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[1/3]  A puppet of Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan is hung by its feet during a demonstration in Stockholm, Sweden, January 12, 2023, in this image obtained from social media. Twitter @realrojkom/via REUTERS ISTANBUL, Jan 12 (Reuters) – Turkey summoned Sweden’s ambassador to Ankara on Thursday, a diplomatic source said, over a demonstration in Stockholm in which a puppet of President Tayyip Erdogan was hung…

He’s trashed Turkey’s economy. He’s locked up all opposition. He’s playing a deadly game standing between East and West. Now President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is on the brink of triggering a war to boost his re-election chances. It’s the centenary of Turkish democracy. On June 23, the nation that sits at the crossroads of Europe, Asia and the Middle East will go to the…

The Maria case – The Reappraisal In the summer, SPIEGEL published several articles about refugees at the border river Evros. We reported that a Syrian child had died because Greece had not provided assistance. After doubts arose, we went deep into the research again. 30/12/2022, 18:24 Refugee group around Baidaa S. at the Evros Photo: private In the summer of 2022, DER SPIEGEL published…

Even though the self-proclaimed Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) has a population of merely 326,000, it boasts 21 universities which are largely only recognised by itself and by its big brother, Turkey. The universities try to attract foreign students with degree programs, which often only serve as a pretext to get people much closer to the external borders of the EU.

Asli Kandemir and Beril Akman, Bloomberg News The cost of commercial loans in Turkey fell below the interest rates on lira deposits for the first time since 2019, as the world’s most aggressive easing cycle and new regulations make loans for businesses cheaper. Nice Credit If You Can Get It in Turkey’s Micromanaged Economy The weighted average interest rate on commercial credit dropped to…

“I come to the Floor today to condemn the recent actions of the Turkish President which are not only disturbing—they are totally unacceptable.” WASHINGTON – Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) today delivered remarks on the Senate Floor following Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s threatened missile strike on Athens, Greece. Menendez called on the United States and the international community to take concrete steps…

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s warm handshake with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi during the opening ceremony of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar is likely to accelerate the process launched in 2021 to restore diplomatic relations between the two countries, which had been downgraded to the level of chargé d’affaires in 2013. However, el-Sisi issued a decree on Tuesday unilaterally determining the country’s…

First Greek-designed special operations craft receives its armament – Naval News The new special operations craft of the Hellenic Navy’s Underwater Demolition Command (UDC) is a product of Phi-Mechaniseas, a company formed by Greek shipbuilders, engineers and naval system manufacturers led by Panagiotis Alourdas, Commodore HN (rtd), Nautical Architect and Mechanical Engineer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT. The Hellenic Shipyards SA (Skaramaga Shipyards) built…

Bayraktar TB2 Drones ‘Out Of Action’ From Ukraine War; Russia’s Air Defense Or Diplomacy Behind Their Disappearance? Turkish Bayraktar TB2 drones emerged as the ‘ideal weapon’ that could change the course of the war in Ukraine. However, the Turkish-origin UAVs have now largely vanished from the battlefield, raising doubts about their efficiency. The Turkish drones’ success was extensively covered in the media in the…

Turkey’s online community has been rocked by a scandal surrounding Twitch after it was revealed that Amazon’s live streaming service is used to launder money worth millions of dollars. The scheme was noticed by Twitch streamers after a massive data leak on Oct. 6, which showed thousands of streamers’ payouts. Upon a close inspection, Turkish streamers noticed that those with 40 to 50 viewers…

The Al Nahyan family owns Manchester City Football Club, a dozen or so palaces and invested big in SpaceX and Savage X Fenty. In a region where opulence is on full display, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan keeps a low profile belying his importance. That doesn’t stop the whispers about the Abu Dhabi royal, who’s also the top spymaster for the United Arab Emirates: that…

Sıtkı Ayan, the businessman helping Tehran sell oil, has so far dodged US sanctions. On March 22 of 2021, several of the world’s most dangerous men descended on Beirut’s historic seaside Summerland Hotel — not to swim in the Mediterranean or explore the sumptuous resort’s “Le Beach Pop Up,” but to talk Turkey. The meeting was a secret one, between a delegation of senior Iranian…

Finland must lift an arms embargo on Ankara as a condition to securing support from Turkey for its NATO membership bid, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Tuesday. Finland and Sweden both asked to join NATO this year in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but longtime member Turkey refused to endorse their request until a number of demands were met, including…

In his 2013 speech in Tusványos, PM Viktor Orbán mentioned Turkey as an example of an illiberal democracy. Since then, Hungary has not only moved closer to Ankara in ideological terms, but trade between the two countries has also increased significantly. More recently, the Turks have also been involved in the development of the Hungarian armed forces: for example, Hungarian Defence Forces bought Turkish…

    Turkish soldiers patrol along a wall on the border line between Turkey and Syria, in the Turkish border town of Ceylanpinar, in Sanliurfa province, Turkey, October 29, 2019(photo credit: REUTERS/KEMAL ASLAN) A new investigation has focused on Turkey’s use of missiles as part of its operations in Syria. These are missiles fired from Turkish drones. Conflict Armament Research (CAR), a European Union-funded organization that helps…

Egypt and Greece are calling on Turkey and Libya to scrap an energy exploration agreement that critics say violates exclusive economic zones off the Mediterranean coast. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu shakes hands with his Libyan counterpart, Najla Mangoush, upon arrival in Tripoli on October 3, 2022. The two nations signed a memorandum of understanding that includes a controversial provision to jointly explore energy…

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said at a Tuesday parliamentary committee meeting on his ministry’s 2023 budget that a maritime agreement signed between Turkey and Libya in 2019 is merely a memorandum and that it can’t be approved by the Libyan parliament. Main opposition lawmaker and former ambassador Ünal Çeviköz had asked the minister what Turkey had done to make the officially titled “Memorandum…

Egypt-Libya-Greece gas pipeline: a new alternative route for blue gold? | Nova News The idea is to build two gas pipelines, in addition to the current pipeline with Italy: one to connect the North African country to Greece through the Mediterranean, while the other should reach the gas terminals of Damietta, Egypt, approximately 200 kilometers north of Cairo La Libya is studying a new,…

The migration path has witnessed an unprecedented turn on the Turkish side since the beginning of last September in dealing with refugees seeking to reach Europe by land through the border line separating Greece. This coincided with the launch of calls to organize a campaign of mass migration to Europe called the “Caravan of Light.” The organizers of this campaign launched on the Telegram…

The Geo-Politics Of Natural Gas To Europe – Eurasia Review It seemed like a good idea at the time. In January 2022, as Russian troops were massing on Ukraine’s border, the U.S. government withdrew support for the EastMed natural gas pipeline, claiming the project conflicted with the environmental goals of the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden, and created tensions in the region. The pipeline, set to be completed…

The Russo-Ukrainian crisis, which started on 24 February 2022, brought war back to Europe. This war has visibly impacted the energy nerve of Europe as Russia is the primary exporter of energy, for – Liquified Natural Gas (LNG), oil and solid fossil fuel. Germany, in particular, had maintained a pro-longed diplomatic front in a bid to continue its energy trade which is largely dependent…

The Libyan EEZ challenge – JNS.org Israel should reject Turkey’s claims in the Eastern Mediterranean. (November 23, 2022 / Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security) Israel’s recent rapprochement with Turkey need not preclude Jerusalem taking a firm stand on Ankara’s claims in the Eastern Mediterranean. Indeed, Israel must again reject the Memorandum of Understanding signed in October between Turkey and the Government of National…

Albanian leader Rama becomes Erdoğan’s pasha – Turkish Minute Albania’s charismatic Prime Minister Edi Rama, the only Albanian prime minister in history to have won three parliamentary elections in a row, has been hard at work establishing a personal friendship with Turkey’s autocratic leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The Albanian government’s decision to shut down schools affiliated with the faith-based Gülen movement came as a…

The European Union rejects the statements by Türkiye about the acceptance of the Turkish Cypriot secessionist entity, the so-called, internationally not recognised, “Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus”, as an observer in the Organisation of Turkic States. …

The EU is fully committed to a comprehensive settlement of the Cyprus problem based on a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation with political equality, in accordance with the relevant United Nations…

Part of being, or becoming, allies is agreeing who your common enemies are and aren’t. Otherwise, there’d be no need for the alliance in the first place. But that’s easier said than done, especially when at least one ally is on an ego trip worthy of an Ottoman sultan. In the NATO alliance, that would yet again be Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He’s…

The European Union takes note of the reports indicating that Turkey and the Libyan Government of National Unity have signed an agreement on hydrocarbons based on the 2019 Turkey-Libya Memorandum of Understanding on delimitation of maritime jurisdiction areas in the Mediterranean. The EU recalls that its position on this Memorandum has been clearly stated by the European Council in December 2019 and remains unchanged: The…

OSLO/STOCKHOLM, Sept 30 (Reuters) – Sweden’s Inspectorate of Strategic Products (ISP) said on Friday reversed a ban against exporting military equipment to Turkey, following the Nordic country’s decision to join the NATO military alliance and agreement to overcome Turkish objections. The Sweden and Finland sought membership to NATO earlier this year following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but faced a hurdle as its application needs…

Ahmet Yilmaz* shouldn’t be in a dangerous profession. He’s not a cop or a criminal. Ahmet is a banana importer in Turkey. “This is my third decade in the industry,” he proudly told InSight Crime. “[My company] made the first transit sales from Turkey to countries [like] Iraq and Iran. Until 2010, we were the regional representative of companies such as Chiquita and Del…

Either way, Turkey will still have difficulty overcoming the substantial technological edge the HAF will likely attain by 2030.

Even if Turkey fields 120 Block 70/72 F-16s (40 brand new and 80 upgraded), they will be up against 84 HAF Block 72 Vipers (all in service no later than the second half of 2027), 20-40 F-35s, and, at the…

Seen as a rogue outlier in Nato, Turkey found and acted upon the opportunity to get the West to support its military operation in northern Syria. Turkish forces and alleged mercenaries occupy parts of this region. A vast array of human rights abuses was reported during the peak of its military intervention and Ankara faced condemnation from the Western world. All major NATO members…

Mr Erdogan will now expect Sweden and Finland to adhere to the spirit, and not just the (notably vague) letter, of the agreement. This means he will demand they back a future Turkish operation in Syria to combat the YPG, who happen to be the West’s main allies against Islamic State, support Ankara’s plans to expel and forcibly resettle over one million Syrian refugees in…

The accounting rules apply retroactively from Jan 1 of the year in question. The impact on BBVA’s first quarter results will be reflected in the bank’s second quarter income statement. The official inflation rate in Turkey is currently above 70% and BBVA’s base-case scenario is that it will not fall below 60% at any point this year.

This is…

“Since the 1960s, Turkish traffickers have dominated the global heroin trade, establishing both deep corruption webs at home and a criminal tapestry of port contacts, logistics networks and distribution gangs across Europe,” the report said. “By the 1980s, this had consolidated into the so-called “Balkan Route”: a modern multi-branched Silk Road that transported opiates from Afghanistan and Iran, through the Turkish land…

Historic rivals, Turkey and Greece have been at odds over issues ranging from overflights and the status of Aegean islands, maritime boundaries and hydrocarbon resources in the Mediterranean, and ethnically-split Cyprus.

Tensions flared again recently over air space and the status of demilitarised islands in the Aegean. Erdogan has said Mitsotakis “no longer exists for him” after the Greek…

Turkey blocks access to Deutsche Welle and Voice of America | AP News ISTANBUL (AP) — Turkey’s media watchdog has banned access to the Turkish services of U.S. public service broadcaster Voice of America and German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, prompting criticism of censorship. The Supreme Board of Radio and Television enforced a February decision requiring international media that air television content in Turkish online…

Turkey’s hopes that developments at this week’s Nato Madrid summit moved it closer to obtaining F-16 warplanes from the US were on June 20 tempered by an announcement that regional arch-rival Greece has sent an official request to Washington for the acquisition of 20 of the world’s most advanced fighter plane, the Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth jet.

Ankara remains…

The US did not offer Turkey anything to get Erdogan to drop his objections to allowing Sweden and Finland into the alliance, a trio of senior administration officials claim – The Pavlovic Today A trio of senior administration officials detail the first day of NATO Summit in Madrid. Here’s what they told The Pavlovic Today. The new NATO strategic concept will be released shortly…

Before the text was released, Turkish officials circulated to media outlets a note titled “Turkey got what it wanted.” Finland’s leading newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, wrote in an editorial that “Turkey got what it wanted – and so did Finland and Sweden.”

“The memorandum was the price that had to be paid for the weird style of dealings with Turkish…

Turkish police officers seize 615kg of cocaine hidden in banana crates from South America with the help of a sniffer dog in an operation in the southern city of Mersin. Photo: Mustafa Gungor/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images Turkey has become a global trafficking hub for South American cocaine, fuelling rising demand for the drug in Eastern Europe and the Persian Gulf, according to organised crime experts….

In 2022, cocaine shipments heading to Turkey have been seized in Ecuador, West Africa, and Malta, as well as in Turkey itself.

Though the vast majority of this cocaine simply transits through Turkey, a growing minority now stays in the country, according to…

Turkey is now using the distraction of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a cover to increase its likelihood of officially annexing Cyprus’s north. On April 14, a protocol was signed between Turkey and the illegal Turkish de facto regime that has been ruling occupied northern Cyprus. Although Turkey has already forcibly altered the demography of Cyprus through the ethnic cleansing campaign,…

Egypt, Greece, Cyprus sign power linkage agreement in Athens – Ahram Online The ninth trilateral summit, focusing on energy and boosting trilateral cooperation, is part of a cooperation mechanism launched in 2014 between the three countries. Egypt on Saturday signed an accord with Cyprus on linkage between the two countries’ electricity transmission networks. Two days earlier, Egypt also signed with Greece an agreement on…

Turkey is now further away from the EU compared to what was happening a quarter of a century ago, according to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, in an interview given to a small number of European newspapers, including Kathimerini.

Commenting on the choice by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan not to apply European sanctions against Russia, von…

Government patronage has been a crucial factor in aiding the internationalization of Turkish construction service corporations.[23] Construction firms, especially those aligned closely with the AK Party, have been among the main beneficiaries of easy access to credit in the international market, tax incentives and exemptions, and relaxed public procurement practices.[24] Erdoğan has personally presided over the building and functioning of this patronage system, actively…

During the Fifth Trilateral Defence Ministers Meeting, Egypt’s Minister of Defence and Military Production Mohamed Zaki highlighted the importance of supporting cooperation and partnership between Egypt, Cyprus and Greece to achieve security and stability in the Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean regions, Egyptian Armed Forces spokesman Gharib Abdel-Hafez said in a statement.

He hailed the fruitful relations witnessed recently between the…

When you, Mister Secretary-General, call on Greece to engage in dialogue with Turkey to resolve their differences, you are essentially asking Greece to place its territorial integrity as a subject of negotiations with Turkey. And you are asking for it while representing an Alliance that was set up and still exists for this very reason, namely the protection of the territorial integrity…

While Russia has become India’s “second-biggest” oil source since the start of the war in Ukraine, following its $25 per barrel discount to India and supply chain disruptions since the war, data collected by the Finnish think tank, the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), also shows…

In an interview for the newspaper “Naftemporiki” on Saturday, where the main place was occupied by Greek-Turkish rhetoric and tensions, Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias also referred to relations with Albania.

Asked if after the election of the new Albanian president, there could be rapid developments regarding the signing of the joint agreement for the establishment of the EEA…

“Now, I am saying that I am the candidate of the People’s Alliance,” he told supporters in the Aegean port city of Izmir last week. He was referring to the ruling coalition of his AK Party and the nationalist MHP.

Turkey’s allies and rivals, along with Turks themselves, might want to buckle up for 12 months of turbulence. The US and Europe should…

European Commission Vice President Margharitis Schinas said that Turkish Cypriot authorities should also be held accountable for curbing migrant arrivals. “We won’t let the Turkish Cypriot community to consider itself neutral in what is going on,” Schinas said after visiting upgraded facilities at the Pournara migrant reception camp outside the capital. “They must also assume their share of responsibility and we’ll find a way to…

Turkey under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is in a somewhat similar situation. If he makes the mistake – as his political rivals are encouraging him to do – of transferring his hostile instincts into the field of military operations in Evros and the Aegean, he will spell his own destruction just as Putin did. The difference is that no one will step…

Aside from a few words of condemnation at the start of the war in Ukraine, Turkey has remained on good terms with Russia throughout. When Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, visited Ankara this month his Turkish counterpart kindly suggested that the West should ease sanctions against Russia if Russia relaxed its blockade of Ukrainian ports. When Mr Lavrov repeated his claim that…

The timing of the event was not random. Greece’s relationship with Turkey is deteriorating and tensions are escalating dangerously due to their maritime disputes in the Aegean Sea and the eastern Mediterranean Sea. The dispute is complicated, and perceptions from each side are different. According to Turkey, for instance, everything starts back in 1923 and the Treaty of Lausanne, the main treaty between the…

You forget, of course, that these islands have been Greek for thousands of years, many centuries before your ancestors for the first time in their history laid their eyes on the… blue colour of the Aegean. The islands of Imvros and Tenedos were also Greek. Why do you not implement, correspondingly, the provisions of Article 14 of the Treaty of Lausanne? [Article 14 stipulates: “The islands…

The crisis culminated when Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis rushed to the United States recently and targeted Turkey in Congress. While the Turkish delegation was discussing the F-16s in the U.S., the Greek leader was trying to persuade Washington to embargo Ankara, a NATO ally and neighbor of Greece. It happened at a time when “third parties” were not included at the…

“What is default for Turkey, what is bankruptcy? It means that the Republic of Turkey cannot pay for the natural gas and oil it imports. Bankruptcy means that basic needs such as gas and diesel cannot be met even with money. You have money, you can’t get more than half a gas tank, or you wait in a queue for 3 hours….

Nowadays, the only remaining problematic region in Turkish foreign policy is the Eastern Mediterranean, in which it conflicts with Greece. As a matter of the fact, the balance of power has changed in the region in favor of Turkey over the last two decades. Turkey has begun to play in a higher league, which creates more concerns in Greece, which has been exploiting the…

Under President Erdoğan, Turkish foreign policy has increasingly become an extension of domestic politics. Therefore, whenever President Erdoğan is conducting foreign policy, he has goals at both the international and domestic levels. Given that Erdoğan has an uphill battle in the presidential and parliamentary elections scheduled for June 2023, the domestic level game is at least as important as, if not more…

Greece and Turkey’s competing bids to win U.S. attention, money and weapons are roiling the region, with war already raging next door.

The longtime Mediterranean rivals have suddenly found themselves in a prominent position as the U.S. and its Western allies reorient their military forces to constrain Russia’s march into Ukraine, which sits just across the Black Sea from…

Kakabaveh says she believes the NATO memberships stalemate will be resolved with a backroom deal between the U.S. and Turkey. If it isn’t, and Sweden is unable to join NATO because of her, Kakabaveh won’t have any regrets. She is against NATO membership anyway, saying it would undermine Sweden’s ability to be a voice for peace in the world.

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In the concluding paragraph, the Turkish president requests the approval of parliament to send Turkish troops to foreign countries for operations and interventions in order to effectively protect Turkey’s interests and to help pursue a dynamic policy so as to to avoid facing a situation that can’t be remedied, adding that the scope of operations, number of troops and time deployed will be determined…

“Unfortunately, this is not the first time that Mr. Stoltenberg has chosen to justify the authoritarian Erdogan regime, even Turkey’s extortionate attitude towards Sweden and Finland,” Androulakis said, adding: “But it should be absolutely understood by everyone that it will be the last. He can not be both Erdogan’s ambassador and NATO Secretary General.” “The provocations in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean, the threat…

Turkey, in addition to provocative actions and inflammatory statements, is also spreading fake news, accusing Greek authorities of opening fire on migrants trying to cross the border in Evros, resulting in the death of an Afghan man.

The DHA news agency reports that the incident took place in the village of Alibey on the border…

A serious incident took place during the NATO Parliamentary Assembly Committee between Greek MPs and the Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar.

Speaking at a meeting of the NATO parliamentary committee in Constantinople, Hulusi Akar once again raised the issue of territorial waters and the demilitarization of the Aegean islands and accused Greece of supporting terrorism.