HIrgUr MUstemleke; Sanki Fiyasko Ha

[kurdeng at aps.nl]

From: tabe at newsdesk.aps.nl
Subject: Re: HIrgUr MUstemleke; Sanki Fiyasko Haberler, 15/5/95, TSI 08:00
Reply-To: kurdeng at aps.nl

er 2.20)
           id VT4279; Mon, 15 May 1995 19:26:29 -0800

NATO's Claes to visit Greece, Turkey over row

By Jonathan Clayton

BRUSSELS, May 14 (Reuter) - NATO Secretary-General Willy Claes flies this week
to Greece and Turkey to mediate in a dispute between the two alliance members
and regional rivals that threatens sensitive military operations.

The latest row has led to Ankara blocking NATO's entire military budget and
forced the grouping to freeze all military projects just as it is in the
process of finalising plans for a possible pull-out of U.N. peacekeeping forces
from Bosnia.

"Turkey's action is out of proportion. It is hitting at the entire alliance not
just Greece," one senior NATO diplomat said. He added that, if the dispute was
still unresolved by the end of this month, the alliance would have to shift to
some form of emergency financing for previously approved military projects that
are worth several hundred million dollars.

Greek diplomats said they believed Claes would carry with him various proposals
for a compromise solution, but said they were not encouraged by recent Turkish
actions despite Ankara's need to win support after its recent military thrust
against Kurdish rebels in Iraq.

Disputes between Greece and Turkey have often blocked alliance activity in the
eastern Mediterranean, but this time Turkey has chosen to widen the dispute
which centres on the financing of NATO facilities in Turkey.

Greece had previously vetoed the funding of alliance facilities in the port of
Izmir, pushing the case for a new NATO command centre to also be set up on its
territory.

The embattled Claes, who has been dragged recently into a murky Belgian defence
contract corruption scandal dating from his time as Belgium's economics
minister, heads first for Athens on Tuesday and then goes to Ankara on the
following day.

Claes said on Saturday he had no intention of quitting as NATO
secretary-general and proclaimed his innocence after being questioned for 12
hours on Friday about the so-called Agusta affair by investigators at
Belgium's highest court.

"I am supported by all the ministers in the NATO Council. None of them is
asking for my resignation," Claes was quoted as saying in by the German
weekly paper Bild am Sonntag.

The visit is formally part of a tour that Claes, who only took office last
October, is making of capitals of member states. But it has taken on greater
significance since the tension heightened between Athens and Ankara.
"This is now a very important visit," a NATO source said.

Apart from his personal problems, Claes has faced an array of crises in the
alliance since taking over, from transatlantic squabbling over air strikes in
support of U.N. actions in Bosnia to a row with Moscow over NATO enlargement
plans.

Diplomats fear failure to resolve the Greece-Turkey row soon could further dent
NATO's credibility at a time when its relevance in a post-Cold War world is
increasingly questioned. The NATO row coincides with Turkish efforts to
encourage European parliamentarians to vote later this year in favour of a
lucrative European Union-Turkey customs union.

Independent analysts say Turkey's drive against Kurdish separatists in northern
Iraq has cost it much support in Europe and the dispute within NATO has further
angered its allies. "Turkey just seems to keep doing things which do not help
its case," one political analyst said.