| August 14, 2003 The Honorable Colin L. Powell Dear Mr. Secretary: July 20, 2003 marked the 29th year of Turkey’s aggression against Cyprus on July 20, 1974 by its invasion of Cyprus with the illegal use of American arms and equipment in violation of the U.S. Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, as amended, and related laws, the United Nations Charter, article 2(4), the North Atlantic Treaty, preamble and article 1, and customary international law. On July 22, 1974, when a UN cease fire had been agreed, Turkey occupied about 4 percent of Cyprus’s territory. On July 23, 1974 the legitimate government of Cyprus was restored following the July 15, 1974 coup against Cyprus President Makarios initiated by the Greek dictator, Brigadier General Demetrios Ioannides. The Greek dictatorship also fell on July 23, 1974, and former Prime Minister Constantine Karamanlis was installed as interim prime minister pending elections. Today, August 14, 2003, marks the 29th anniversary of the second wave of Turkish aggression against Cyprus when Turkey launched a massive assault on Cyprus with the illegal use of hundreds of U.S. tanks, hundreds of U.S. airplanes and 35,000 ground troops. This further aggression, which occurred three weeks after the legitimate government of Cyprus had returned to office on July 23, 1974, lasted three days from August 14 to August 16 and resulted in a land grab by Turkey of 33 percent of Cyprus. The second wave of aggression by Turkey resulted in substantial killings of innocent Greek Cypriots, rapes, looting and robbery on an extensive scale. The European Commission on Human Rights in its report on July 10, 1976 on two applications by the government of Cyprus, found Turkey guilty of violating the following articles of the European Convention on Human Rights:
On January 23, 1977 the London Sunday Times published excerpts of the report and stated:
Mr. Secretary, in formulating current policy it is important to remember that the Cyprus issue is one of aggression and occupation, and that it is between Turkey, the aggressor and Cyprus, the victim. There is no legal difference between Turkey’s aggression against Cyprus and Iraq’s aggression against Kuwait. And it is of great importance in formulating current policy to recognize that the actions and failure to act of the then Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger were a direct cause of the Greek coup of July 15, 1974, the Turkish invasion of July 20, 1974 and the second wave of Turkish aggression on August 14, 1974. Mr. Kissinger violated the U.S. Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, as amended, and related laws, by refusing to halt immediately, as required by law, military assistance to Turkey. He also violated his constitutional oath of office to faithfully uphold and execute the laws of the United States. At no time did Mr. Kissinger denounce Turkey’s aggression or the Greek coup, in contrast to the almost universal condemnation by the world community. (See Rossides, “Cyprus and the Rule of Law,” 17 Syracuse J. Int’l L. & Com. 21-90, for a detailed account of Mr. Kissinger’s actions.) Mr. Secretary, what should U.S. policy be regarding Cyprus in the best interests of the U.S.? In my letter of May 15, 2003 to President George W. Bush regarding Cyprus, I analyzed the current situation and wrote that “The time is propitious for positive movement on a just and viable solution to the Cyprus problem" because of two new factors: First, is Cyprus’s accession to the EU; Second, Operation Iraqi Freedom demonstrated:
The May 15, 2003 letter makes the following four recommendations for U.S. action in the interests of the U.S.:
Copies of my May 15, 2003 letter to President Bush and my summary May 16, 2003 letter to you enclosing my letter to the President are enclosed. In addition to the above four recommendations, I strongly urge you oppose the Administration’s foreign aid request of $255 million in economic and military aid for Turkey in the Fiscal Year 2004 Appropriations Bill. That amount was requested prior to Turkey’s refusal to help the U.S. in the war in Iraq when we needed it most, and secondly the Congress appropriated $1 billion in economic assistance for Turkey in the $79.5 billion Supplemental Iraq War Appropriations Bill on April 12, 2003. Exhibit 1 sets forth 16 reasons to oppose the $255 million foreign aid request for Turkey. Further, we recommend and urge in the interests of the U.S. that any aid to Turkey, including the $1 billion previously appropriated, be subject to the following specific conditions precedent:
United States policy regarding Cyprus has been centered over the past three decades on alleged national security arguments. In 1974 the then Administration and Mr. Kissinger used the national security argument, centering it on Turkey’s alleged strategic importance to the defense of the West and the United States in the Cold War era, to excuse their failure to obey the law. Subsequent administrations did the same. The additional tragedy of Cyprus is that the alleged strategic importance and reliability of Turkey was highly questionable since at least 1973. Exhibit 2 discusses this point. Recent events, of course, have demonstrated Turkey’s lack of reliability as a strategic ally and minimal value currently as a strategic ally. Mr. Secretary, who has been responsible for U.S. policy regarding Turkey and Cyprus? In the past two decades the Defense Department has dominated U.S. policy towards Turkey regarding (1) Cyprus; (2) Turkey’s massive human rights abuses against its 20 percent Kurdish minority and its national torture policy; (3) Turkey’s blockade of Armenia preventing U.S. humanitarian assistance; and (4) recognition by the U.S. of the Armenian Genocide. The State Department has willingly supported this policy. The Defense Department policy towards Turkey has been spearheaded by Mr. Richard Perle, former Assistant Secretary of Defense (1981-1987), Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, Douglas Feith, who was Perle’s assistant in the 1980’s, and Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Marc Grossman. Over the past decades, Turkey’s U.S. foreign agents registered with the Department of Justice have aided and abetted the Defense and State Departments in shaping U.S. policy towards Turkey. Mr. Perle was a former paid foreign agent consultant to Turkey and Mr. Feith was a former paid foreign agent for Turkey. Currently, Turkey is paying $2.4 million for its U.S. foreign agents spearheaded by former House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bob Livingston (R-LA) and former Congressman Stephen Solarz (D-NY). Since money is fungible, these U.S. foreign agents are, in effect, paid from U.S. taxpayer dollars. What we do regarding Cyprus will have an impact on Iraq and the Middle East in general. Adhering to American values of democracy, the rule of law and protection of minority rights will advance U.S. interests throughout the region. Appeasing an aggressor at the expense of its victim will damage U.S. interests throughout the region. The United States bears a responsibility to redress the situation in Cyprus. It is in the interests of the United States in support of democracy and the rule of law to do so. Please see our web site www.ahiworld.org for copies of our letters and testimony. Warmest regards. Sincerely,
Gene Rossides
cc: President George W. Bush EXHIBIT 1 SIXTEEN REASONS NOT TO GIVE AID TO TURKEY
EXHIBIT 2 TURKEY'S UNRELIABILITY AS A STRATEGIC ALLY The record shows that during the Cold War Turkey brushed aside U.S. interests on many occasions and deliberately gave substantial assistance to the Soviet military. In 1974, Edward Luttwak, the noted strategic analyst, stated the following regarding Turkey’s cooperation with the Soviet military. He wrote at that time the following:
Examples of Turkey’s unreliability for U.S. strategic purposes include: (1) During the 1973 Mid-East War, predating the Turkish invasion of Cyprus by one year, Turkey refused the United States military overflight rights to resupply Israel and granted the U.S.S.R. overland military convoy rights to resupply Syria and Iraq, and military overflight permission to resupply Egypt. A member of the Turkish Foreign Policy Institute in Ankara wrote: During the Arab-Israeli war of 1973, Moscow’s overflights of Turkish airspace were tolerated. On the other hand, during the same Middle East conflict, Turkey refused to allow the United States refueling and reconnaissance facilities during the American airlift to Israel. (Karaosmanoglu, “Turkey’s Security and the Middle East,” 52 Foreign Affairs 157, 163, Fall 1983.) (2) In the 1977-78 conflict in Ethiopia, Turkey granted the Soviets military overflight rights to support the pro-Soviet minority of Ethiopian communist insurgents, led by Colonel Mengistu, who eventually prevailed and established a Marxist dictatorship directly dependent upon the Soviet Union. Giant Soviet Antonov-22 transport aircraft ferried Cuban troops, Soviet weapons and other assorted needs to Ethiopia. During the peak months of the conflict (December, 1977—January, 1978), the Soviet Union greatly increased the number of overflights through Turkish airspace with the direct acquiescence of Turkey’s regime. The Soviets ferried in 2,000 Cuban troops by the end of the first week in December. By late December, 17,000 Cuban troops were in Ethiopia. The Cuban troops were immediately moved to the fighting front against Somali and anti-communist Ethiopian forces. They effectively turned the tide in favor of the communists. (3) Over U.S. and NATO objections, Turkey allowed three Soviet aircraft carriers, the Kiev on July 18, 1976, the Minsk on February 25, 1979 and the Novorosiisk on May 16, 1983, passage rights through the Bosphorous and Dardanelles Straits into the Mediterranean in violation of the Montreux Convention of 1936. The Soviet ships posed a formidable threat to the U.S. Sixth Fleet. (4) In 1979 Turkey refused to allow the U.S. to send 69 U.S. marines and six helicopters to American military facilities at Incirlik in Turkey for possible use in evacuating Americans from Iran and protecting the U.S. embassy in Tehran. (5) Again in 1979 Turkey refused the U.S. request to allow U-2 intelligence flights (for Salt II verification) over Turkish airspace “unless Moscow agreed.” (N.Y. Times, May 15, 1979, at A1, col. 3.) This position was voiced over a period of months by Turkish officials, the opposition party and the military Chief of Staff, General Kenan Evren, (See, Washington Post and New York Times, April—September 1979). (6) In January of 1981, President Carter tried to obtain a commitment from Turkey for the use of Turkish territory for operations in cases of conflict in the Middle East. The January 20, 1981, New York Times reported that Turkey was not in favor of “the United States using Turkish bases for conflicts not affecting Turkey.” In the spring, 1983, issue of Foreign Policy magazine, Harry Shaw pointed out that Turkey is unlikely to become involved in, or allow U.S. forces to use Turkish territory in a Middle East war that does not threaten her territory directly. (7) As an example of the above, in 1980, Turkey refused to permit the U.S. to use the NATO base at Diyarbakir in eastern Turkey as a transit point for the purpose of conducting a rescue mission into Tehran, Iran, to free the American hostages held in that city. The distance from Diyarbakir to Tehran is 450 miles as opposed to the actual route taken, which was over 900 miles. (8) In May, 1989, Turkey rejected an American request to inspect an advanced MIG-29 Soviet fighter plane, flown by a Soviet defector to Turkey. (New York Times, May 28, 1989, at A12, col.1.) (9) The Turkish government refused repeated American requests for the installation of antennas in Turkey concerning eleven transmitters whose broadcasts would have been directed primarily at the Soviet Union and its eastern European satellites. As reported in the July 22, 1983, issue of Newsweek, the initiative by the U.S. Department of State sought to improve reception of programs broadcast by Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, and the Voice of America. (10) Turkey further damaged NATO by vetoing NATO’s effort to put military bases on various Greek islands in the Aegean for defensive purposes against the Soviet navy.
The Honorable George W. Bush Re: Cyprus Dear Mr. President: The time is propitious for positive movement on a just and viable solution to the Cyprus problem. Two new factors present the U.S. with an opportunity to achieve a just and viable solution to the Cyprus problem in the interests of the U.S. The first, and clearly the most important new factor, is Cyprus’s accession to the European Union (EU) on April 16, 2003. The second factor is that the war on Iraq has demonstrated (1) Turkey’s unreliability as a strategic ally by its refusal to help the U.S.; (2) that Turkey is of minimal strategic value for U.S. interests in the Middle East, since we opened a northern front and defeated the Saddam Hussein dictatorship without Turkey’s help; and (3) that Turkey is an “extortionist” state who tried to get for its cooperation more billions of dollars, a veto over U.S. policy on the northern Iraq Kurds and access to northern Iraq oil. Turkey’s actions have brought to the fore its history of unreliability as a strategic ally, including active assistance during the Cold War to the Soviet military. In my letter to you of April 29, 2003 (copy attached), I set forth the details of Turkey’s previous unreliability, its minimal strategic value, and its “extortion in the name of alliance.” Mr. President, there is no need now, if there ever was, for the U.S. to continue its harmful policy of double standards for Turkey on the rule of law and human rights. There is a need now, in the interests of the U.S., to change our flawed policy towards Turkey. Business as usual with Turkey would be harmful to U.S. interests. Democratic norms The U.S. should openly support a Cyprus solution based on the EU’s acquis communautaire, democratic norms, and the policy advocated by former President George H.W. Bush in a speech in Boston on July 7, 1988 when he stated: “We seek for Cyprus a constitutional democracy based on majority rule, the rule of law, and the protection of minority rights….I want to see a democratic Cyprus free from the threat of war.” Support of a democratic solution in Cyprus would be an important signal to the world community and particularly to the Arabs and Kurds in Iraq and to the rest of the Middle East. It would be a positive factor in your desire to see democratic reforms throughout the Middle East. As you said in your commencement address at the University of South Carolina on May 9, 2003: “Our greatest strength is that we serve the cause of liberty. We support the advance of freedom in the Middle East, because it is our founding principle, and because it is in our national interest.” Ambassador Thomas Weston, the State Department’s Cyprus Coordinator, stated on May 8, 2003 that the limited opening of the Green Line, and the moves associated with it “are not a settlement. These moves do not and will not solve some very basic issues…The only path to settlement is a settlement.” The U.S. should continue to support those provisions of the U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s proposal that (1) are in accord with the EU’s acquis communautaire and democratic norms, and (2) the basic values and principles of American democracy. It should discard the others. The U.S. should publicly state that the Annan proposal is now subject to the EU’s and American principles of democracy.
Famagusta/Varosha The U.S. should publicly call for the immediate return of Famagusta/Varosha to the government of Cyprus under U.N. auspices for the resettlement of refugees. In 1978, President Jimmy Carter’s administration mounted a massive effort to repeal the remaining partial embargo on arms to Turkey, which succeeded in the summer of 1978. On July 25, 1978 the Senate voted 57 to 42 to repeal the remaining partial embargo, and on August 1, 1978, the House voted 208 to 205 to overturn the remaining embargo. A key argument by the Carter administration was that the Turkish government had pledged to negotiate in good faith regarding the removal of its occupation troops and territorial adjustments, including the early and imminent return of Varosha under U.N. auspices for the resettlement of refugees before negotiations on other items. Turkey reneged on its pledge and the Carter administration did not press Turkey to carry out its pledge. Demilitarization Senator Bob Dole proposed demilitarization of Cyprus during the Senate debate on July 25, 1978, on the amendment, which passed, to remove the remaining arms embargo on Turkey. Dole voted against lifting the embargo and noted that “[n]egotiations between the two communities have remained stalemated over the presence of the Turkish occupation force.” He stated:
The U.S. should call for the speedy demilitarization of Cyprus with a specific and short timetable. The continuing presence of the over 35,000 Turkish military occupation force has been a major, if not the major, impediment to negotiations between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots. The U.N. peacekeeping force as presently constituted, or augmented if so desired, can handle internal security for the Greek and Turkish Cypriots during negotiations for a final settlement. Turkish colonists There are an estimated 100,000 illegal Turkish colonists from Anatolia in Cyprus in violation of the Geneva Convention which prohibits colonization by the occupying power. The U.S. should publicly call for Turkey to return the colonists promptly to their homes in Turkey. Mr. President, these suggestions are actions which can be taken now and which would have a salutary impact on efforts to bring democracy to Iraq and other countries. It would demonstrate that aggression by friend, as well as foe, will not stand and will not pay as President George H.W. Bush and President Mikhail Gorbachev stated in Helsinki on September 9, 1990 regarding Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait:
President Dwight D. Eisenhower, in condemning the invasion of Egypt by Britain, France and Israel, stated in his October 31, 1956 address to the nation: “There can be no peace without law. And there can be no law if we were to invoke one code of international conduct for those who oppose us and another for our friends.” Mr. President, it is in the best interests of the United States to champion democracy and the rule of law uniformly in matters of foreign policy, including the question of Cyprus. Respectfully,
Gene Rossides Enclosure cc: Secretary of State Colin L. Powell
May 16, 2003 The Honorable Dear Mr. Secretary: In the enclosed copy of my letter to President George W. Bush on Cyprus, I stress that “The time is propitious for positive movement on a just and viable solution to the Cyprus problem” because of two factors: First, and the most important, is Cyprus’s accession to the EU; Second, the war on Iraq demonstrated:
The letter makes the following four recommendations for U.S. action in the interests of the U.S.:
Best regards. Sincerely,
Gene Rossides Enclosure cc: Deputy Secretary Richard Armitage |
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08-14-03 Letter to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell
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