Turkey Saying No to Accepting G.I.’s in Large Numbers

Turkey’s newly elected government, which has strong Islamic roots, announced its decision to deny access to substantial number of American GI’s in case of war against Iraq. The government reached this decision, officials reported, because of the need to take into consideration public sentiment, even though Turkey considers America to be a very close ally. The agreement is a product of a long series of negotiations that did yield, however, use of Turkish airspace and warplanes only in the case of a UN Security Council Resolution approval. A second Security Council resolution that allows use of force in case Iraq fails to comply with UN weapons inspectors, as Turkey insists is necessary, would, however, be too time-consuming and approval would not be guaranteed. The United States has been putting pressure on the Europeans to facilitate the acceptance of Turkey to the EU and the U.S. has also promised more funding through the IMF. A U.S. official declared that they were hoping Turkey would change its opinion.-Yale Global