Turkey

Monday

Daniel Korski

Erdogan’s immediate dilemma

It seems that everyone won the election that was held in Turkey this weekend. Prime Minister Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) officially won, taking some 50 per cent of the vote, which is enough to secure him a third term in office, but not sufficient to enable his party to make changes to the constitution. As the BBC’s Gavin Hewitt notes, ‘Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey stands out. He is genuinely popular. He is socially conservative, but he has tapped into the aspirational mood of Turkey’s middle class.’ But although the opposition party, Republican People’s Party (CHP), lost the election they actually polled about a quarter of the

Saturday

Daniel Korski

The end of Assad

After weeks of violence, the end of the Assad regime is now inevitable. It may take weeks, months or years, but the kind of damage that President Assad has inflicted on his domestic credibility and international standing cannot be repaired. The country’s two most populous cities, Aleppo and the capital Damascus have remained calm, but now protesters are defying the army. More than 300 members of the governing party have resigned and publicly condemned the crackdown. Crucially, the army’s loyalty is now in doubt. It is said some military units have refused to quell the protesters in Damascus. Even Syria’s long-time ally Turkey has been angered by the violence that

Wednesday

Daniel Korski

The mystery of modern Turkey

What does Turkey actually think? That’s an issue that has been occupying many Europeans, as the vital NATO ally heads to the polls. On the one hand Turkey has in the last 10 years become more like the West: globalised, economically liberal and democratic. Turkey’s economy is now the world’s 16thlargest, the sixth largest in Europe. But, at the same time, questions arise about its recent policies: will it consolidate its democratic achievements, or is it threatened by a populist tyranny or even authoritarian rule? Certainly, many fear that Prime Minister Recyp Erdogan’s behaviour is moving Turkey away from the West, both in terms of internal policy and external alignmen.

Tuesday

Peter Hoskin

Meanwhile, in Libya…

The death of Osama Bin Laden may be a very arresting punctuation mark in the conflict against tyranny — but the conflict continues nevertheless, not least in Libya. The latest news from the country is that the rebels are maintaining their fragile hold on the port town of Misrata, although Western agencies are still struggling to send in aid and relief supplies. “We have seven ICU beds and eleven cases,” is how one hospital worker puts it to Channel 4’s Alex Thomson. “What is Nato doing? What is the world doing? If any more people come here they will die.” In political terms, there has been one significant development today:

Sunday

Daniel Korski

How to build democracies

Following the events in the Middle East, I have proposed a democracy review of UK bilateral relations and former Europe minister Denis MacShane has suggested that David Cameron set up a Foundation for Democracy Development in the Middle East and North Africa to “provide an all-party source of income, travel grants, and overseas seminars” It would make sense, I think, to do both in succession, starting with the review and then creating a new body that can undertake the work. However, instead of creating a UK-only organisation, the government should build on the links established with Turkey’s government and set up a joint endeavour, chaired by William Hague and Ahmet

Wednesday

Daniel Korski

Where does it leave Israel?

Israel is in a right state over Egypt’s incipient revolution. Israeli politicians talk openly about the threat from an Islamist takeover, the greatness of Hosni Mubarak, and have even taken to sneer at the West’s hopefulness. Now that President Mubarak has announced he will leave, the Israeli leadership will be looking on in horror. They are right to be concerned. The beleaguered Jewish state has already lost one regional ally in Turkey and does not relish the prospect of losing Egypt too. That would leave only Jordan, a country whose monarchy may be the next casualty of the pro-democracy movement sweeping the region. But it is not just a matter

Monday

Daniel Korski

The Gaza flotilla raid was legal – but stupid

Yesterday saw the publication of a report into Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza, the Hamas-run part of the Palestinian crypto-state, and the Israeli military’s raid on a flotilla of aid ships bound for the coastal enclave last year. The inquiry, headed by former judge Yaakov Turkel, argued that: “The naval blockade imposed on the Gaza Strip… was legal pursuant to the rules of international law” The inquiry defined the fight between Israeli forces and Hamas and other Gaza-based militant groups as “an international armed conflict”. Critically, the panel’s two international observers – former Northern Ireland first minister David Trimble and Brigadier-General Ken Watkin of Canada – both agreed with the

Monday

Daniel Korski

Stop blaming Israel alone

Reading the British press – or even listening to some ministers – you would be forgiven for thinking that the only obstacle preventing Middle East peace is Israeli obstinacy and Benjamin Netanyahu’s unwillingness to force his political allies – like Shas – to the negotiating table. But, as always, things are a bit more complicated than the newspaper headlines would suggest. From Israel’s position, the region is looking increasingly hostile. Talk of a war in Lebanon with Hezbollah persists. In Syria, President Assad looks less interested in a rapprochement than he has done for years. Turkey is now closer than at anytime to declaring Israel an enemy – military-to-military links

Monday

David Blackburn

The coalition’s inept EU referendum lock

At least this government is honest. ‘There will be,’ Europe Minister David Lidington says, ‘no referendum on the transfer of competence or power from the UK to the EU during this Parliament’. The government will ensure that there are no more EU power transfer treaties; but, as Douglas Carswell, Tim Montgomerie, and Bill Cash all note, the Lisbon Treaty is self-ratifying. The EU has already picked the coalition’s lock and garnered new powers for itself – notably the extension of the EU arrest warrant. The EU could be an economic superblock with the muscle to influence the globe strategically and culturally. But its current political operation is unnecessary and deplorably

Thursday

David Blackburn

Is the real love affair between Fat Pang and Dave?

We know that Chris Patten is advising David Cameron over the Pope’s visit – the Spectator interviewed him in that capacity recently. But a number of events this week suggest that Patten is very close to Cameron. Patten is currently in India, selling Oxford University with Cameron, but he has found time to pen an article about Gaza for the FT. Like Cameron, Patten believes that Gazans are serving an ‘interminable prison sentence’. He writes: ‘Gaza is totally separated from the rest of Palestine. It is cut off by a brutal siege. The objective is collective punishment of the one and a half million people who live there simply because

Tuesday

Peter Hoskin

Cameron’s provocative language over Gaza serves to obscure the issue

And there’s me thinking that David Cameron’s overtures to Turkey were newsworthy enough, when he drops this into his speech in Ankara: “Let me also be clear that the situation in Gaza has to change. Humanitarian goods and people must flow in both directions. Gaza cannot and must not be allowed to remain a prison camp. But as, hopefully, we move in the coming weeks to direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians so it’s Turkey that can make the case for peace and Turkey that can help to press the parties to come together, and point the way to a just and viable solution.” In a wider sense, this

Saturday

Margaret Macmillan

The threat of holy war

John Buchan’s Greenmantle remains a marvellous read, even if its plot is absurd. John Buchan’s Greenmantle remains a marvellous read, even if its plot is absurd. Who could credit a story about German attempts, headed by the unlovely Kaiser Wilhelm and the glamorous and suitably ruthless Hilda von Einem, to stir up a world-wide Muslim holy war against the Allies during the first world war and ultimately build a vast German empire stretching to India itself? Now Sean McMeekin shows that fiction, after all, was not so far from the truth, and he makes the most of what is a very good story. He starts in the late 19th century

Sunday

Daniel Korski

No more Turkish delight?

I’m sitting at the Ciragan Palace’s glass-filled halls on the banks of the Bosporus. I have joined the UN Security Council’s annual retreat, organised by the Turkish government, to give my view on what the UN did right and wrong in the Balkans from the break-up of Yugoslavia. The retreat is meant to continue the Council’s discussion on the overlap between peacekeeping, peacemaking and peace-building. No immediate action will follow the retreat, but the discussion may lead into a more concrete phase during Turkey’s presidency in September. Being here in Istanbul, however, has given me a chance to find an answer to the debate that has sprung up about Turkish government: is

Tuesday

David Blackburn

A PR disaster for Israel

Prematurely, the world’s press has condemned Israel. As I wrote yesterday, the facts have to be established before Israel can be adjudged to have acted disproportionately. At the moment, the facts seem to support Israel. Video footage shows commandoes descending into a maelstrom of baseball bats and knives, armed with items that resemble paintball guns. The latest pictures released show a hoard of improvised explosives, machetes, bats, crowbars etc. Those sources’ veracity should be scrutinised, but there is nothing else to go on at the moment. Iain Martin has debunked Jon Snow’s absurd genuflection that this is our fault. Being British I apologise for everything, but not this time. Israel

Monday

Daniel Korski

Will we lose Turkey?

Earlier this year, Transatlantic Trends, an annual survey of public opinion on both sides of the Atlantic, was published. Key highlights from the survey included a quadrupling of European support for President Obama’s handling of foreign policy. But what really caught my eye was how badly the relationship between the West and Turkey had frayed. 65 percent of Turks do not think it is likely their country will join the EU. Nearly half of Turks polled think Turkey is not really part of the West, while 43 percent think Turkey should not partner with the EU, the US or Russia in solving global problems. The break-down of the alliance between

Friday

Alex Massie

Annual Forgetting About the Armenians Festival Begins

Poor Armenia. Just about the only time that wee country gets a mention in Washington is when the perennial Recognise-the-Genocide issue comes up. As tradition demands, the Secretary of State lobbied Congress to avoid passing anything resembling or hinting at any such thing. Nevertheless the Foreign Affairs Committee voted 23-22 in favour of the annual motion acknowledging the ghastliness. Whether it makes it to the floor remains a moot issue. Everyone, I think, recognises the practical and political difficulties in siding with the Armenians or, as may be the case, handing a sop to the American-Armenian community. Turkey matters more than Armenia. And Turkey is touchy and macho and quick

Wednesday

James Scudamore

Objects of obsession

The Museum of Innocence is the sixth novel by Turkey’s most garlanded novelist and his first since he became a Nobel laureate in 2006. The Museum of Innocence is the sixth novel by Turkey’s most garlanded novelist and his first since he became a Nobel laureate in 2006. Pamuk’s unflinching eye on his country’s history has brought him well-documented trouble, but it is in the subtle exploration of how west and east collude and collide there that he excels, notably in the novel My Name Is Red, a bravura extemporisation on art and representation at the Ottoman court of the 16th century, and in the more modern setting of his

Monday

Alex Massie

Good News for Armenia! And Turkey!

Turkey and Armenia are planning to establish diplomatic ties and open their shared border. There’s still a long way to go, of course, and it owuld be wise to remain cautious on this but, nonetheless, the signs are encouraging. Normalising relations with Armenia will be another small step towards Turkey establishing its credentials as a candidate for EU membership. And it’s good news for Armenia too. Since I argued that Barack Obama might have been tougher on Turkey and the question of recognising the Armenian genocide, one should admit that staying relatively quiet was probably a sensible move. That doesn’t mean that the improvement in relations between Ankara and Yerevan

Friday

Alex Massie

Denying the Armenians

So, as expected Barack Obama has reneged upon his campaign promise to call the Armenian genocide, er, genocide. Instead it’s “slaughter”. Such are the prosaic demands of office. As Mike Crowley suggests this is not a defining moment in the Obama administration, but nor is it a particularly edifying spectacle. Memo to politicians: be careful what you promise! Memo to voters: Don’t believe the promises! Today’s statement in full here; reaction from Turks and Armenians here. UPDATE: Courtesy of Ben Smith there’s this video in which Samantha Power argues that: “What is amazing about Barack…[is]…his willingness as president to commemorate [the genocide] and certainly to call a spade a spade

Monday

Alex Massie

Turkey in the EU?

Like George W Bush, Barack Obama is in favour of Turkish accession to the EU. That’s grand, though those American progressives who would like to see europe do more, not less and project a more, not less unified approach to all manner of international issues – be they fiscal or military – should remember that Turkish membership makes a common european policy on just about any issue less, not more likely. For that reason, of course, so-called “euro-sceptics” ought to be enthusiasts for Turkish membership. Con Coughlin adds this reason for welcoming Turkish membership: Countries like France should also recognise that Turkish membership would strengthen, not weaken, the EU alliance,