VZCZCXRO4362
PP RUEHBC RUEHDE RUEHDIR RUEHKUK RUEHTRO
DE RUEHIT #0421/01 3141712
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 101712Z NOV 09
FM AMCONSUL ISTANBUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 9325
INFO RUCNIRA/IRAN COLLECTIVE PRIORITY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ISTANBUL 000421 
 
SIPDIS 
 
LONDON FOR MURRAY; BERLIN FOR ROSENSTOCK-STILLER; BAKU FOR 
MCCRENSKY; BAGHDAD FOR POPAL AND HUBAH; ASGHGABAT FOR 
TANGBORN; DUBAI FOR IRPO 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/10/2034 
TAGS: PREL PGOV ECON KNNP OIC TU IR
SUBJECT: AHMADINEJAD IN ISTANBUL 
 
REF: (A) 2008 ISTANBUL 438 (B) ISTANBUL 394 
 
Classified By: Deputy Principal Officer Win Dayton; Reason 1.5 (d) 
 
¶1.  (C) Summary:  Turkey and Iran have actively courted each 
other in recent months, including Foreign Ministerial bilats 
in August, September, and early November, Erdogan's October 
trip to Iran, and Ahmadinejad's November 8-9 Istanbul visit. 
Ahmadinejad came for the OIC Summit, but also to further bind 
Turkey in Iran's diplomatic embrace and paint a picture of a 
confident Iranian President surrounded by friendly 
counterparts including President Gul, Syrian President Assad, 
and Afghan President Karzai. 
 
¶2.  (C) Summary continued: This was more low-key than 
Ahmadinejad's 2008 visit, however, as the GOT did not allow 
him to speak to a public gathering or visit local sites.  In 
his press and OIC Summit remarks Ahmadinejad stuck to 
familiar talking points on the nuclear issue and US-Iran 
relations; he also blamed the global financial crisis on the 
practice of charging interest on loans, and urged the OIC not 
to trade in dollars or Euros.  Turkish officials pressed Iran 
on the side to send its low-enriched uranium (LEU) to Turkey 
to salvage the P5 1 TRR offer, but Iran was reportedly 
noncommittal.  Several contacts predict Turkey's relations 
with Iran will face serious challenges soon, especially if 
the P5-1's engagement with Iran ends and tougher measures 
against Iran are needed.  We agree the direction of 
Turkey-Iran relations going into 2010 will depend both on the 
status of P5-1 diplomacy and on whether Turkey continues to 
judge that its "positive" influence serves as a moderating 
and stabilizing factor vis-avis Iran's hard-line, defensive 
regime.  We will offer a more detailed look by septel at 
Turkey's efforts to influence Iran and the limits of that 
influence.  End Summary. 
 
Turkey and Iran:  Relations at a High point? 
---------------------------------------- 
¶3.  (C) Relations between Iran and Turkey have been marked by 
warm rhetoric and active courtship since President 
Ahmadinejad's August 2008 visit to Istanbul (ref A) and 
Turkey's critical response to Israel's January 2009 incursion 
into Gaza.  With a cautious lull before and after Iran's 
disputed June elections -- to avoid a perception of 
favoritism beforehand, and to allow the violent dust to 
settle afterwards -- this mutual effort has accelerated the 
past three months, including Iranian FM Mottaki's 
participation in the August "Friends of Democratic Pakistan" 
Ministerial in Istanbul, Turkish FM Davutogulu's 
mid-September visit to Tehran, Prime Minister Erdogan's late 
October travel to Tehran, Davutoglu's bilateral meeting with 
Mottaki at the D-8 Ministerial in Kuala Lumpur on November 1, 
and President Ahmandinejad's November 8-9 visit to Istanbul. 
One close observer of Turkish diplomacy, retired Turkish 
Ambassador Murat Bilhan (please protect), an international 
relations professor at Istanbul Kultur University, told us 
that Turkey's relations with Iran are currently at a high 
point, possibly the closest they have been since the Iranian 
revolution. 
 
Ahmadinejad in Istanbul 
-------------------- 
¶4. (C) The nominal purpose of Ahmadinejad's November 8-9 
visit to Istanbul was to participate in an OIC Summit focused 
on trade and anti-poverty measures.  However, several 
observers suggested the real reasons were to reciprocate 
Erdogan's Iran visit, further bind Turkey into a diplomatic 
embrace with Iran (personified by Ahmadinejad's apparently 
awkward attempt to bear-hug the much taller Erdogan at their 
November 8 bilat, according to a Press TV contact who saw 
it), and paint a picture of a striding, confident Iranian 
President surrounded by friendly regional counterparts 
including Syria's Assad, Afghan President Karzai, and a 
gaggle of Gulf state leaders.  (Comment:  Sudan's Al-Bashir 
was invited and expected to come but canceled at the last 
minute, in part due to behind-the-scenes intervention from 
President Gul, Bilhan suggested.) 
¶5.  (C) Unlike Ahmadinejad's August 2008 visit, this time the 
GoT did not re-route city traffic for him, allow him to speak 
in public, or arrange a visit to a mosque or other cultural 
site.  Our Press TV contact told us that when he was not in 
meetings, Ahmadinejad stayed almost entirely in his hotel. 
Ahmadinejad did give several interviews to Turkish press 
(including TRT and NTV), in which he praised Turkey's efforts 
to engage Iran but said Turkey should also keep close links 
with the west, offered Iranian support for Turkey's EU 
membership ("this would promote EU credibility in the eyes of 
Muslims"), and defended Iran's "glorious achievements in 
nuclear technology" while insisting Iran had answered all 
 
ISTANBUL 00000421  002 OF 003 
 
 
outstanding IAEA questions.  Ahmadinejad also spoke at an 
invitation-only November 8 dinner for Iranian businessmen and 
expats, reaffirming the goal of a USG 20 billion relationship 
by 2011 (ref B), praising Iranian-Turkish cultural links, and 
urging Turkish companies to invest more in Iran, according to 
a Turkey-Iran Business Council contact. 
¶6.  (C) On November 9, Ahmadinejad joined Gul, Karzai, Assad, 
and Pakistani and Saudi officials to discuss the situation in 
Afghanistan, according to the Turkish press.  However, an 
Istanbul-based Afghan diplomat told us that the discussion 
rarely elevated beyond congratulatory praise for President 
Karzai's announced election victory or Iran urging that 
Afghanistan seek more help from Muslim nations to "safeguard 
its sovereignty" rather than relying on NATO or the USG to 
bolster Afghanistan's security and stability. 
 
Ahmadinejad's OIC Speech 
--------------------- 
¶7.  (C) In a circuitous speech later on November 9 to OIC 
Summit participants, Ahmadinejad called on the OIC to act as 
a counter-weight to the West, including by adopting a foreign 
exchange basket of OIC currencies excluding the dollar and 
the Euro.  Ahmadinejad blamed the global financial crisis on 
"the excesses of capitalism" including the practice of 
charging interest on loans, which he called un-Islamic. 
Ahmadinejad also called on the OIC to establish a common 
market for tariff-free trade, and challenged all OIC members 
to devote more attention and resources to anti-poverty 
programs. 
 
Iranian LEU to Turkey? 
-------------------- 
¶8.  (C) On the sidelines, according to the Turkish media and 
a well-informed Turkish contact close to Davutoglu, Turkish 
officials pressed for Iranian support for the November 6 
proposal from IAEA DG ElBaradei that Iran send its LEU to 
Turkey rather than Russia as a compromise to keep the 
P5-1--Iran Tehran Research Reactor deal alive.  But FM 
Mottaki declined to publicly support the idea, instead 
pledging noncommittally to Turkish interlocutors that Iran 
will "consider the idea carefully." 
¶9.  (SBU) In a press conference following the OIC Summit, 
Ahmadinejad defended Iran's right to peaceful nuclear energy, 
praised Iran's technical achievements in developing uranium 
enrichment, and said that Iran stands ready to hold dialogue 
with any parties.  On the P5-1's TRR proposal, Ahmadinejad 
said Iran has "finalized everything" with the P5 1.  "We're 
not making any further discussions on energy matters." 
Regarding Iran-USA relations, Ahmadinejad said "We are 
looking in a positive light to the U.S.  If they really reach 
out their hand, we will shake it.... But they have to make 
changes.  Did they close Guantanamo?  Did they end their 
support for the Zionists?  If change really happens we,ll be 
positive." 
¶10.  (C) Ahmadinejad was accompanied by Vice President Parviz 
Davoodi, FM Mottaki, Economy Minister Shamseddin Hosseini, 
Presidential advisors Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie and Mojtaba 
Samareh-Hashemi, and Ambassador to Ankara Bahman Hosseinpour. 
 
 
But What Goes UP Must Come Down 
------------------------------ 
¶11.  (C) According to several contacts including Bilhan and 
Istanbul Center for Economics and Foreign Policy Studies 
(EDAM) Vice Chair Can Buharali (a former Turkish diplomat 
once based in Tehran), Turkey's warm relationship with Iran 
is likely to face serious challenges in coming months that 
will test Ankara's ability to deconflict its Iran policy with 
its ties to the US and its obligations as a UNSC member.  If 
Iran fails to accept core aspects of the P5-1's offer to 
further enrich Iranian LEU abroad, for example, and P5-1 
engagement with Iran subsequently ends, Turkey will be 
hard-pressed to justify maintaining such close political and 
economic relations with Iran, especially as the international 
community considers tougher economic and financial measures. 
¶12.  (C) Even in the nearer-term, according to a Bilkent 
University professor who closely follows Iran's nuclear 
program, a report from the IAEA DG is expected in 
mid-November that may reveal Iran gave only partial 
cooperation and access to IAEA inspectors at Iran's 
formerly-undeclared Fordo enrichment plant.  Depending on the 
language in that report, Turkey could find itself in an 
uncomfortable position when the November 23 IAEA Board of 
Governors address the Iran issue. 
¶13.  (C) Perhaps to Turkey's relief, the recent wave of 
high-level bilats -- the most visible embodiment of the 
Turkish-Iranian relationship -- appears to have crested. 
According to Bilhan, a simple function of a crowded 
Ministerial calendar (including upcoming OSCE and NATO 
 
ISTANBUL 00000421  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
Ministerials) is likely to keep Davutoglu away from Mottaki, 
while prudence and the early December visit of PM Erdogan to 
Washington are likely to preclude any further Erdogan- or 
Gul-Ahmadinejad hand-shaking, hugs, or photo-ops at least 
until next year. 
¶14.  (C) The direction that the Turkey-Iran relationship 
takes going into 2010 will depend largely on the status of 
P5 1 diplomacy and/or sanctions on Iran at that time, as well 
as on whether Turkey believes its pragmatic approach and 
positive neighborly influence can genuinely moderate a 
hard-line, defensive, and increasingly vulnerable Iranian 
regime, and add to rather than detract from regional 
stability.  We will offer a more detailed look at Turkey's 
efforts to influence Iran, and the limits of that influence, 
by septel. 
WIENER