TURKEY'S NEW FOREIGN MINISTER: YASAR YAKIS

S E C R E T ANKARA 008380

SIPDIS


E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/18/2012
TAGS: PREL PGOV PINS TU
SUBJECT: TURKEY'S NEW FOREIGN MINISTER: YASAR YAKIS

(U) Classified by DCM Robert Deutsch; reasons: 1.5 (b,d).



1. (U) Turkey's 58th government, announced Nov. 18, includes
former career diplomat and three-time ambassador Yasar
(Yashar) Yakis (Yah-kish) as Foreign Minister. Bio below.



2. (C) A mostly conventionally-minded, retired 39-year
veteran of the MFA, Yakis is now AK Vice Chairman for foreign
affairs. He not in the inner circle of AK Chairman Erdogan's
advisors; according to a number of younger AK officials, some
of them among Erdogan's closer advisors, Erdogan considers
Yakis useful as a barbarian handler/liaison to the Kemalist
foreign policy establishment but will keep his own counsel;
indeed, Erdogan has now appointed as his foreign policy
advisor Egemen Bagis, who spent 17 years in the U.S. and is
intimately familiar with, and a promoter of, the American way
of doing things.



3. (U) Yakis was born 1938 in Akcakoca on the Black Sea. Of
Laz extraction (an ethnic minority related to Georgians;
known for their mixture of cleverness and otherworldly sense
of humor and often the butt of jokes by other Turks).
Graduated from Ankara U. Political Science Faculty, which at
the time was the premier institution for training high civil
servants and a bastion of Kemalism. Entered the Turkish
Diplomatic Service 1962. Served in the following positions
until 1988: Antwerp Consulate General; Lagos; NATO Defense
College; Counselor at Turkey's Permanent Mission to NATO;
Counselor in Damascus; head of the Economic and Commercial
Cooperation Permanent Committee of the Islamic Conference
Organization in Jiddah; formed and headed the ISEDAK
Coordination Bureau in Turkey's State Planning Organization.
From 1988-92 Ambassador to Riyadh; 1992-95 MFA Deputy
Undersecretary for Economic Affairs; 1995-98 Ambassador to
Cairo; 1998-2001 Permanent Representative at Turkey's Mission
to the UN in Vienna. Retired 2001.



4. (U) Married, one child. Speaks French, Arabic, fluent
English. Recipient of the Saudi Government's King Abdulaziz
Award (first degree). Several publications, inter alia on
Middle East water issues, Histadrut, and Turco-Egyptian
Relations.



5. (S) Yakis is described by both AK officials and MFA
officials as liable to be captured by the MFA establishment
if, as expected, he becomes Foreign Minister. One MFA
contact described him as someone who would not be strong at
the MFA helm. From Embassy contacts with him he strikes us
as extraordinarily protocol-conscious and as having a chip on
his shoulder with regard to the MFA: at once eager to return
at a higher rank than his former colleagues and at the same
time anxious to prove that his talents were unrecognized
during his career. He has told us he wants to take a fresh
look at Turkey's rocky relations with its Arab neighbors and
Iran.



6. (S) The one area where we have seen him move beyond
conventional thinking is Iraq. He has expressed a strong
preference for a peaceful solution, but also engaged in
creative thinking in our presence about how to handle the
problem of the Kurds in Northern Iraq, floating the idea that
perhaps the creation of two independent states there would
help keep the Kurds in check.
PEARSON