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US' unilateral actions against Turkey source of problem
April 30, 2021The backlash over U.S. President Joe Biden’s statement on the so-called Armenian “genocide” continues.
The backlash over U.S. President Joe Biden’s statement on the so-called Armenian “genocide” continues. Deeming the Turkish government’s reaction insufficient, opposition leaders argued that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan lacked “the courage to hang up on Biden.” Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) Chairperson Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu and Good Party (IP) leader Meral Akşener eagerly attacked the government much more fiercely than they reacted to the White House statement. Turkey’s contemporary foreign policy, they said, was actually responsible for what happened.
Targeting Turkey, instead of its adversaries, over national questions has become a common practice among opposition ranks. Opposition leaders have grown so comfortable exploiting foreign policy issues to target Erdoğan that they disregard how they undermine our national identity and common interests.
The main opposition leader called on U.S. President Joe Biden, days before the announcement, to “act with common sense.” When the White House statement came, however, Kılıçdaroğlu was quick to blame Erdoğan instead of the U.S. president. His initial statement, it seems, was a precursor to a series of attacks on the Turkish government.
Ironically, neither Kılıçdaroğlu nor Akşener bothered to criticize a controversial call by the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) on Turkey to “confront the crime of genocide.”
Nonetheless, the opposition’s cunning, selective silence and provocations did not evoke an emotional response from Erdoğan. The government already knows that opposition leaders tend to be reckless when it comes to foreign policy crises. Indeed, Kılıçdaroğlu once claimed that YPG, the terrorist organization PKK’s Syrian branch, did not “pose a threat to our country.” If anyone were to take the main opposition leader’s advice, there would have been no military incursion into Syria’s Afrin region or a game-changing
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