Turkey under pressure from US
Pompeo calls for release of pastor amid sanctions and tension
SINGAPORE: US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo pressed Turkey for the release of a detained American pastor whose case has led the Trump administration to hit senior Turkish officials with sanctions and badly strained ties between the Nato allies. Pompeo also said he would be seeking the release of several local employees of the US diplomatic missions in Turkey.
Just two days after the administrations slapped sanctions on Turkey’s justice and interior ministers over the case of Andrew Craig Brunson, Pompeo met with Turkish Forreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on the sidelines of a South-East Asian security conference in Singapore.
Ahead of the meeting, Pompeo said Brunson’s case would be high on his list of items to discuss with his Turkish counterpart. He defended Wednesday’s sanctions as a sign of how seriously the administration takes Brunson’s case.
“The Turks were on notice that the clock had run out and it was time for Pastor Brunson to be returned and I hope they’ll see this for what it is: a demonstration that we’re very serious,” he said.
“We consider this one of the many issues that we have with the Turks,” Pompeo said. He did not elaborate but Washington and Ankara have been at odds over numerous matters, including Turkeys’s continued detention of three Turkish employees of the US consulate in Istanbul, as well as military activity in northern Syria and Turkey’s plans to purchase an advanced air defense system from Russia.
“Brunson needs to come home as do all the Americans being held by the Turkish government,” he said.
“Pretty straightforward. They’ve been holding these folks for a long time. These are innocent people.”
Brunson is being tried on espionage and terror-related charges, which he and the US government vehemently deny.
Last week, President Donald Trump and Vice-President Mike Pence threatened to impose sanctions on Turkey if Brunson was not immediately released. They said his recent transfer from prison to house arrest was not enough.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has rejected the US demands, saying his government won’t back down and is willing to “go its own way” if the US acted.
The Turks have also vowed to retaliate for the sanctions “without delay.”
The Turkish foreign ministry called the sanctions a “disrespectful intervention in our legal system” that would harm “the constructive efforts toward resolving problems between the two countries”.
Brunson, 50, was arrested in December 2016 following a failed coup on charges of “committing crimes on behalf of terror groups without being a member” and espionage.
Although he was released to home detention, he faces a prison sentence of up to 35 years if he is convicted on both counts at the end of his ongoing trial.