Limits of relations with Iran

First, we must say that the biggest win for Iran, which has been suffering from a sort of international isolation due to its anti-Israel discourse and foreign policy, with the risk of this grip of isolation tightening, is that it was able to make this visit to Turkey, a NATO member, under these circumstances. This visit was a hard-to-find opportunity for Iran to render dysfunctional international efforts to isolate Iran. As Ahmadinejad has long sought to visit Turkey, the party that must be congratulated or criticized for the visit is Turkish diplomacy, which eventually gave the green light after a long period of hesitation.

We can safely conclude that Ahmadinejad made rather good use of his visit to İstanbul, an important world city, and turned it into a public relations campaign directed at both the Turkish and international communities. This is backed by the fact that he was not satisfied with his joint press conference with Turkish President Abdullah Gül, but met with journalists and academics at a breakfast and held a surprise -- and long -- press conference after it.

His attending Friday prayer with Sunni Turks at a mosque built by Iran's historical and regional rival, the Ottoman Empire, was an important part of this PR campaign and is, as Ahmadinejad put, "a very important political event." The propriety of describing an ordinary act of worship as an "important political event" can be understood by those aware of what Sunni and Shiite thoughts correspond to in the regional competition.

Ahmadinejad attending Friday prayer in an Ottoman mosque in İstanbul with an enthusiastic show of support from the Sunni people can be seen as a historical moment in Iran's move toward eliminating the historical distrust between the two countries.

We can conclude that Turkish-Iranian relations, on the rise in recent years in the fields of counterterrorism, security, trade, tourism and communications, will receive a considerable boost after this visit. Many bilateral agreements were signed during the visit, and they give room for hope in this respect. The joint will to increase the trade volume between the two countries to $20 billion in the future signals developments in the interest of both countries.

Moreover, by opening its doors to the leader of Iran, which is known to pursue a foreign policy independently of pressures from foreign powers, Turkey has once again showed its ability to develop and pursue policies irrespective of international powers when its national interests so demand. Turkey attaches great importance to developing good relations with Iran, and it acts according to its own national interests while exerting efforts to use its good bilateral relations toward the interests of the international community. Within this framework Turkish diplomacy seeks to assume a "facilitator role" in the settlement of the nuclear crisis with Iran. This is the reason Ahmadinejad was told to "take into consideration international concerns" during the talks in İstanbul.

Ahmadinejad said: "It is perfectly natural that Iran, Turkey, Syria and Iraq cooperate in all areas from economy to culture, from politics to security, as these countries belong to the same cultural basin. ... Turkey and Iran may complement each other by combining their means. The cooperation between the two countries may create a big power that can be used for the establishment of regional and world peace. We can make it if we continue to walk toward dignity. We are happy to see the existence of this will in both countries." His words are music to our ears.

Yet it is still unknown whether these amiable words correspond to any real policy. At least, despite the fact that one year has passed since a memorandum of understanding was signed for about $3.5 billion worth of energy cooperation between the two countries, the agreement could not be concluded during the İstanbul visit, which implies that the bilateral relations do not have wide non-rhetorical aspects. Despite all these good words, the Iranian leader has not yet undersigned this agreement with Turkey, which embraced him despite international pressures.

Iran introduced new conditions regarding prices and investment terms in the energy field, and this attitude gives credence to the argument that Iran does not see Turkey as a partner in the energy field but rather as a transit route through which to access European markets. This attitude is also a concrete indication of the possible limits of potential relations Turkey may develop with Iran. However, the two countries need to develop actual relations that would boost concrete projects rather than playing with words with the rhetorical capabilities provided by the Persian language.