The Turkey Analyst

Vol. 2 no. 6, 27 March 2009

ANALYSIS

Turkish President's Iraq Visit Marks Thaw in Turkish-Iraqi Relations
M. K. Kaya
Turkish president Abdullah Gül’s visit to Iraq last week signals a more relaxed Turkish attitude toward the Kurdish administration of northern Iraq. While relations have been acrimonious due mainly to the PKK’s ability to use northern Iraqi territory to stage terrorist attacks on Turkey, the picture has changed since Turkey’s military incursion into northern Iraq in 2007. The interests and policies of Turkey and of the Iraqi Kurds are indeed increasingly set to converge on the eve of the scheduled American withdrawal from Iraq.

Government's Struggle for Hegemony Fuels Doubts about the AKP's Democratic Values
Orhan Bursali
Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development party (AKP) has won two consecutive elections and is now in its eighth year in power. Since the AKP’s leaders came from an Islamist political background, doubts about the sincerity of its adherence to the principles of the democratic system have lingered on among the opposition. These suspicions have been fed by the controversial policies of the AKP, and in particular by its sustained effort to concentrate power in the hands of the executive branch.

NEWS DIGEST: THE FORTNIGHT IN REVIEW

I. What the Columnists Say
Dramatic developments in the Ergenekon case shaped public debate in Turkey during the fortnight. The imprisonment of Mustafa Balbay, chief Ankara correspondent of the secularist daily Cumhuriyet, who is accused of having taken part in a military-civilian conspiracy to topple the AKP government, and whose diaries that were recovered by the investigators are used as evidence against him, was followed by another dramatic turn in the coup conspiracy case. The prosecutors presented the charges against former generals Sener Eruygur and Hursit Tolon, shifting focus in the case from the alleged activities of low-level members of the “deep state” to the coup planning in 2003-2004, which according to the prosecution failed because of the stand taken by the then Chief of the General staff General Hilmi Özkök. A palpable change in the public discourse has now occurred. A general consensus is emerging among most commentators that the Ergenekon prosecutors have indeed unraveled a real threat to Turkish democracy.

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NEW Silk Road Paper published

Prospects for a 'Torn' Turkey: A Secular and Unitary Future?, by Svante E. Cornell and Halil M. Karaveli, October 2008.


The Turkey Analyst
The Turkey Analyst is a publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Joint Center, designed to bring authoritative analysis and news on the rapidly developing domestic and foreign policy issues in Turkey. It is published weekly, and includes a topical analysis, as well as translations and summaries of selected Turkish news reports. It is edited and compiled under the supervision of Svante E. Cornell, Halil M. Karaveli, and M. K. Kaya.

The Turkey Analyst occasionally publishes guest analyses, which are normally solicited. Submissions are nevertheless welcome.

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The Joint Center
The Joint Center, created in 2005, is the product of the merger of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute, at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, and the Silk Road Studies Program, at the Stockholm-based Institute for Security and Development Policy.

The Turkey Initiative
The Joint Center launched a Turkey Initiative in 2006 in order to improve understand of Turkish domestic and foreign affairs in Europe and the United States.

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