SEP (Turkey) Statement on the rising aggression against Yemen and Iran and the coalition between the Saudi Monarchy, Turkey, and Pakistan

END SUPPORT FOR THE SAUDI MONARCHY, TRUMP AND ISRAEL!

THE MECCA AGREEMENT MUST BE ABROGATED!

1- The AKP government is increasingly and openly aligning itself with the interests of US imperialism in the Middle East. The so-called Mecca Agreement, signed in Mecca with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan and presented as a “joint defence agreement,” is not, as Erdoğan claims, an innocent regional peace initiative that “does not target any country.” Iran and its allies are clearly among its targets. The Saudi monarchy, one of the most loyal lackeys of the US in the Middle East, is already hinting that it could intervene in Yemen under the pretext of the Mecca Agreement and the obligations arising from it. Moreover, the fact that such statements can be made by the foreign minister even though the agreement has not been approved by the parliament and no authorization for external military intervention has been granted by parliament is a scandal in itself!

We ask: Last year, Afghanistan and Pakistan fought a border war in which hundreds of people lost their lives. If this war flares up again, will Turkey also declare war on Afghanistan? We ask because, according to the Mecca Agreement, if one of the parties is attacked, the other parties will regard the attack as an attack against themselves and join the war! This foreign policy is a completely US-oriented, utterly irresponsible, and entirely unserious masterpiece of the AKP.

What kind of rot is it to join forces with the rotten Saudi dynasty and attack, or threaten to attack, the Houthis, who are waging a struggle that is anti-American and anti-Israeli and enjoy broad popular support? Sending the people of this country to Yemen to kill and die for US, Israeli, and Saudi interests, or threatening Yemen in this direction, is absolutely unacceptable. While selling its supposed anti-Israeli rhetoric in domestic politics, the AKP government is in reality taking its alliance with the US-Israeli partnership to a new level. There is no other explanation for this!

The Saudi monarchy’s military intervention and blockade of Yemen has continued since 2015. Under one of the longest-running conditions of famine and blockade in the world, a child dies every ten minutes as a result of hunger and the blockade. Those who have remained silent for eleven years in the face of the suffering of the Yemeni people now rush to the front whenever it comes to protecting Saudi interests!

The US has suffered a major defeat in Iran. For the US-Israeli camp, which refuses to accept this defeat and is prolonging the war, control over Yemen is of great importance, since Iran is gaining a major advantage through its control of two critical maritime chokepoints, putting it in a position to inflict an outright defeat on the US-Israeli camp. These are the strategic calculations behind the stick being waved at the Houthis through the Mecca Agreement. The working class of Turkey must reject this agreement and any participation in US-Israeli aggression with an internationalist and anti-imperialist stance. If security is desired in the Middle East, the forces that must be stopped are the Saudi executioners and the Zionist killers.

2- The same hypocrisy is laid bare in the case of Iran. Unable to force Iran into submission militarily, the US is deepening its economic and strategic siege, seeking to suffocate Iran through sanctions targeting its oil revenues, financial system, aviation sector, and channels of foreign trade. Instead of at least remaining neutral, the Erdoğan government is enthusiastically joining the US in its efforts to further suffocate its neighbouring country through economic blockade measures.

While delivering anti-imperialist rhetoric in its speeches, the AKP government is, in practice, fully aligning itself with the US’s financial and regional siege of Iran. Faced with the threat of punishment by US courts, the government has forced Halkbank to implement the US sanctions regime to the letter and cut its financial ties with Iran, thereby aligning Turkey’s banking system with the directives of the US Treasury Department. Indeed, the Iran-based Bank Mellat, which is on the US sanctions list, has seen its operations in Turkey crippled through financial isolation; Turkish companies providing services to Iran’s Mahan Air have likewise been forced to withdraw in the face of US secondary-sanctions threats. The AKP government has become the enforcer, within Turkey’s borders, of the Washington-Tel Aviv axis’s sanctions against Iran.

This policy, which will contribute to the impoverishment of the Iranian people and the intensification of the war in the region, is turning Turkey into a de facto enforcer of the imperialist siege. Given that Iran has retaliated against neighbouring countries that have participated, even indirectly, in attacks against Iran by cooperating with the US, it is clear how dangerously and recklessly the AKP is dragging Turkey into troubled waters.

The disarming of the Palestinian movement, regime change in Syria based on imperialist intervention, and the economic strangulation of Iran are all parts of the same imperialist plan. The AKP regime needs Trump’s support to prolong its own rule. That is why it is doing whatever Trump demands, dragging the country into increasingly dangerous waters.

• WE REJECT THE AKP’S COLLABORATION WITH THE REGIONAL INTERESTS OF US IMPERIALISM, FROM SYRIA TO IRAN AND FROM YEMEN TO PALESTINE!
• ALL EMBARGOES AND SANCTIONS ON IRAN AND YEMEN MUST END IMMEDIATELY! KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF!
• THE AKP MUST IMMEDIATELY WITHDRAW FROM YEMEN AND SYRIA! THE MECCA AGREEMENT MUST BE ABROGATED!
• US IMPERIALISM, THE AKP GOVERNMENT AND THE SAUDI MONARCHY: GET OUT OF THE MIDDLE EAST!
• LONG LIVE THE UNITED CLASS STRUGGLE OF THE POOR AND OPPRESSED PEOPLES OF THE MIDDLE EAST!