DC think tank accused of bending over backwards for Erdogan Washington tongues are wagging as prominent think tank the Atlantic Council prepares to receive Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with whom its leadership has enthusiastically pursued relations. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst.

By Amberin Zaman

May 16, 2017

The last time Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan came to Washington was in March last year to attend the Nuclear Security Summit, and things went horribly wrong. Erdogan delivered a speech at the Brookings Institution. What most people remember is not what he said there but what happened outside the think tank’s Massachusetts Avenue premises. News that Erdogan’s notoriously thuggish security detail set upon protesters and reporters, physically assaulting and hurling insults at them, made international headlines. It has therefore been a matter of intense speculation whether any think tank would dare to invite Erdogan during his brief stint in the capital to meet with President Donald Trump today. Turkish think tank SETA and the Atlantic Council have stepped up to the plate. Erdogan will speak at a closed session co-hosted by them at the Turkish ambassador’s residence after his noon encounter with Trump, and tongues are wagging.

It’s hardly unusual that SETA would make room for the Turkish leader. The outfit has been long mentored by Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) and before the government’s recent free fall into authoritarianism, SETA was well-respected for its high quality if occasionally ideologically tinged output. The Atlantic Council’s alleged cozying up to the Erdogan regime is another matter. The incestuous relations between some Washington think tanks and foreign governments that are said to be greased by plenty of dollars is well-covered ground. Still, allegations that the Atlantic Council had bowed to Turkish pressure and excluded speakers, including a member of its own staff, at its yearly energy summit held in Istanbul in April have left some think tankers clutching their stomachs.

Turkish government-linked and pro-government conglomerates were among sponsors of the summit, themed “Strengthening Transatlantic Engagement with a Turbulent Region.” They included the state-owned Halkbank, whose deputy general manager is sitting in a New York jail over his alleged connections to money laundering for Iran, and construction giants Limak, Calik and MNG holding. Erdogan was the star draw of the event. In separate conversations with Al-Monitor, four sources with intimate knowledge of the summit’s arrangements asserted that the claims of Turkish government meddling were true. On condition of anonymity, they said the alleged targets of Turkish objections were both Turks — and women.

One was the highly respected Turkish journalist Asli Aydintasbas, who writes for the opposition daily Cumhuriyet and is a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. The other was the Atlantic Council’s own Naz Durakoglu, a former State Department staffer under the Obama administration.

A draft program of the summit seen by Al-Monitor billed Aydintasbas as a speaker at a luncheon titled “Regional Security Outlook.” She was to be joined, among others, by former US national security adviser James L. Jones and Stephen J. Hadley, who held the same position under President George W. Bush.