Posted tagged ‘President Putin’

Are You Sure About That? Why Erdogan Shouldn’t Have Asked for Proof

December 1, 2015

Are You Sure About That? Why Erdogan Shouldn’t Have Asked for Proof

14:02 01.12.2015(updated 14:23 01.12.2015)

Source: Are You Sure About That? Why Erdogan Shouldn’t Have Asked for Proof

Recep Tayyip Erdogan has dramatically vowed to leave office if any proof is provided that Ankara has been buying oil from the terrorist group Daesh (ISIL/IS). But does the Turkish leader really believe that President Putin is going to make a statement unsupported by evidence? Here’s at least some of the evidence Erdogan has hastily asked for.

Satellite images and aerial photos showing the true scale of the Daesh (ISIL) oil trade:“I’ve shown photos taken from space and from aircraft which clearly demonstrate the scale of the illegal trade in oil and petroleum products,” Vladimir Putin told reporters in November on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Antalya.

“Car convoys stretching for dozens of kilometers, going beyond the horizon when seen from a height of four-five thousand meters,” added the Russian president.

The real thing is that President Putin actually got up in front of the world’s largest economic powers and told them, right to their faces, that Russia knows exactly where the oil is going.

The Guardian’s investigation on the Daesh oil flow into Turkey:

The British newspaper has posted a number of articles on the Daesh oil business based on its own investigations.

“After a US attack on the compound of a Daesh (ISIL) leader in Syria in May, direct dealings between the terrorist organization and Turkey became undeniable,” the newspaper wrote back in July, referring to documents seized at the compound.

“Following the killing of Abu Sayyaf, an ISIL official responsible for oil smuggling in May, a senior Western official familiar with the intelligence gathered at Sayyaf’s compound said that direct dealings between Turkish officials and ranking ISIL members were now “undeniable.”“From mid-2013, the Tunisian fighter [Abu Sayyaf] had been responsible for smuggling oil from Syria’s eastern fields, which the group had by then commandeered. Black market oil quickly became the main driver of Isis [ISIL] revenues — and Turkish buyers were its main clients,” the daily then said.

In a follow up of the President Putin’s remarks on the issue, the newspaper has published another article with the reference to a “long list of evidence of Turkish support for Daesh (ISIL) in Syria, compiled by The Institute for the Study of Human Rights at Columbia University.

A picture taken on November 25, 2013 shows oil rigs in the Kurdish town of Deriq (al-Malikiyah in Arabic), in the northeastern Hasakeh governorate on the border with Turkey and Iraq
A picture taken on November 25, 2013 shows oil rigs in the Kurdish town of Deriq (al-Malikiyah in Arabic), in the northeastern Hasakeh governorate on the border with Turkey and Iraq

Based on the evidence of a variety of international sources including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Daily Mail, BBC, Sky News, as well as Turkish sources, CNN Turk, Hurriyet Daily News, Taraf, Cumhuriyet, and Radikal among others, the document confirmed that:

“Turkey Provides Military Equipment to ISIS (ISIL Daesh), Turkey Provided Transport and Logistical Assistance to ISIS Fighters, Turkey Provided Training to ISIS Fighters, Turkey Offers Medical Care to ISIS Fighters, Turkey Supports ISIS Financially Through Purchase of Oil, Turkish Forces Are Fighting Alongside ISIS.”

The Zero Hedge Investigation

Zero Hedge, a financial blog that aggregates news and presents editorial opinions from original and outside sources, presented its own selection of related articles on the issue.

 ​As part of their continuing effort to track and document the Daesh (ISIL/ISIS) oil trade, they turned to a study by George Kiourktsoglou, Visiting Lecturer, University of Greenwich, London and Dr Alec D Coutroubis, Principal Lecturer, University of Greenwich, London.

Their paper, entitled “ISIS Gateway To Global Crude Oil Markets,” looks at tanker charter rates from the port of Ceyhan in an effort to determine if Daesh (Islamic State) crude is being shipped from Southeast Turkey.

 ​“The tradesmen/smugglers responsible for the transportation and sale of the black gold send convoys of up to thirty trucks to the extraction sites of the commodity. They settle their trades with ISIS on site, encouraged by customer friendly discounts and deferred payment schemes.  In this way, crude leaves Islamic State-run wells promptly and travels through insurgent-held parts of Syria, Iraq and Turkey,” the paper says.
This November 18, 2015 image from a US Department of Defense Twitter site of the Spokesman for Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR), the US military operation against ISIL, shows a leaflet warning civilians of upcoming airstrikes
This November 18, 2015 image from a US Department of Defense Twitter site of the Spokesman for Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR), the US military operation against ISIL, shows a leaflet warning civilians of upcoming airstrikes

“Since allied US air-raids do not target the trucks lorries out of fear of provoking a backlash from locals, the transport operations are being run efficiently, taking place most of times in broad daylight. Traders lured by high profits are active in Syria (even in government-held territories), Iraq and south-east Turkey.”

“The supply chain comprises the following localities: Sanliura, Urfa, Hakkari, Siirt, Batman, Osmaniya, Gaziantep, Sirnak, Adana, Kahramarmaras, Adiyaman and Mardin. The string of trading hubs ends up in Adana, home to the major tanker shipping port of Ceyhan.”Ceyhan is a city in south-eastern Turkey, with a population of 110,000 inhabitants, of whom 105,000 live in the major metropolitan area. It is the second most developed and most populous city of Adana Province, after the capital Adana with a population of 1,700,000. It is situated on the Ceyhan River which runs through the city and it is located 43 km east of Adana. Ceyhan is the transportation hub for Middle Eastern, Central Asian and Russian oil and natural gas (Municipality of Ceyhan 2015).

The same investigation took a closer look at exactly who is facilitating the transport of the stolen crude and where it ultimately ends up.

“The quantities of crude oil that are being exported to the terminal in Ceyhan exceed the mark of one million barrels per day and given that ISIS has never been able to trade daily more than 45,000 barrels of oil, it becomes evident that the detection of similar quantities of smuggled crude cannot take place through stock-accounting methods.” In other words, if Daesh oil was being shipped from Ceyhan, it would essentially be invisible.Family Ties

The blog then reveals how the suppliers can hide its crude shipments by, selling off the coast of Malta via ship-to-ship transfers and helping to disguise the final buyers.

​“It turns out, Bilal Erdogan (the third child of Recep Tayyip Erdogan) owns a Maltese shipping company. The BMZ Group, a company owned by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s son Bilal alongside other family members, has purchased two tankers in the last two months at a total cost of $36 million,” the blog quotes Today’s Zaman as reporting back in September.

Oil trucks, which, according to Russia's Defence Ministry, are being used by Islamic State militants, are hit by air strikes carried out by Russia's air force, at an unknown location in Syria, in this still image taken from video footage released by Russia's Defence Ministry on November 18, 201
Oil trucks, which, according to Russia’s Defence Ministry, are being used by Islamic State militants, are hit by air strikes carried out by Russia’s air force, at an unknown location in Syria, in this still image taken from video footage released by Russia’s Defence Ministry on November 18, 201

All the above only supports the argument presented by President Putin: “We have every reason to believe that the decision to shoot down our aircraft was dictated by the desire to ensure the safety of supply routes of oil to Turkey, to the ports where they are shipped in tankers.”

Like It or Not, America and Russia Need to Cooperate in Syria

September 22, 2015

Like It or Not, America and Russia Need to Cooperate in Syria

September 17, 2015

 

Source: Like It or Not, America and Russia Need to Cooperate in Syria | The National Interest

Image: Flickr/Official U.S. Air Force

Many outside observers view the Russian military buildup in Syria as a way for President Putin to force his way through to the negotiating table with Barack Obama ahead of the UN General Assembly meeting in New York. There is some truth to that. To be effective, diplomacy should be backed by facts on the ground, and Moscow is busy creating them—in the face of mounting U.S. concerns. However, coercive diplomacy is just another form of diplomacy.

The current spike in Russia’s involvement in Syria, however, does not need to be linked solely to UNGA. Even without it, Moscow would now be sending more weapons and more instructors to Syria. As the Islamic State has expanded its control over more territory in Syria, it has posed more of a threat to the survival of the Russian-backed regime in Damascus. Thus, Moscow’s Plan A now is to help Bashar al-Assad keep his remaining strongholds; its Plan B is to help him secure the Alawite enclave around Latakia.

The Kremlin’s upping the ante in Syria is explained by its vision of IS as a threat to Russia itself, and Putin’s view of Assad as one who stands up to that threat and refuses to give up. Fighting the enemy abroad, by bolstering an ally is preferable, of course, to having to fight in the Caucasus or Central Asia. It is also important not to appear weak under pressure: in Putin’s memorable phrase, “the weak get beaten.”

The expansion of Russia’s military role in Syria has real risks. Both Russian political and military leaders and the Russian people still remember Afghanistan. The Kremlin, however, is probably calculating that the risks in Syria are manageable. Russia is sending advisers and technicians, crews to operate weapons systems, some support personnel and it may send pilots, but not combat troops: the pro-Assad fighters on the battlefield will continue to be Syrians, Iranians or Hezbollah.

Another risk is a potential collision with the United States and its allies, who have long been striking IS targets in Syria and who can also bomb Assad’s forces and potentially hit their Russian advisers. Russian weapons—and warplanes, if it comes to that—can in turn hit Western-backed Syrian opposition. Finally, Israel may not tolerate advanced weapons in the Syrian arsenal that can endanger the Jewish state’s security.

Diplomatically, the collision has already occurred: Washington is angry with Moscow’s policies. The Kremlin, for its part, likely believes that its firm stance would make the White House accept Russia as a player and negotiate with it on the following: de-conflicting of their parallel engagements or even on a division of labor as both countries execute their strategies in Syria; a broad anti-IS coalition, which Putin has proposed; and eventually the future of postwar Syria.

Moscow certainly hopes that cooperation with the United States and the West on Syria would blunt their confrontation over Ukraine, the Kremlin’s overriding concern. It is probably not a mere coincidence that since September 1, shelling in Donbass has died down, the leadership in Donetsk has been purged of recalcitrant figures and progress is expected on the issue of local elections next month. Right after UNGA, Vladimir Putin will be meeting in Paris with Chancellor Merkel, President Hollande and Ukraine’s Petro Poroshenko.

So far, Western reactions to the Russian activism in Syria has been largely negative. Emotionally, this is understandable. Moscow’s actions are clearly at odds with Washington’s policies on an issue very sensitive to the Obama administration. Russia is not asking for permission when it moves troops and borders in Ukraine, or when it ramps up military support for a regime that the United States has said needs to go. Moscow is visibly upgrading its politico-military presence in the key region of the Middle East. While doing so, Russian officials miss few opportunities to sneer at U.S. policies in Iraq, Libya, Yemen—and Syria.

Yet, in a deeper sense, Russian, U.S., European, Iranian, Saudi, Chinese and Indian interests are on the same side against an enemy that threatens all of them. Everyone agrees that IS must be defeated, even though they disagree on how to do it. The Obama administration is unlikely to fall for the Putin plan of a grand coalition with Moscow, Tehran and Damascus to accomplish that, but a degree of coordination is advisable. Alas, Syria as the world has known it for the past seventy years probably cannot be restored. It will have to be put together again in a wholly new way. This can only result from negotiations among the various Syrian players (minus IS), with the assistance of the international community, including the West and Russia.

Dmitri Trenin is Director of the Carnegie Moscow Center.