Divining the News (DTN)

Tension on the rise in Black Sea, Turkey stuck in the middle

The tension in the Black Sea has increased steadily, placing Turkey in a very difficult position. The first challenge Turkey faced was the passage of U.S. warships through its straits carrying humanitarian aid to Georgia, a move slammed by Russia.

Ankara refused to open its straits to two hospital ships of the U.S. Navy but agreed to the passage of smaller cruisers, in line with the 1936 Montreux Convention.

The two hospital ships tonnage exceeded the limits set by the Montreux Convention, which governs international traffic through the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits. Under the convention, the total weight of the warships that countries not bordering the Black Sea can deploy was limited to 45,000 tons. [...]

By choosing Batumi [port], the U.S. opted for a less confrontational move than docking at Poti, another Georgian port where Russian troops are dug in. The U.S. may have also suspected that the Russians had mined the harbor at Poti.  Source

New Turkish commander dubs globalization a threat.

Turkeys new head of the Turkish army (Gen. Işıl Koşaner) stressed the Military’s role in preserving Turkey as a secular state. He also seemed to be expressing a lack of confidence in Georgia’s Rose revolution:

The nation state, which is considered as the greatest obstacle in front of globalization, is trying to be removed through economic control, micro ethnic provocations, redefining the regimes and organizations of countries, colorful revolts injected in countries and titles which are tried to be added in front of country names,” he stressed.

In his defense of the nation state versus globalization he took aim at NGO’s and organisations wishing to further ethnicity and economic connections. It was US institutions that fostered Georgia’s pro-democracy Rose Revolution.

Koşaner argued that a propaganda network devised by global powers and comprised of postmodern civil society institutions, some academic and capital groups and domestic media were continuing their efforts to water down the values of national unity and security parameters. Source