Web restrictions come amid a government corruption scandal
Recep Tayyip Erdogan
Erdogan Visits Iran As Trouble Mounts at Home
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan escaped from a sweeping graft probe at home to visit Iran in hopes of easing tensions over the region’s handling of Syria’s civil war, state media reported Wednesday.
Erdogan flew to …
How Erdogan’s Troubles Are Good for Turkey
The massive corruption scandal that has rocked the Turkish government, may be bad for its Prime Minister, but good for Turkey in the long-term
Turkey’s House of Cards Moment: Arrests and Scandal Signal a Crisis for Erdogan
An astonishing series of arrests this week hint at a power struggle between Turkey’s Prime Minister and the Gulenists, an influential Islamist movement that was once his ally — but which now could provoke a political meltdown in Ankara
For Turkey, Planned U.S. Missile Strikes on Syria Not Good Enough
For some American allies, such as the UK, whose parliament seemed to reject any armed involvement in Syria on Thursday, punitive airstrikes against the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad might be too much to stomach. For …
Erdogan’s Crisis: How Protests Undermined Turkish Leader’s Legacy
In 2011, as regional leaders were toppled from power, one after the other, Turkey’s strident Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan looked like he had it all: a thriving economy (the world’s fastest-growing after China’s), …
As Turkey’s Protests Continue, Attention Falls on Failures of Turkish Media
As epic clashes between antigovernment protesters and riot police turned downtown Istanbul into a battle zone last weekend, the country’s two main news channels had, well, not much to report. One ran a documentary on penguins. …
Erdo-gone? After Taksim, Turkish Leader’s Political Future May Hang in the Balance
By Sunday night, most of the businesses on Istiklal Avenue, Istanbul’s biggest pedestrian street, seemed to have had their front teeth knocked in. ATM screens glared and winked stupidly from behind broken glass monitors. …
Turkey’s Massive Military Trial Opens Old Wounds and New Anxieties
Claims of procedural and evidentiary anomalies in a huge trial of coup plotters raise criticism of the Erdogan administration. Is the Prime Minister trying too hard to bury the military — and Turkish secularism?
French Draft Law On Armenian Genocide Rocks Franco-Turkish Relations
Anyone who hoped that calm and harmony might somehow prevail after the passage of a French bill criminalizing denial of the 1915 genocide of Armenians by Ottoman Turks was mightily disappointed Monday night. Adoption of that …
Turkish P.M. Erdogan: We Cannot Deny Our Ottoman Past
Our interview with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, published earlier this week on Global Spin, dwelled mostly on the growing shadow cast by the charismatic premier across the face of Mideast geo-politics. One question edited out of the earlier transcript raised the legacy of the Ottoman Empire, whose dominion once …
Israel and Turkey: It’s Hard to Fight with Your Hands in Each Other’s Pockets
One of the pleasures of covering Florida politics in Washington used to be Sam Gibbons, D-Tampa, the only Democrat reliably elected to the House from the Gulf Coast, and a dedicated teller of war stories. Gibbons parachuted into Normandy with the 101st Airborne and what followed would inspire certain quality entertainments from …
Turkey’s Prime Minister Erdogan Faces Many Challenges in Third Term
TIME editor Rana Foroohar examines the political and economic climate that gave Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan a third term as prime minister. Known as both a populist and a firm economic leader, Erdogan has achieved nearly unprecedented success in Turkey’s complex political environment. But although he has thus far handled an expanding …