June 24, 1992 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS 16143 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS TURKEY'S IMPORTANT NEW ROLE atrocities inflicted on the Azeris by the Ar­ Kyrgyzstan has 4.4 million people, a 640- menians. Pictures of this appeared in most mile border with China, an official language major American media, including The Post. and alphabet imposed for 70 years from Mos­ HON. JIM MOODY The author never points this out. Nor does cow, development needs uncounted- and a OF WISCONSIN she bother to explain how the Armenian ag­ long-lost friend in the West with whom to IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES gression into Nakhichevan and Azerbaijan share new dreams. contravenes every principle of international Wednesday, June 24, 1992 "The Turks are our brothers," law and order. She does not mention the out­ Sherimkulov said. " We share the same blood, Mr. MOODY. Mr. Speaker, as many of you cry in the Conference on Security and Co­ the same religion and the same language. know, I have undertaken over the past many operation in Europe, NATO and the Euro­ This is the motherland. It can help us in all months in a series of speeches and "Dear pean Community against it. Indeed, the things." United States, Germany and other world Sherimkulov had come to the Turkish cap­ Colleague" letters to raise issues that I believe powers have repeatedly called upon the Ar­ should be of interest to all who are following ital at the head of an official delegation menian leadership to stop its naked aggres­ looking for aU-in-the-family economic help the unfolding events in and around the former sion against a country unable, at this time, and to enroll bright Kyrgyz students on Soviet Republics of Central Asia. to defend itself. scholarships at Turkish universities. In inde­ Today I would like to share with the House Yet the article seems to condone Arme­ pendence, Kyrgyzstan and its neighbors want two recent items. The first is a letter to the nia's grabbing land by force from a neighbor an alternative to dominance by Russia. Washington Post on June 23, 1992, from Am­ undergoing a difficult political trans­ A pleased if somewhat bemused beneficiary formation, and portrays sympathetically the bassador Nuzhet Kandemir of the Republic of of the collapse of the Soviet Empire, Turkey Armenian militia volunteers occupying is embarked on a full-court press to extend Turkey regarding Turkey's rising concerns Azerbaijan. over the hostilities between Armenia and Azer­ The article also includes, without noting its influence east and west to Turkic lands baijan. Specifically, the Turkish Ambassador their controversial nature, the allegations and communities so long cut off from West­ ern influences. raises several valid criticisms of a recent Post that the Armenians were the subject of geno­ cide under the Ottoman Empire. I have writ­ For decades the eastern flank of NATO, story that ignored the military aggression by Turkey suddenly offers the West the pros­ Armenian forces against Azerbaijan. ten to The Post several times outlining the position of scholars specializing in Ottoman pect of a relatively sturdy bridge eastward to And second, in order to appreciate the con­ studies. These scholars contend that 2 mil­ little-known, volatile, unstable new nations text and to provide background for Turkey's lion Turks and several hundred thousand Ar­ hungry for change. But its spreading of the broad interest in this matter, and in the newly menians fell victim to the Armenian-initi­ gospel of Western political and economic val­ emerging Turkic-speaking nations of Central ated civil war during World War I through ues to the East also improves Turkey's Asia, I am also attaching an article from the famine, epidemics and intercommunal vio­ standing in the West; there this valued lence. For seven decades, the Armenians American ally is seeking membership in the Los Angeles Times of May 19, 1992, entitled European Community. "Turkey Emerges as West's Influential Bridge have chosen to portray that tragedy as unique to them. Now some are attempting to In five Islamic former Soviet republics ex­ to East." portray the Armenian Republic's lust for tending in a long and lonely arc from the I urge Members to consider these two arti­ Azeri lands as somehow justifiable. It is not. Caspian Sea to the Chinese border, there are cles carefully. The United States has a strong NUZHET KANDEMIR, Turkic majorities: Azerbaijan, political, trade and security interest in strength­ Ambassador, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and ening, and supporting democratic institutions Republic of Turkey. Kyrgyzstan. There is also a 30-percent and government structures in these emerging WASHINGTON. Turkic minority in Tajikistan, where the majority speaks a Persian-related language countries. Largely Muslim and predominantly [From the Los Angeles Times, May 19, 1992] and the Turkish-Iranian struggle for influ­ Turkic-speaking peoples from Bulgaria to TURKEY EMERGES AS WEST'S INFLUENTIAL ence is particularly marked. Kirghizistan and beyond will look to Turkey BRIDGE TO EAST Turkey, a republic sprung from the re­ and the United States for inspiration, or-if we (By William D. Montalbano) mains of the Ottoman Empire, spent decades fail to respond-to the radical and antidemo­ studiously ignoring neighborhood spats. But ANKARA, TURKEY.-lt is an adventuresome, cratic doctrines of fundamentalist, theocratic it emerged as a major allied player in last historic spring for Turkey. The prime min­ year's Gulf War. Since the collapse of com­ regimes like Iran or politico-terrorist states like ister, the national airline, diplomats, busi­ Libya and Syria. munism, it has bulked large in Bulgaria, nessmen, Big Bird and the Cookie Monster where there is a strong Turkish minority, [From the Washington Post, June 23, 1992] have all been dispatched on voyages of explo­ and farther west, where brother Muslims ARMENIA'S "NAKED AGGRESSION" ration to uncharted lands of Central Asia. Turkey is shaking off decades of Cold War look for Turkish support from Albania and It is interesting that the slant of the June aloofness, emerging as a new regional power Bosnia-Herzegovina. 10 news story on the Azeri-Armenian conflict at a volatile and busy international cross­ More than 1,000 Turkish businessmen have was decidedly pro-Armenian. Previous Post roads. set up shop in Romania. Turkish construc­ articles on the conflict were much more bal­ It is testing new muscles in direct competi­ tion teams are building roads, airports and anced, whereas this one was inaccurate to tion with Iran and China for friends and cus­ hospitals from the Persian Gulf north in to the point of misrepresentation. tomers across a broad swath of awakening Russia. Some 3 million Turkish workers live For instance, the bunker that the Arme­ Central Asia. in Western Europe, half of them in Germany. nian militiamen in the story are occupying There are questions about the dollars-and­ Nationalists claim proudly that, counting was not only dug by Azerbaijanis, it lies cents benefits for Turkey. But for a still­ the Central Asians, there are about 140 mil­ within the borders of Azerbaijan-on Mil Hill poor nation sprung from the ruins of an em­ lion Turks, including 15 million in Iran and to be precise. Thus when the " housewife" pire, the new role swells national pride. 13 million in China. Almost 60 million of militiaman says, " It is our land down From the sidelines, the United States and them are in the republics of Central Asia; there," she is reiterating the expansionist Western Europe applaud the growing Turk­ double-locked in remote hinterlands and in policies that brought Armenian forces into ish shadow, which also newly extends into sterile Soviet communism for seven decades, Azerbaijan and keep them there. the Balkans and the Middle East. they are belatedly entering this century. The place names that the author cites­ Medetkan Sherimkulov, agape at the glit­ They are in a hurry to get with the pro­ Nakhichevan, Nagorno-Karabagh, Shusha ter of a swirling hotel lobby here, is a man gram-computers to stereos, jeans to jets. and Khojaly- as having become battle cries, of these new Turkic times. He looks Chinese Who better to lead the way than long-lost "with hundreds dead on both sides and tens but turns out to be the affable chairman of cousins who settled in what is now Turkey of thousands of refugees," all lie within the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of after migrations that began a millennium Azeri territory. I might add that Khojaly and Kyrgyzstan, a poor, remote and newly inde­ ago in those same Asian steppes that are now Shusha were the scenes of indescribable pendent shard of the former Soviet Union. so anxious for development? • This "bullet" symbol identifies statements or insertions which are not spoken by a Member of the Senate on the floor. Matter set in this typeface indicates words inserted or appended, rather than spoken, by a Member of the House on the floor. 16144 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS June 24, 1992 Seen from Central Asian eyes so long for­ vision signals but also provide direct links to lient of Central Asian politicians can be sure bidden to peer beyond Moscow, brawny Tur­ the West for telecommunications, most of that either democracy or free market eco­ key is everything they are not-but might which is now routed through Moscow. nomics will take root. like to be. The U.S. government may sublease time on In the view of the Western powers, that is It is the world's only democratic, secular the current Turkish-controlled satellite cir­ all the more reason Turkey is to be encour­ Muslim state, a dynamic workshop for rapid cuits for its own television programming to aged in playing East.