NATO leaders fail to agree on new alliance chief
NATO leaders fail to agree on new alliance chief
Will Rasmussen of Denmark be able to win the position of secretary general?
The most recent news is as follows:-
Leaders of the NATO military alliance failed Friday to agree on a new secretary general, despite pressure from Germany to overcome Turkish opposition to favourite Anders Fogh Rasmussen.
“There has been no decision now. The discussion will continue into tomorrow on the succession to Jaap de Hoop Scheffer,” said NATO spokesman James Appathurai, after a working dinner between heads of state and government.
The threat of a Turkish veto hangs over the nomination of Denmark’s Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen due to his defence of a series of cartoons mocking the Prophet Mohammed, which sparked anger in the Muslim world.
But Appathurai refused to comment on which candidates were discussed or how many of the 28 NATO nations raised objections, saying only that the leaders were “not being particularly brief”.
“We always arrive at consensus at NATO. We will arrive at consensus on this issue as well. Until then, the only way to describe it is that we don’t have consensus,” he said.
“We will get there, this alliance always gets there,” he added, after the first session of a two-day summit hosted by France and Germany.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed confidence earlier that a decision would be reached on Friday and said Rasmussen, Danish prime minister, would be an “excellent choice.”
“I am convinced that we will name a new NATO secretary general this evening,” Merkel told reporters in Baden-Baden, southern Germany, at a joint press conference with US President Barack Obama.
She said she would “do everything” to persuade other NATO leaders to back the Dane, who has the support of other alliance heavyweights Britain, France and the United States.
“I believe that Mr. Rasmussen would be an excellent choice,” she said. “If we choose him he would be a strong secretary general.”
According to Danish press reports, Rasmussen has privately announced his candidacy to take over from Dutch diplomat Scheffer, whose term ends on July 31.
But Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is angered by Rasmussen’s failure to ban a Denmark-based TV station linked to Kurdish rebels and by his stance during the crisis over Danish cartoons.
NATO’s secretary general is chosen by an informal process involving negotiations behind the scenes and in corridors at NATO headquarters in Brussels, but all 28 nations must agree on the nominee.
It remained unclear whether Turkey, a mainly Muslim nation, would veto the move.
In Istanbul, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose ruling party has Islamist roots, urged NATO to find an alternative candidate.
“Why do we have to stick to a single name? Aren’t there other alternatives?,” he told reporters. “We wish to find another person with whom the issue will be settled.”
But Turkey is represented at the summit by President Abdullah Gul, who has appeared slightly more conciliatory.
Rasmussen invoked Danes’ right to freedom of expression to defend the publication of the cartoons in September 2005.
NATO is fighting Islamist militants in Afghanistan while trying to work with neighbouring Pakistan and reach out to Iran for help, and the alliance is therefore particularly wary of how it is perceived in the Muslim world.
Potential candidates for NATO’s top civilian job — which has only ever been held by European nations in the alliance’s 60-year history — almost never declare their intention to run.
Norway’s Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere appears to be the only other strong candidate left.
His Polish counterpart Radoslaw Sikorski said earlier Friday that he was not in the running and Canada was low key about the chances of its Defence Minister Peter MacKay.
Source:BADEN-BADEN, Germany (AFP)
Turkey Raises Objections to Rasmussen’s NATO Bid as New Secretary General
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan raised objections Friday to his Danish counterpart’s possible nomination for NATO’s top job, citing lingering Muslim anger over Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.
In an interview with NTV television, Erdogan said he explained his objections to Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen personally in a lengthy telephone conversation earlier Friday.
“I told him about the annoyance of the public” over his possible nomination for NATO secretary-general, Erdogan said.
“My party has principles… and I definitely cannot contradict them,” he said. “I told him he can appreciate what that means.”
Erdogan said he had received calls from the leaders of Islamic countries urging Turkey, NATO’s only predominantly Muslim member, to veto Rasmussen.
“There was serious indignation in Muslim countries because of the cartoon crisis. These countries are now calling us,” he said.
Rasmussen invoked freedom of expression to defend the publication of a series of irreverant cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in a Danish newspaper in September 2005, which triggered outrage among Muslims worldwide.
Erdogan said Rasmussen had also failed to act on Turkish requests to ban a Denmark-based Kurdish TV station, widely seen as the mouthpiece of the separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party, listed as a terrorist group by Ankara and much of the international community.
“It has been four years now and they have not finalised the issue… We are seriously disturbed,” he said.
However, President Abdullah Gul had suggested earlier Friday that Turkey would not block Rasmussen’s nomination, saying that Ankara does not have “any attitude against the prime minister or anyone else on that matter.”
Rasmussen is a favourite to take over NATO’s top civilian post from Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer in August, with most of the alliance’s big powers solidly behind him, but Turkey is seen as a key obstacle.
NATO leaders meet in Strasbourg, France and neighbouring Kehl in Germany on April 3-4 for a 60th anniversary summit, but it is unclear whether the next secretary general of the 26-nation alliance will be announced there.