairs. Unlike the Yearbook for 1993, also printed in the current year but largely dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the Lausanne Convention, the present Yearbook brings together nine articles, reviews of över a dozen books or journals, a basic document on Turkish foreign policy, a chronology of events and a bibliography for 1994.
Professor Faruk Şen's article dwells on the numerous violent incidents of the neo-Nazis dırected agaınst "foreigners", especially targeting Turkish residents, most of whom have been living in Germany for more than a generation. The author, a Turk who teaches in Essen, is in a position to observe how a militant ultra-rightisı movement with neo-Nazi characteristics has been generated in that country.
His article, moreover, gives one a chance to take the discussion a step further and introduce some concepts for "humane governance". The attacks on "foreigners" also pose a challenge to democracy and bring onto the agenda the need for a genuinely new world order. Some conventional notions of democracy and of international relations are already questioned. It is often the leading states that violate restrictions on governmental conduct. The role of grassroots activists should be to seek ways and means to bridge the gap between legal commitment and day-to-day behaviour. Compliance with laws by groups, states and market forces should be the duty as well as the right of the peoples of the world. Civil societies everywhere need to be concerned about adherence to law, domestic and international, and the role of citizens in pressing for adherence.
John Quigley, professor of law and political science and a member of the Bar of the United States Supreme Court, is the author of many pioneering books, including Treatment of Palestinians in Israeli Occupied West Bank and Gaza (National Lavvyers' Guild) and Flight into the Maelstrom: Soviet Immigration to Israel and Middle East Peace (Ithaca Press). The last mentioned book studies the post-1989 migration of Soviet Jews to Israel, yet unexplored despite its importance. Professor Quigley underlined in the latter the negative impact of the migration on the peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinians. Not only many Soviet Jews have been placed in the West Bank while displaced Palestinians are refused repatriation, the influx of more immigrants has worsened the employment and housing conditions for the Palestinians. His book, with eight fictional chapters as well, conveys how the immigrants and the Palestinians react to the situations that immigration has created for them.
Professor Quigley's article in the present issue of the Yearbook is on the legal status of Jerusalem, one of the three issues that the 1993 agreement betvveen Israel and the Palestinians has not solved. The other two are Israel's settlements and the retum of the refugees. The author concludes that the international community should promote for Jerusalem a solution consistent with the legitimate claims of the contending parties and that no territorial settlement can be imposed against the will of the Palestinians.
The article by Bülent Gökay, a Turkish scholar previously associated with the teaching staff at Cambridge and now at Keele University, focusses on Chechnia, one of the trouble spots in the Caucasus. Chechnia, which the author describes as "Russia's Kuwait", is within the frontiers of the Russian Federation. Russia wants to develop, however, its own "Monroe" doctrine in relation to the "Near Abroad". One of the roots of the main crises of the early 1990s has been the new ascendancy of the "weak state", whether in the former Soviet Union or in former Yugoslavia. Challenging the governance resources of world order in different ways than do the aggressive strong states, the weak state also offers horrifying examples of cruelty and devastation. But the challenges of the weak or the strong states cannot be met successfully. In contrast to the militarist approach to a former strong Soviet Union, there is a tendency to prevent the collapse of governance of a much weaker Russia. This tendency partly explains Western passivity toward the revival of Russian militarism in the "Near Abroad" and in relation to its own minorities. But will new "spheres of influence" prevent the breakdown of governance?
Ayşe Gülgün Tuna dvvells on a topıc recently added to our agenda. Although the author does not describe it wıth these words, it is the rediscovery of human dependence on nature. Her article is another reminder of an emergent environmental consciousness. The ancient peoples were also concerned över droughts and flooding, but there is now a new emphasis on limits and sustainability. Moreover, in terms of environmental scarcities, the grip is more tightening on the South. This reality seems to be a part of the new patteming of geopolitics which, in a way, is more menacing to human interests than the conditions during the Cold War years. It may even be asserted that the post-Cold War period is a new world disorder.
Mensur Akgün traces the previous need for a new regime for the Turkish Straits in the early 1930s, the evolution of the Montreux Convention and the resulting gains of Turkey, which sought a negotiated settlement in spite of examples of military "solutions" in the same decade. The agreement at Montreux (20 July 1936) accepted the Turkish proposals, approved by ali the Lausanne signatories, excepting Italy, which acquiesced in a separate agreement (2 May 1938).
The article by Gela Charkviani, chief advisor to Georgia's President, was the talk he had delivered at a Wilton Park Conference in the United Kingdom. He kindly gave the text to me at the end of his talk for publication in the Yearbook. Although there has been a delay in its printing beyond the control of the editör, the ideas and the opinions, nevertheless, may stili be
read with profit. He refers to grovving Georgian-Turkish relations, Turkey's assistance in terms of credits and humanitarian aid, its commitment to Georgia's territorial integrity, and Ankara's initiation of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation.
Burcu Bostanoğlu's article is a short "Turkish perspective" on European security. Can there be a new world in which rule-governed security system replace traditional geopolitics? The League of Nations could not achieve it. The Cold War experience demonstrated the inadequacy of the existing U.N. mechanism. The Korean War (1950-53) was controlled by the Union States, and its decision could be taken almost accidentally-the absence of the Soviet Union ın that crucial Secunty Councıl meeting. Iraq had clearly attacked Kuwait, another U.N. member, but the undertaking was geopolitical ın motivation and execution. Collective security could not be applıed in Bosnia. Time has come to rethink what collective security is and what it should entail in our time.
My first article is on the İndian and Turkish experıences on terronsm. The second one is meant to be a reply to a series of articles by Professor V.N. Dadrian, an Armenian-American writer.
The Book Review section introduces several publications of the Turkish International Cooperation Agency (TICA), including the periodical Eurosian Studies (Turkish counterpart Avrasya Etüdleri). The book from Baku is on the Armenian aggression on Azerbaijan. Others are an American studies journal (JAST), two Turkish Georgian periodicals (Çveneburi and Mamuli) and a publication by Hungarian Turcologists (Török Füzetek).
The lengthy statement of Professor Mümtaz Soysal, Turkey's Foreign Minister at the U.N. General Assembly in 1994, is expectedly a summary of the country's appraisal of current world events and also its foreign policy. Perhaps again expectedly, the talk, from the pen of an impressive men of letters, offers, in moving and convincing terms, thoughts fit for a new global politics based on humane govemance. Expressed in the midst of historic breakthroughs in South Africa and the Middle East as vvell as the eruption of long-suppressed ethnic and xenophobic natıonalism and racism, the talk is another initiative -though one of the few- for a better civilization based on equitable international relations.
Calling for new and workable mechanisms to respond effectively to the challenges of our times, Turkey's Foreign Minister attached importance,
ınter alia, to the restructuring of the United Nations. For example: "We must
make sure that the Security Council is not perceived as the tool of a small group of big states that seeks to impose their vvill and ıheir national policy objectives on others". Turkey once more underlined that the international community, most regretfully, had neither been able to put an end to the ethnic cleansing, nor roll back the brutal aggression against the Bosnian Muslims. The latter were not even provided with ali the necessary means for self-defence, to exercise its inherent right under Article 51 of the U.N. Charter. The Foreign Minister termed it as "a moral, legal and political
obligation of tfıe intcrnational community". The Balkans could not stand ihe pressure of additional tensions. Macedonia, for instance, suffercd from an illegal economic blockade imposed by Greece. Macedonia was stili waiting to be represented al the U.N. under the name and the flag it had chosen.
Lying at the very epicenter of the vast geography and the new geopolitics of Eurasia, Turkey had initiated the Black Sea Economic Cooperation idea and helped enlarge the Economic Cooperation Organization. As a blatant defiance of international law, Armenian forces continue to occupy one-fıfth of Azerbaijani territory. Turkey followed very closely the development in Georgia, and fully supported the efforts of the secular Central Asian Republics in their strive to build pluralistic societies. Misinformation and official propaganda stili continue on the conditions of life formerly imposed on the Turkish people of Cyprus as well as on the history of events on the island since 1974. Professor Soysal was formerly advisor to President Denktaş of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Turkey also continues to suffer great economic losses on account of the embargo imposed on Iraq, whose people wait for a return to normalcy.
Apart from elucidating Turkey's stand on various issues, the statement of the Turkish Foreign Minister at the U.N. General Assembly supports a number of shared values and visions. It urges for nonviolent politics and the expansion of democracy, which he terms as the underlying imperative for human security, social integration and good governance.
T.A.
