Secret contacts in the Middle East

The Turkish daily "radical" has unveiled on Tuesday continuous and secret diplomatic contacts in the Middle East similar to what took place before the realization of the Oslo agreement.

In a news report it published on Tuesday, the paper confined to saying that the Turkish foreign minister Ismael Cim is making contacts with all sides concerned. The paper expected Ankara to propose to the conflicting sides, without specifics, details on that.

For its part, the Turkish daily Yani Savak noted the Turkish concern over the possibility of Sharon's winning of the coming Israeli election and expected Ankara to be exposed to a strategic isolation in case it tries to protect its strategic relations with Israel under Sharon's rule.

The paper explained that if Sharon wins the elections in Israel, Ankara will not be able to preserve its close relations with the Chairman of the Palestinian Authority Yasser Arafat and will also loose the competition in the Middle East with Iran and Egypt, besides Israeli, US and Turkish triangle loosing of its might as used to be the case before.