The truth about Ankara sofagate
by Thierry Meyssan
Tuesday 13th of April 2021
The press has wrongly presented the protocol incident in Ankara as a humiliation of the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen by President Erdoğan. In reality, the latter in collusion with the President of the Council of the Union, Charles Michel, tried to hoist the latter to the non-existent post of President of the Union.
News agencies widely disseminated images of the European Union / Turkey summit in Ankara on April 6, 2021. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is seen receiving European Council President Charles Michel and Commission President. European Union, Ursula von der Leyen. There are only two seats for three. Madame von der Leyen, after standing for a while, goes to sit on a sofa.
The European media interpreted these images as an insult directed by the Turkish autocrat to the European Union. Some saw it as a confirmation of his machismo. However, this is absolutely false and masks a serious problem within the European Union.
The interview should have taken place in Brussels and President Erdoğan went out of his way to make him stay at his home in Ankara. It was prepared by telephone by the protocol services of both parties. The layout of the courtroom conformed to the requirements of the European Union. It was not President Erdoğan who wanted to humiliate Ursula von der Leyen.
To understand what happened, we have to place the event in the context of the evolution of the Union's institutions.
On March 25, thirteen days before the Ankara interview, the Council of European Heads of State and Government was held. Due to the Covid outbreak, the meeting was not physical, but via video conference. It brought together the 27 heads of state under the presidency of Charles Michel, plus their real leader: the President of the United States Joe Biden [ 1 ]. The latter confirmed unequivocally that Washington needed a strong European Union at its command. He gave several instructions, in particular to maintain good relations with Turkey despite the various current disputes (delimitation of borders in the eastern Mediterranean; military occupation of Cyprus, Iraq and Syria; violation of the UN embargo in Libya ; religious interference in Europe).
Certainly President Trump intended to replace imperial relations with the United States with commercial relations. He had questioned both NATO and the European Union. He had made the Europeans face up to their responsibilities. But the United States' attempt to return to the organization of the world inherited from World War II has met with no opposition. All European leaders find it more comfortable to place their Defense under the “American umbrella” and to pay the price for it.
The European Union was built in several stages.
- Initially, in 1949, the United States and the United Kingdom placed the whole of Western Europe within an unequal alliance, NATO. They intended to govern the area of influence they had negotiated with the Soviet Union. Subsequently, in 1957, they encouraged six NATO member states (including one occupied by them militarily) to conclude the Treaty of Rome which constituted the European Economic Community, ancestor of the European Union. This new body was to structure a common market by imposing trade standards set by NATO. This is why the EEC was organized around two Powers: a bureaucracy, the Commission, responsible for translating Anglo-Saxon NATO standards into local law and a Council of Heads of State and Government responsible for implementing these decisions in their own country.
- This Cold War device having been designed against the USSR, its purpose was called into question with the latter's disappearance in 1991. After many adventures, Washington imposed a new architecture: Secretary of State James Baker announced before the holding of the Council of West European Heads of State and Government that NATO and the EEC, renamed the European Union, would accept in their midst all the states of the former Warsaw Pact, except Russia. The institutions, imagined for 6 Member States, had to be reformed to be practiced at 28, or even more.
- When President Trump decided to disengage his country from its imperial obligations, some European officials imagined transforming the European Union into an independent and sovereign superpower, on the model of the United States, to the detriment of the member states. They censored Italy's budget and put Hungary and Poland on trial. But they met too much resistance and failed to transform the Commission into a superstate. The return of the US sponsor with President Biden provides a glimpse of a new institutional outcome: the Commission would continue to translate NATO's ever-increasing standards into European law and the Council to implement them into national law, but given the number of its member states,
Until now the Presidents of the Commission and the Council have been equals. If the President of the Commission was at the head of an imposing bureaucracy, that of the Council was a small figure, just responsible for setting the agenda and recording decisions. However, neither was elected, but civil servant. Both had the same status by protocol.
Charles Michel therefore indicated to his colleague Recep Tayyip Erdoğan that he aspired to become the Union's super-head of state, while the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, would only be his super "Prime Minister".
It was Charles Michel and he alone who provoked the “protocol incident” in Ankara. President Erdoğan was only too happy to render him this service because he thus divided the European Unionists. If you watch the videos carefully, you will find that Charles Michel climbs the steps of the White Palace without waiting for Ursula von der Leyen, then rushes into the available armchair and clings to it instead of giving way to Madame von der Leyen or to leave the room with her if we do not bring them an extra chair. If you read his statement at the end of the interview, you will find that he does not even mention the incident [ 2]. If you watch Turkish videos of the same incident, you will find that the sofa on which the President of the Commission sits faces another where the Turkish Foreign Minister, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu is seated, in accordance with the instructions of the European Protocol. Indeed, there is no longer a Prime Minister in Turkey since the regime has become presidential. Mr Çavuşoğlu, therefore legitimately sits facing the European “Prime Minister”.
This is not a diplomatic incident, but an attempt by Charles Michel to arrogate to himself a power within the Union to the detriment of the latter. The battle has only begun.
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