What were Erdoğan’s three goals of visiting Iraq?

Mehr News, :%20Turkish%20President%20Recep%20Tayyip%20Erdogan%20visited%20Iraq%20after%2013%20years.%20Several%20cabinet%20ministers,%20the%20head%20of%20the%20Met%20intelligence%20service%20and%20some%20military%20and%20economic%20advisers%20accompanied%20Erdogan%20on%20this%20trip.%20A%20look%20at%20the%20list%20of%20agreements%20signed%20between%20Erdogan%20and%20Iraqi%20Prime%20Minister%20Mohammad%20Shia%20al-Sudani%20shows%20that%20economy%20and%20security%20were%20highlighted%20as%20two%20important%20pillars%20of%20Ankara’s%20goals%20in%20this%20trip,%20and%20Turkey%20wants%20to%20make%20the%20most%20of%20Iraq’s%20economic%20capacities.%0A

Iraq and Turkey signed 26 agreements and memorandums of understanding in the fields of security, trade, water, development and other fields. Trying to achieve the goals of the “Development Path” project is one of the most important goals of Turkey in Iraq, and it is supposed to connect Iraq’s Faw port to Turkey and create a new trade passage from Faw to Turkey’s Mersin port on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. have financial participation. For this reason, in addition to Abdulkader Oraloglu, the Minister of Transport and Infrastructure of Turkey and Razzak Mohibs Al-Sadawi, the Minister of Transport of Iraq, Jassim Bin Saif Al-Sulaiti, the Minister of Transport and Communications of Qatar, and Sohail Mohammad Al-Mazrouei, the Minister of Energy and Infrastructure of the UAE, also participated in the signing ceremony of the memorandum. understanding were present.

Erdogan, after meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani, announced at a joint press conference: “This trip and the agreements signed are a new milestone in The relations between Turkey and Iraq will be The strategic framework agreement for joint cooperation that we signed with the honorable Prime Minister of Iraq is a valuable and solid roadmap. Cooperation in the field of security and fighting terrorism was one of the most important topics on our agenda. We welcome Iraq’s official reference to the fact that the PKK is a banned group, and we discussed the joint measures that can be implemented against the PKK terrorist group and its branches that target Turkey from Iraqi territory. Erdogan also said about the continued attacks of the Zionist regime on Gaza: “With the Iraqi authorities, we examined the effects of Israel’s oppression in Palestine on our region and discussed the joint steps we can take.”

Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, the Prime Minister of Iraq, also linked the security of Iraq and Turkey and announced: “In this meeting, we discussed the security cooperation that will ensure the stability of Turkey and Iraq.” Guaranteed, we agreed. We cannot allow an attack on another country through the territory of Iraq”.

In the past years, Iraq has become one of the most important export destinations and business partners of Turkey. During his trip to Baghdad, Erdogan said about the volume of trade exchanges: “The volume of trade between our country and Iraq was about 20 billion dollars last year. We want to increase this volume to higher levels. We talked with the prime minister about the measures we should take in this regard”.

Triangle of Turkish objectives in Iraq

During the past years, Turkey has created special problems for Iraq in the sensitive area of ​​water and security. Countering PKK terrorist movements by the Turkish Air Force and Ground Forces has repeatedly caused the villagers of the border regions of northern Iraq to lose their security and the possibility of movement and daily activities, and the safety of civilians in the region has been put in danger. Also, by building dams and controlling the amount of water entering Iraq, Turkey has practically put its neighbor in a tight spot, while large areas of northern and southern Iraq have become a market for the consumption of Turkish goods. Therefore, we can briefly say that economy, security and water are the three sides of the triangle of Turkey’s goals in Iraq.

Turkey is looking to buy oil from Iraq and wants to transfer Iraqi gas in the future, and in addition to huge construction projects, in the market of food consumption, clothing and Iraq’s furniture, won big points and used the pressure card in the field of water. At the same time, it seeks to put an end to the terrorist threats of the PKK with the cooperation and accompaniment of the Iraqi army as well as the Peshmerga forces of the Iraqi Kurdistan region. But it is still not clear that in the field of action, to what extent the joint operational committee can create the possibility of coordinating forces and changing the conditions on the ground.

Erdogan’s trip to Erbil

The President of Turkey, after the end of his meetings in Baghdad, went to Erbil to meet and talk with the heads of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. One of the important highlights of Erdoğan’s visit to Erbil was that he met with Regional President Nechirvan Barzani, Regional Prime Minister Masrour Barzani and members of the local cabinet, but he did not meet with Bafel Talabani, leader of the Iraqi Kurdistan Patriotic Union Party. Some journalists and analysts who accompanied Erdogan on this trip announced that Ankara took a position against Talabani under the pretext of the freedom of action of the Turkish Kurdistan Workers’ Party in Sulaimaniyah, and in recent weeks, Erdogan and Minister Hakan Fidan His cabinet’s foreign affairs have repeatedly warned the Patriotic Union and criticized Talabani.

However, although there is a growing and established relationship between Turkey and the Kurdistan Democratic Party led by Barzani, control of Iraq’s oil remains with the central government in Baghdad. And after the court ruling, Turkey and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq cannot sell Iraqi oil illegally.

Result

Iraq, as one of the richest countries in the region, in addition to oil and energy, in other sectors such as agriculture and the consumer market, is receiving the attention of the Turkish government and the private sector. has taken. It is expected that in the situation where Turkey’s economic crisis has engulfed and inflation and the inability to finance the country’s economy have faced great problems, Iraq will practically become a breathing channel and Erdogan’s government will solve part of its economic problems with gifts and gifts. Iraq should solve.