"Dear Lukery,ftr, Sibel is Turkish, and I have nothing against Turkey.
Your highly limited knowledge of Turkish political processes and blind faith in Sibel Edmonds' integrity really impair the credibility of your blog. While Sibel is justified in her anger toward the FBI for terminating her contract because she protested the corrupt practices of its translation department, she makes broad claims about other institutions that she could never back up- even if the "States Secrets Privilege" is revoked and she is allowed to state her case.
Turkey is a very important U.S. ally. Do you think that an alliance with, say, Iran- Sibel's native country- would be more desirable? Sibel is quick to criticize Turkey, but I have never heard her defame her homeland in any way. I have no problem with people of Iranian origin, but to criticize Turkey's human rights standards and to quesion its democratic principles while neglecting to do the same for Iran leads me to question her objectivity.
Turkey is a democratic country with a firmly secular legal and political orientation. Turkish women are not required to wear the headscarf. There are no laws in Turkey against adultery, abortion, alcohol, peaceful protests or political demonstrations, homosexuality, professing atheism or adherence to religions other than Islam. Turkey has recently implemented many reforms in conjunction with its bid to join the EU, and its success in this aim would certainly be in America's best interests. Although Turkish laws such as Article 301, which forbid "insulting Turkishness", prevent Turkey from being 100% democratic, it is steadily progressing in that direction. When considering human rights issues, it's interesting to note that Turkey illegalized the death penalty years ago and does not practice torture.
My advice to you: learn more about Turkey before you dismiss it as a gross violator of human rights and a refuge for drug lords and weapon smugglers. The Susurluk incident was a cause for concern in Turkey, where media coverage on the incident inspired public debate and galvanized Turkish society to successfully press for elevated transparency in the Turkish political process. Furthermore, the incident took place 11 years ago-- a lot has changed since then.
Please don't let your devotion to Sibel Edmonds lead you on a crusade against Turkey. I know that she has a lot of supporters, and unfortunately, they will likely believe her when she claims that Turkey is a state sponsor of terrorism, drug-smuggling, and money laundering. Try to be more objective in your reporting.
Thanks for reading,
Steven"
update: miguel has a response to steve in the comments, and more substantially, here
2 comments:
Dear Steven,
You have every right to put Sibel Edmond's allegations to the light of critical scrutiny. They are explosive charges and need not be taken at face value. I myself scrutinized what Sibel public statements very carefully before I became a strong supporter of hers.
Sibel has basically said that secret wiretaps show Turkish nationals engaged in a host of illegal activities against the interests of the American people. Some of these individuals were connected with the American Turkish Council and other Turkish organizations, some with the Turkish embassies and consulates. Some of these activities such as money laundering and illegal arms sales appear to have some al Qaeda connections.
The key question is not what Sibel's nationality is- though as Luke pointed out, she is Turkish and NOT Iranian- but how good a translator she is/was. If you look carefully at the record, the FBI has never disputed that Sibel's translations, and not Melek Can Dickerson's, were the correct ones. And if you look at the Inspector General's report, it is clear that the IG took the FBI to the cleaners for trying to imply Dickerson's translations were done innocently: the IG report all but confirms Dickerson was a spy.
So we know the most important part of Sibel's allegations is certainly true. At the very least we know that Turkey is engaged in espionage against the United States. On the other charges- the drugs, nuclear black market, etc.- we don't have as much independent confirmation. However, it must be remembered that every Congressman that has checked out Sibel's allegations has come back to say that the FBI has confirmed much of the story.
As for Turkey being a great ally of the U.S.- I'm increasingly of the view that this 'great ally' is more image than reality. But I'll keep an open mind until the wiretaps are made public. Then we can all debate how great ally Turkey has been to the U.S..
"Turkey is a democratic country with a firmly secular legal and political orientation. Turkish women are not required to wear the headscarf. There are no laws in Turkey against adultery, abortion, alcohol, peaceful protests or political demonstrations, homosexuality, professing atheism or adherence to religions other than Islam."
I think Sibel would agree with all of that except the word 'democratic'. How democratic is a country in which military coups happen all too often and journalists and human rights activists live under constant threat of assassination?
While it's great that women don't have to wear headscarves in Turkey, the key questions here lies around Turkey's foreign policy and the activities of certain Turkish officials and private citizens abroad.
Finally, there is no crusade against "Turkey". There is an attempt to uncover illegal activities of corrupt officials, generals and spies in Turkey and the United States.
Nothing on this blog should be considered "anti-Turkish". On the contrary, and I think I speak for Luke too when I say this, we are in solidariy with the vast majority of people in Turkey, who are as much victims of this criminal activity by a select few Turkish nationals and U.S. neocons as are other people's around the world. In fact, they are probably much more victims of all this corruption than are people in the United States.
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