Turkish-Iranian rapprochement dubious

The Turkish government wants to boost trade with Iran while the West is considering imposing tougher sanctions on the country because of Tehran's nuclear programme. Turkey shouldn't go too far, writes the conservative daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung: "Officially the goal is to diversify Turkish policy, as conceived by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu. The basic idea of this policy is to complement Turkey's Western orientation by opening up to the country's Islamic neighbouring states with which Turkey has close religious and historical ties. For Prime Minister Erdoğan and President Gül the religious component in particular should be especially important. Before the rise of the conservative-Islamic governing party AKP the relationship between Ankara and Tehran was not the best for a long time. This had to do with the secularism of [founder of the Turkish state Mustafa Kemal] Atatürk. Turkey is a member of Nato and associated with the European Union. An eye should be kept on how much further it plans to go in its rapprochement to Iran."

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