Russia Accuses Turkey's Erdogan of Involvement With ISIS Oil Trade

[IDemo]

Source: NBC News

MOSCOW — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his family are "involved" in ISIS' illegal oil trade and personally benefit from it, Russia alleged Wednesday.

"Turkey is the main destination for the oil stolen from its legitimate owners, which are Syria and Iraq," Russia's Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov told journalists in Moscow. "Turkey resells this oil. The appalling part about it is that the country's top political leadership is involved in the illegal business — President Erdogan and his family."

Russian military officials displayed satellite images that they said showed columns of tanker trucks being loaded with oil at installations controlled by ISIS in Syria and Iraq, and then crossing the border into Turkey.

Antonov did not say what evidence Russia had of Erdogan's involvement — an allegation that the Turkish leader has previously denied.

Read more: http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/isis-terror/russia-accuses-turkeys-erdogan-involvement-isis-oil-trade-n472596

[lovuian]

1. Whose afraid of Sibel Edmunds : Turkey

Sibel Edmunds got in trouble when she talked about our connections with Turkey guess Putin is in trouble too

What happens when the world knows our shadow government is involved in a alliance with IsiL buyer of oil?

whose satellite pictures do you believe Russia or USA
oh that's right we displayed Weapons of Mass Destruction satellite pictures to the UN and did a preemptive strike on Iraq

Whose profiting on that oil now? Now after our children died and were wounded in Iraq?

Who do we believe? Russia or USA

[another_liberal]

3. Is the U.S. Government actually denying that Turkey receives Islamic State oil?

I had not heard that? I know we have been saying, vaguely, that we "support" Turkey, but I had not heard any American official who claimed Turkey was innocent of profiting from illegal trade in seized Syrian and Iraqi oil?

[Democat]

2. At least the US media is reporting on this

Maybe someone will do a real investigation and find out what's going on and who in the United States government knows about it. If anyone in Obama's administration has been supportive of this type of activity, they should be outed.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

4. Credible? Meet The Man Who Funds ISIS: Bilal Erdogan, The Son Of Turkey's President.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016138104

I'm not sure of the credibility of the article the thread references, but I thought it important enough to bookmark.

[Historic NY]

5. Want to know? Follow the tire tracks the oil tankers make which way are they going?

[2naSalit]

6. French version of CNN -

has been reporting about this claim since Putin made the claim at the COP21 on Monday. Takes a while for satellite signals like that to translate into US media format.

France24 is a 24/7 news stream in CNN format only with actual substance.

Glad you brought this up since it is a major factor in this geographically distant issue... seems there was some reporting on the oil caravans back in the early days of the Iraq WarII and then we sort of kept quiet about it until, well nobody's brought it up until Monday when Putin said something in Paris this Monday.

[lovuian]

7. Turkey can shoot down a Russian jet who graces their border but

they can't bomb oil convoys of Isil in their own country


sounds like Turkey has some explaining to do and America knows all about it too

It's one billionaire fighting another billionaire for oil .....

[2naSalit]

8. Essentially. nt

[PosterChild]

10. The United states is actively bombing the tanker convoys . ....

..... using fighters stationed in Turkey . Turkey is a member of NATO and supports US efforts to degrade and destroy ISIS oil production and transportation.

Bombing tanker columns is not a simple task because it requires smart munitions. I'm not sure that Turkey has that capacity.

First the aircraft fly by and drop leaflets telling the tanker drivers thst they are going to be bombed. Then they do a low fly by to scare them and get them to run. Then launch of a few bombs nearby to scare off the realy stubborn ones. Then they use guided precision munitions, not gravety bombs, to destroy the tankers.

Personally , I'm glad we are doing this rather than turkey

[tabasco]

9. Should be a huge embarrassment to the USA

if Russia is exposing something that we should have or did know about.

[killbotfactory]

11. Somebody is buying it.

All signs point to Turkey.

[patsimp]

12. interestnig point. isis is selling lots of oil through a big channel. Could this be it?

[Xithras]

13. Read an interesting theory yesterday.

I'll see if I can dig up the link, but it's premise was based around a question. Why would Turkey risk international condemnation to sell ISIS oil? On a grand scale, the amount we're talking about isn't particularly large.

The article pointed something interesting out. ISIS has generally ignored international borders in their attempt to build an Islamic nation. They control large swaths of land in Syria and Iraq. Their forces have crossed borders into Lebanon and Jordan. ISIS has openly declared that Saudi Arabia is one of its next targets.

And yet, IS forces have marched right up to the Turkish borders, controlling long stretches of it at one point, and didn't cross it. To date, there hasn't been a single major attack on ANY Turkish border outpost or attempts to cross the border with a large force. Just a smattering of small firefights that can be easily attributed to fog of war as the IS claimed the Syrian side of the border. ISIS even permitted Turkey to relocate the tomb of a Turkish founder of the Ottoman Empire to an area outside of their control, rather than destroy it (unheard of). In fact, the ONLY major IS actions in Turkey have been a series of bombings. And who have those bombings targeted? Leftist student groups, Kurdish rallies, and other groups that oppose Islamism and are thorns in Edrogans side. And what has Turkeys response to those attacks been? After the Suruc bombing (which killed Left-Socialist college students), which was FORMALLY claimed by ISIS, Edrogan responded by...bombing the PKK and Kurdish positions in Syria.

The theory should be plain to see. Edrogan has struck a deal with ISIS. They leave the Turks alone and stay out of his country, scoring only some symbolic attacks against people Edrogan doesn't like anyway, and in exchange Turkey will help to funnel IS oil needed to fund the Islamic State. There's probably very little cash profit in the entire deal for Turkey, but it keeps their borders secure and keeps Turkey OUT of the Islamic State crosshairs. And if some of Edrogans opponents get blown up in the process, so much the better for him. It maintains the facade of opposition.

Is there any evidence for this? Not really. It's just a theory at the moment, but it sure makes sense.

[another_liberal]

14. There was that bombing of protesters in the Capital, Ankara, which the Turks blamed on IS . . .

But since the demonstration which was bombed was an anti-war, pro-Kurdish demonstration against the Turkish government's policies (and because IS never claimed responsibility for the attack) some observers suggest the bombing was actually done by agents of President Erdogan's government, as an effort to silence criticism of Turkey's on-going war against its own ethnic Kurdish population.