Opinion

Erdogan's long shadow

photo_camera Recep Tayyip Erdogan

The intelligence services of different countries are discovering the long shadow of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, lately the unwanted guest of some international conflicts. His interventions with his own soldiers or mercenaries in the conflicts in Nagorno-Karabakh, Syria and Libya have been hiding an intense activity of MIT (Turkish secret service) in the fight against the Kurds in the countries hosting their exiles.   

A week ago, a 53-year-old man who claimed to be called Feyyaz Ozturk Aslan showed up at the Austrian Ministry of Interior and said to have defected as an agent of MIT in face of the assignment of the Ankara government to assassinate the leader of the Kurdistan Green Party Aygul Berivan, who was exiled in Vienna. The news, which is cautiously managed by the Austrian government, has warned about some Turkish interferences in its policy and even public order.  

The first investigations showed the name to be correct and that he had somehow been involved in activities related to espionage and terrorism. The Turkish government denied these allegations. Aslan was sparing in his testimonies, but he expressed his wish to be offered political asylum and security in return because as soon as it became known that he had defected he would be persecuted and killed. Austrian Interior Minister Karl Nehammer told The New York Times that this is a very serious matter and is being thoroughly investigated. 

Other sources, which the newspaper does not identify, say that the presence of Turkish agents has been detected for a long time in Austria, where 270.000 Turks, one third of them Kurds, live, and that Erdogan is known to have recruited several dozens of specialized agents to closely follow the Kurds and other Turkish citizens, scattered in different countries, who disagree with Erdogan and his authoritarian drift.  

Information on the threats that some Turkish nationals living abroad have been receiving for some time is also circulating in diplomatic circles. The Austrian police suspect that Turkish MIT agents are charged with promoting riots such as those recently recorded in Vienna by collaborating with groups of extreme ideologies in violent initiatives. The most affected European country is Austria.  

In view of these reports, some analysts agree that Erdogan is accumulating hatred and wants to turn his fury against the European Union's refusal to admit Turkey as a partner, which has been the biggest failure in his unstoppable race towards the absolute power he is imposing. This information also includes the surprise caused by the close relationship he is establishing with Putin as a NATO member.