SYRIA

In 2005, we received an invitation from Syria for a workshop on “Syria-Turkey relations” organized by Damascus University for the Marmara Group Foundation. The President of the Syrian Strategy Center, MP Prof. Dr. Faisal Khaldoum insisted that we come.

In 2004, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's visit to Syria as Prime Minister was the beginning of a very focused period with our neighbors.

We considered this beginning as a new horizon for the expansion of the Eurasian Economic Summits that we were organizing, because the intercultural peace movement that we started at the Eurasian Economic Summit, which was 8 years old at that time, was attracting interest from neighboring countries. We wanted to include Syria among us.

However, Türkiye-Syria relations were troubled. We were receiving news that Syria's son Assad, who came to power after the death of Assad's father, was looking warmly at Türkiye. The Prime Minister's visit was a harbinger of a new chapter to be opened.
Therefore, we did not say “no” to the invitation of Damascus University.

The delegation should not only consist of Marmara Group Foundation members. There should have been MPs from the Justice and Development Party and the Republican People's Party among us. Again, there should have been journalists in the delegation.

But people were uneasy about Syria. In addition to removing the uneasiness, there should have been people representing the state among us on our trip. Because we were a think tank.

We first applied to the Justice and Development Party, and MPs Sait Açba and Yüksel Çavuşoğlu said they would attend. Abdulaziz Yazar from the Republican People's Party would be with us.

After the parliamentary work was completed, it was time for the journalist. Syria did not give visas to journalists. We recruited Yavuz Donat from Sabah and Tufan Türenç from Hürriyet as members of the Marmara Group Foundation. When we arrived in Damascus, we would state that they were both journalists. After we agreed among ourselves, we also formed a delegation of friends from the Marmara Group Foundation.

In addition to myself, parliamentarians and journalists, we formed the delegation with (F) Ambassador Ertuğrul Kumcuoğlu, Prof. Dr. İlter Turan, Prof. Dr. Gül Turan, Prof. Dr. Nedret Kuran, Müjgan Suver and Engin Köklüçınar from the Marmara Group Foundation.

When we arrived in Damascus, in addition to our workshop, we were received separately by President Bashar al-Assad, Prime Minister Mohamad Naji-Ohri, Speaker of the Parliament Mahmoud Al-Abrach, Minister of National Education Hani Murtada at the Shaab Palace. Müjgan Suver, Prof. Dr. Nedret Kuran and Prof. Dr. Gül Turan from our delegation were also hosted by the President's Wife Esma Assad.

The visit of our delegation was widely covered in Syrian and Turkish media.

After we made this trip, then President Ahmet Necdet Sezer called me to Çankaya to get information about our trip. We went to Çankaya together with Ertuğrul Kumcuoğlu and Engin Köklüçınar from our Foundation who had traveled to Syria with me. We presented what we had seen, our impressions and thoughts to the President.

During the talks, President Bashar al-Assad emphasized the importance for world peace and regional security of resolving the problems and conflicts in the region through peaceful means, the legitimacy of which cannot be disputed in the international arena. Bashar al-Assad underlined that the current development of the dialogue between the two countries is satisfactory and pleasing despite all the difficulties.

To repeat today, his impressions that day were President Assad's desire to create a Syria on the Turkish model and to establish good relations with Türkiye.

We explained these to our President.

Later on, our visit had a positive impact and the visits of our President and Prime Minister took place.

This visit, which we realized with our civil society identity, opened a new door to peace and unity in those days.

This was an important and productive example of the impact of civil society.