Further partnership conditional on no more stupid sh!t like this happening.
Turkish PM Erdogan likens Xinjiang violence to 'genocide'
Especially when the majority of those killed were Han Chinese by Uighurs.
The Turkish head of state's verbal indiscretion not withstanding, it's no accident that the uppder echelon of the CCP were willing to 大事化小 (minimize fallout), at least pertaining to the said diplamatic incident.
First of all, Erdogan presides over a
democracy where the whims and vagaries of populism, whether in the press or among selected groups, can turn ripples into a full-fledged tempest ... This in my books, qualifies as Turkey's domestic context.
Secondly, most people can see that this so-called "green belt" stretching across the heartlands of Eurasia has felt a sense of "siege" since the very beginning of regime change and map redrawing disguised as "WOT" ... When people are "twitchy", they "over-react". We don't even need to look outside of China for examples of that. This, in my books is the international context.
Thirdly, I think it's fair to say that some Turks
care for the Uyghurs the same way we care for the ethnic Chinese in say, Indonesia. You know as well as I that the same cannot be said of certain other "international players" who see them as useful pawns on a "grand chess board" (I don't just mean the Yanks btw, certain "custodians" of certain holy places were also implicated - at least in the past). That's the historical context.
These contexts inform my attitude. I don't know about you.
Finally, few politicians in "democracies" put money where their mouths are. And Erdogan by my reckoning (I'm personally neutral on him) does not seem one of them. He stepped up to the plate at a key moment in history in proposing the fissile material swap with Iran.
I am not saying his government did this to get China "off the hook". Far from it. But the net effect speaks for itself. You can bet your last cookie that for this the PRC is immensely grateful.
They just want something to be angry about.
