Davutoglu ‘hijacked’ conference to lobby for Turkey
The SA government hosted a historical Palestine solidarity summit, titled “Global AntiApartheid Conference on Palestine”, in Sandton over a week ago.
The conference’s most strange high-level attendant was Turkey’s former prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who is known for his offensive foreign policy in Syria against SA’s mediation efforts.
Davutoglu, who got the invitation just a few days before, was keen to hijack the meeting for his personal reputation.
While Palestinian National Initiative leader Mustafa Barghouti described the conference as a historic opportunity to launch global resistance against Israel, Palestine’s former health minister and Hamas’s director of international relations Basem Naim hoped the summit would save the
Gaza people from genocide.
Davutoglu is one of the most controversial and mysterious figures in recent Turkish political history. He served as chief adviser to prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan from 2003 to 2009 and later became minister of foreign affairs from 2009 to 2014. He also served as the 26th prime minister of Turkey and leader of the Justice and Development Partyfrom 2014 to 2016.
Davutoglu radically transformed Turkey’s Western-oriented passive foreign policy into multidimensional active foreign policy. He describes Turkey as an inheritor of the Ottoman Empire in North Africa, the Middle East, and the Balkans. In addition, Davutoglu pursued a very aggressive policy against Syrian leader Bashar Al-Assad and he became the architect of the Turkish military invasion of Syria.
Davutoglu even called for Syria without Assad in his UN address in September 2015. On the other hand, former SA foreign minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane advocated for a balanced approach during a UN Security Council debate on the Middle East in September 2012. She emphasised the importance of addressing the Syrian crisis by urging all parties to cease violence and fully comply with their obligations outlined in the six-point plan and the Geneva Action Group communiqué.
Meanwhile, Davutoglu was obsessed with advancing Turkey’s expansionist agenda, which was described as neo-Ottomanism. His policy of “zero problems with neighbouring countries” failed and Turkey found itself involved in the war in Syria. He has now been trying to portray himself as a defender of Palestinian rights.
Davutoglu failed to answer the
SABC’s question about why Muslim countries do not back SA’s genocide case against Israel. He continued his behind-the-door meetings with SA Muslim religious leaders and other influential politicians, including former president Thabo Mbeki, and Mandla Mandela, MP, the grandson of Nelson Mandela.
It would be naïve to believe that Davutoglu, who presents himself as a defender of Gaza, has pursued an independent foreign policy for Syria and now for Palestine.
Davutoglu was not in Johannesburg to support the global apartheid movement, but rather to lobby among Palestinian activists and leaders to convey a strategy aligned with Turkey’s Nato alliances.