RIGHT of RETURN

If New Zealand continues to call out the human rights abuses of Turkey's increasingly autocratic and paranoid leader, it faces the threat of being banned from staging official Anzac commemorations in Gallipoli.

- PETE MCKENZIE

In 2017, Ian McGibbon retraced the footsteps of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force in Gallipoli by following the dusty road up to Chunuk Bair, where more than 800 New Zealanders died in an ill-fated attempt to seize and hold the summit against Ottoman troops in World War I.

McGibbon, who is this country's foremost military historian, had risen early that morning to attend an annual service remembering those soldiers' dismal sacrifice. Two other academics joined him. But this time, as McGibbon and his colleagues made the slow trek up, a column of young Turkish boys flowed downhill beside them.

Waving vibrant red flags and adorned with imitation kabalaks (the light cap worn by Ottoman troops), the boys chanted nationalistic slogans and directed Turkish barbs towards the clearly Western academics. McGibbon leaned over to his group's guide to ask what they were saying. "You don't want to know," responded the sheepish local.

Gallipoli has become a casualty of the increasingly autocratic Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and it's possible that political fractures and growing paranoia in Turkey may sabotage New Zealand diplomats' ability to maintain Turkish support for Anzac commemorations. It could also force us to choose between protecting access to Gallipoli and championing liberal ideals in the country.

Determined to break down the secular legacy of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the Ottoman commander who later transformed his country from a dictatorial empire to a secular republic, Erdoğan has recently encouraged a more religio-nationalistic understanding of the Ottoman Empire's Gallipoli campaign.