By: Kayhan Int’l Staff Writer

 

It was a tough fight, almost a neck-to-neck run between incumbent Recep Tayyip Erdogan and presidential aspirant Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who lost by a narrow margin in the run-off vote to give the former a third 5-year term.

Anyway it was a victory for democracy and for the Turkish Muslim people, who want resumption of Ankara’s diplomatic ties with Damascus, resolving the issue of water flow to Iraq, further growth of cooperation with the Islamic Republic of Iran, support for the liberation of Palestine from the Zionist yoke, confronting terrorism, solution to the tensions with Greece and Armenia, end to European meddling in Turkish affairs, and changing the one-sided relationship with hegemon US.

Let us hope Erdogan who is in charge of the country for the past two decades (first as prime minister and since 2014 as president) and has restored to Turkiyeh its religious and cultural identity by ending the power of the Kemalist generals, will succeed in his endeavours.

President Ibrahim Raisi in his congratulatory message has expressed hope that Erdogan who opposes the illegal US sanctions on Iran, will in his new term in office give further boost to Ankara’s economic, political, security, cultural, and trade relations with Tehran.

As a matter of fact, trade transactions over the past two months between Iran and Turkiyeh saw a 23 percent increase in Iranian exports which totaled 7.5 billion US dollars, and 15 percent increase in imports which almost reached 7 billion dollars.

The two countries, along with Russia, also closely cooperate in resolution of the US-Israeli engineered crisis in Syria, and recently they invited senior Syrian officials to their meeting.

Ankara has revised its misconstrued policy towards Damascus and is eager for peace with its neighbour, especially the issue of repatriation of the 4 million plus Syrian refugees driven across the Turkish borders by the American-backed Takfiri terrorists.

Then there is the chronic question of Palestine and the almost daily desecration of Islam’s former qibla, the al-Aqsa mosque by the Zionists, whom the majority of the Turkish people despise and question the diplomatic ties of their country with Israel.

The government in Ankara and the Turkish Muslim people also resent the Islamophobia mentality of most European states, where terrorists fleeing justice are given asylum, where diplomats of Muslim countries are kidnapped and jailed on trumped up charges, and where enemies of humanity burn copies of the Holy Qur’an, especially in front of the Turkish embassies.

President Erdogan should take stock of such vexing issues and solidify ties with the Muslim countries, especially those sharing borders with Turkiyeh. The Islamic Republic of Iran will greatly help him in this field with its avowed policy of clearing the region from the unwanted presence of all outside powers and bolstering the Resistant Front.

It is worth noting that his presidential rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu during the recent election campaign had proposed setting up of what he called “Organization of Peace and Cooperation in West Asia” with Turkiye, Iran, Iraq, and Syria as member states.

It is reported that the Turkish president also shares such views, which means once such an organization is set up it will definitely turn the region into a solid bloc yielding rich dividends in the political, cultural, security, economic, and industrial fields.