There was a really interesting confluence of meetings in Turkey last week, roughly coincident with the final push on the shameless UN resolution on Lebanon. King Abdullah from Saudi Arabia showed up with a delegation 400, plus many, many limousines, for meetings with Turkey's President, Prime Minister, business and military leaders. Under discussion were investment and security agreements, and Turkish participation in Gulf so-called `mega-projects'. Almost as soon as the Desert Kingdom's ruler's delegation was ushered off the airport tarmac and on its way into Ankara, the Foreign minister of Iran flew in. Then, surprise, surprise, the vice-Premier of Iraq, Al-Hashemi arrived, and reports surfaced that on the 12th of August, while all these dignitaries were present, Turkey's Prime Minister Erdogan had a telephone discussion with Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki. These developments are discussed in: Saudi Arabia , Turkey Set to Boost Trade Ties, http://www.thenewanatolian.com/opinion-12755.html, and http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=51396.

Then, on Monday it was reported that Iraqi and Iranian oil ministers had concluded an agreement under which Iraq will ship Basra light to refineries in Iran, and Iran will ship refined products back into Iraq Iran, Iraq sign oil products exchange deal . This will, perhaps, help counter the oil blockade which Baghdad has recently been under as a result of sabotage of the pipeline out of the Kirkuk oil-fields to the refinery which supplies Baghdad at Baiji. Today Turkish and Iranian oil ministers met, to discuss opening up Iranian oil fields to Turkish companies, and Turkish purchases of Iranian reserves. Turkey, in exchange, is to help Iran market natural gas in Europe http://zaman.com/?bl=economy&alt=&hn=35669. Both of these agreements are major snubs to the US policy of embargoing Iran, especially on energy deals. They indicate that what Bush did with the Israeli proxy may well have crossed the line for countries in the area which had hitherto been US major supporters, like NATO member Turkey.

To some, this all portends the emergence of a kind of re-groupment among non-Shi'ites in the neighborhood to counter the growing influence of Iran, Syria and Hezbollah. To others, given Turkey's concerns with its own Kurdish minority, and therefore the way Turkish internal politics and foreign policy desires, such as EEC membership, have become tied to the way Iraq's civil war and possible partition are proceeding, (if Turkey follows its previous impulses and crushes the Kurds, EEC membership may well be over, and so probably will be the Erdogan government).

It may, alternatively, indicate an effort to try to stem the flood tide that seems to be sweeping war and dislocation through the region. In either case Kurdistan seems to have a key part to play. Either Kurdistan will be a lever against all the countries in the neighborhood which contain Kurdish minorities, or it may perhaps become a transmission belt for a different policy into Iraq. The link will take you to the Wikipedia entry for the first cut at the area, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan . Kurdistan has something for everyone, including Israel, most of the region's larger rivers rise in the mountains of Eastern Anatolia, including the Tigris and the Euphrates, and oil, one plan envisions building a pipeline from Kirkuk through Syria to Israel's Mediterranean coast.

Turkish and Iranian military are reported to have been shelling positions of Kurdish guerrillas. The shooting is said to have taken place around Hakur which is where the borders of Turkey, Iran and Iraq come together,
( http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=51441 ) . The fighting is said to have begun on Saturday the 12th. Last week the head of the Iraqi autonomous Kurdish area Barzani said that the Turks had launched attacks into Iraqi territory.

Both Turkey and Iran are said to have been building up military deployments on their respective borders with the Iraqi Kurdish area. This activity has been reported in http://www.kurdmedia.com/news.asp?id=12999 and in the Montreal Gazette http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/news/story.html?id=8ff2db31-0d29-480f-9921-ad10a3504270&k= 97667 and other places. Kurdmedia considers that Turkey and Iran are both on the same wavelength on the Kurdish question. Turkey is concerned about PKK attacks in eastern Anatolia. The Iranians by the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan's call for Kurds in Western Iran to begin a civil disobedience campaign against Teheran. Turkey has deployed around 250,000 troops into position on its south eastern border, and is said to have conducted at least 53 incursions into Iraqi territory since March. By contrast, when Turkey deployed to pressure Syria into handing over the Kurdish terrorist Ocalan in 1998, 30,000 troops were sent to the border area. The current deployment may be in strength sufficient enough to occupy the whole of Iraqi Kurdistan.

On August 1st General Yasar Buyukanit was appointed Chief of the Turkish military to replace the retiring General Hilmi Ozkok. Buyukanit is known as a "blunt-speaking hawk" active against Kurdish separatists in the 1990's. It is not known here how many troops the Iranians have deployed. Both countries are said to be sealing off their borders.
Yesterday Iraqi Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani was reported to have called for the formation of a Kurdish army within the autonomous territory. It is not clear what this means, for a major part of the national army in Iraq is Kurdish,. If it means transforming parts of the Iraqi national army into a Kurdish force, this will spell major trouble for the Bush policy of "as they stand up, we stand down". The Iraqi national army is majority Kurdish, organized out of the Pesh Merga militia. If it means calling up additional Pesh Merga units into a local army, it will be something else.
http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=490&language_id=1 .

At this time the military deployments can be seen as both preparatory to what can be expected from Bush, and as efforts to pressure the Kurds. The Iraqi Kurdish autonomous area is beginning to shake itself free of the rest of the country. Both Turkey and Iran have to face up to how to deal with the emergence of an institutional rallying point for the substantial Kurdish minorities in both their countries, as well as Turkey. Saudi Arabia is going to have to figure out how to deal with a Shi'ite neighbor on its north-eastern border if it has not done so already.

On August 8th the legislative body of the Iraqi Kurds published a draft law arrogating to itself the right to control petroleum operations in its own territory, and in the province of Kirkuk, (Steve Negus ft.com August 8th) where 1/3rd of Iraq's oil is produced. Kirkuk is not part of Iraq's Kurdish territory, but is claimed for the Kurdish territory by both major Kurdish political parties. It is a life and death issue for Iraq's Sunnis. If the Kurds take Kirkuk, the country's oil resources will be divided between the Kurds in the north, and the Shi'ites of Basra in the south, with nothing, or very little, for anyone else.

Under the constitution adopted last year a referendum is to be held in Kirkuk by the end of 2007 to determine "the will of the people". The constitution does not relate the referendum to the assimilation of Kirkuk into Kurdish territory, nor does it make it a vote on who gets the oil. The Kurds seem to be acting on the basis that possession is 9/10th of the law, and using Bush's tactics of pre-emption. Kurds displaced from Kirkuk by Saddam are being relocated back there from all over the country. Non Kurdish inhabitants of Kirkuk, including especially Sunni Arabs are being kicked out. There are nearly 200,000 displaced people in and around the city, according to a Reuters Alertnet report of Monday.

On the 30th July the Kurdish Assembly passed a foreign investment law, allowing foreign investors 100% ownership, full transfer of profits, ten years of tax relief, and free land for investment. Kurdish spokesmen said the "lion's share" is for Turkey http://www.the newanatolian.com/opinion-12027.htm. These two laws are inducements to Turkey to drop the policy it has maintained toward the Kurds since Ataturk drowned the provisions of the Treaty of Sevres in the blood of Greeks, Armenians, and Kurds, and "make a deal". That is supposed to be what the Americans want. Condolezza Rice does not want Turkey to attack the PKK. She is looking for a qualified American to be part of a tri-partite commission between Turkey, Iraq and the US to take care of the question. Whether what the Americans want can offset the blood lust for revenge of generations revived in current political independence movements is another matter. Whether she wanted energy agreements involving Turkey, Iran and Iraq is something else she will have to deal with.

The flow of crude oil from the northern producing areas to the Baiji refinery for the capital Baghdad has been shut down with another round of attacks on the pipeline, http://www.iags.org/iraqpipelinewatch.com. The Baiji refinery has been closed because of a huge explosion. The storage facilities for the product from the refinery at Latifiyah south of Baghdad have been shut down because of death threats against the people who work there. Baghdad has been under an internal oil embargo. In late January of this year the governor of Kirkuk Abd-el-Rahman Mustafa threatened to suspend oil shipments to the rest of the country http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=449&language_id=1 .

Against this backdrop Hussein Al-Sharistani, Iraqi Oil Minister traveled to Teheran to meet with his Iranian counter-part and conclude a deal under which Basra light would be shipped to Iranian refineries and kerosene would be shipped back into Iraq to try to break the fuel blockade of Baghdad. The two ministers were expected to explore joint development of shared fields. "On the likelihood of US opposition to close cooperation with Iran in the vital oil industry, Sharistani said Baghdad decides on the basis of maximizing its own interests". http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/story.aspx?dist=newsfinder&siteid=google&guid=%732395c fe1-f843-41e2-8336-6293779f7d63%7d&keyword=

These are indications that some who have been prepared to travel with Bush down the road he has chosen may be deciding that there will be just too much more sorrow involved for them to continue on their way with him. It is a cross-roads, or turn off, which many others will be choosing too, and not just in the Mid East.