The Al Qaida attacks of September 11, 2001, took place two weeks after I left my responsibilities at the Turkish Embassy in Washington, DC. I was appointed to the America desk of the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Ankara. It was just past lunchtime and our assistant deputy undersecretary Vefahan Ocak was not in
The media is overflowing with news about Afghanistan. After a twenty-year occupation, the irregular withdrawal of the United States and the re-take of power by a group that it tried to destroy is, of course, a situation that will occupy the international agenda for a long time. Especially in the last two decades, despite everything,
The new scenario spoken in the political backdrop in Ankara is based on the separate participation of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its election ally Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) in the upcoming parliamentary elections. According to that scenario, the MHP will not nominate its candidate in the presidential election and will continue
The row debate between the USA and China over the origin of the Covid-19 virus that shook the world is turning into a worldwide diplomatic war. China has launched a campaign through its diplomatic missions against US-origin accusations that the virus may have leaked from a lab in Wuhan. This was launched in Turkey, too.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan said on September 1 that his Justice and Development Party (AKP) government was planning to make public a new Constitution draft to the “nation’s discretion” in the first months of 2022. He wants to get the draft ready together with his election partner, Devlet Bahçeli, the leader of the Nationalist Movement
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey took a series of political-military steps last week, which had practical as well as symbolic significance. Taking the opportunity of the “Victory Week”, August 26-30 about the War of Independence of Turkey he gave a message to the exterior parties, especially the USA, the European Union, and Russia. The
An investigation has been launched into the killing of some 62 baby caretta carettas, or loggerheads, due to wooden walkways installed by two luxurious hotels in Antalya on the beach where the turtles lay their eggs.The baby loggerheads that hatched in the Belek district in Turkey’s Antalya were squeezed under the panels used by the
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan chose to be more cautious about operating Hamid Karzai Airport following the deadly attacks in the Taliban-controlled Afghan capital. Erdoğan confirmed in a press conference before leaving for Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro on August 27 that Turkey held talks with the Taliban“The Taliban have offers for us to operate the
An article about Afghan refugees by British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace for the U.K. newspaper Daily Mail triggered reactions in Turkey, despite the minister did not mention the name of the country.“We will establish a series of processing hubs across the region outside Afghanistan for those Afghans we have an obligation to bring to this
Late Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit visited Moscow on the eve of the Soviet invasion into Afghanistan in 1979 where he asked his counterpart Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin what they were aiming at by an intervention against the Mujahideen in Afghanistan. Kosygin sarcastically answered that they wanted “to carry Afghanistan from the 12th to the 16th