So, love with “coupists” happens in a tight spot!

The isolation it has pushed Turkey into through unilateral interventions in the Eastern Mediterranean and, compounding this, the gradual exclusion it is starting to experience in Libya is forcing the Erdoğan administration to remanoeuvre.

The most striking of these manoeuvres are the fresh steps taken towards rapprochement with Egypt, with which relations have been strained for a long time. It is common knowledge that the Chief of the General Staff in Egypt, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, overthrew the Muslim Brotherhood Morsi administration in a military coup in 2013 and the Erdoğan administration, having lost one of its most important allies in the region, cut off relations with Egypt.

At every opportunity, President Erdoğan has included cutting off relations with Egypt in his domestic political repertoire dressed up as “opposition to coups and coupists.” However, in the same period, the Erdoğan administration took various steps to develop relations with Sudan’s coupist dictator al-Bashir and mutual visits were undertaken. So, the issue is not with Sisi being a coupist, but this coup having been staged against Muslim Brother Morsi who had a common alignment with the Erdoğan administration.

Anyhow, let us leave this aspect of the affair to one side and look at recent developments.

In an interview he gave the Qatar-based site named Araby21, AKP General Chair Consultant and Yeni Şafak columnist Yasin Aktay replied to the question as to whether there were contacts between Ankara and Cairo, “From what I’m hearing and seeing, there’s rapprochement and contact between the sides.”

More interestingly, in his 5 September article titled “Relations with Egypt and Kılıçdaroğlu’s Coupist Love Season,” harbinger of this development Yasin Aktay accused CHP Leader Kılıçdaroğlu, the latter having criticized President Erdoğan saying, “Why are you squabbling with Egypt?” of “being in love with the coupist.”

So, if Kılıçdaroğlu’s argument in favour of relations with Egypt is “love of coupists,” what is to be said about the Erdoğan administration’s “rapprochement and contact” of which Aktay speaks?

This “rapprochement and contact” with Sisi’s Egypt is for sure not devoid of cause.

It has come to the point at which the expansionist policy the Erdoğan administration has pursued with rhetoric such as “Being the game breaker” or “Undoing Sevres on the seas” has embroiled Turkey in serious tension and isolation

The Erdoğan administration aspired to be one of the event-swaying actors in the Libyan civil war with the support it was giving Sarraj’s Government of National Accord (GNA). Foreign Minister Çavuşoğlu said they would not recognize the ceasefire in Libya until Sirte and Jufra, held by Haftar’s Libyan National Army, were surrendered to the GNA. However, such pronouncements notwithstanding, the ceasefire was proclaimed, testifying to the Turkish ruling entity’s lack of sway over events in Libya. In continuation, talks under UN auspices to broker a political solution have started in Morocco between the GNA and the House of Representatives (HoR).

The ongoing tension with South Cyprus and Greece over maritime authority zones and energy exploration matters has paved the way for France to make new agreements with and arms sales to these forces and increase its clout in the Eastern Mediterranean. As a further consequence of the tension here, Turkey may face new sanctions at the outcome of the meeting of EU leaders slated to be held on 24-25 September

Following the USA’s lifting of its arms embargo, Secretary of State Pompeo then visited South Cyprus and the concern he voiced about Turkey’s actions in the region shows that the US, which yesterday was providing Turkey with support to counterbalance pro-Haftar Russia, is seeking to turn the new situation into an opportunity both to strengthen its position in the region and to up the pressure on the Erdoğan administration.

Squeezed from multiple sides, the Erdoğan administration has withdrawn the Oruç Reis seismic exploration ship to Antalya harbour due to the tension it was experiencing with South Cyprus and Greece and has started to speak of favouring a “peaceful solution.”

The quest for rapprochement with Egypt would surely be inconceivable absent these developments.

At this very point, the need arises to address the statement the CHP has made regarding these developments. In its statement on developments in the Eastern Mediterranean, the CHP Central Executive Committee considers the withdrawal of Oruç Reis to Antalya to be a compromise and calls on “the government not to compromise on our just causes.” It is clear that this stance, seeking to pressurize the ruling entity, legitimizes the expansionist policy that is stoking up the tension in the Eastern Mediterranean. The furthest this brand of opposition can go is to support “with a heavy heart” the embroiling of the country in conflict in the Aegean or elsewhere for the ruling entity to conceal the country’s problems by whipping up nationalism and one fine day win a possible election!

In summary, the developments that have brought the Erdoğan administration to the brink of “contact” with “coupist Sisi” present us with two important conclusions.

First, the expansionist foreign policy that forever confronts Turkey with fresh tension and threats is an impasse.

Second and more importantly, this policy results in the imperialists exploiting the ensuing developments to their own advantage and an increase in the relations of dependence with the imperialists of the regional reactionaries who are party to the tension.

Conversely, it is in the interests of the peoples of the country and region for the bourgeois reactionaries’ expansionist and armament contest to end, for problems to be solved through peaceful means and for resources to be expended on basic needs such as work, education, health and shelter.

Neither Yasin Aktay presuming to teach us about democracy out of opposition to “coupist Sisi” nor regaling us with news of “contact” with Egypt alters the truth: be they coupists or be they dictators in democratic guise, “love” of bourgeois reactionaries kills the peoples!