Whither Turkey?
Turkey is going where President Erdogan wants to take it to, as those who do not agree with him are too intimidated to stand in his way.
- K. P. Fabian |
- August 17, 2016 |
- IDSA Comments
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Turkey is going where President Erdogan wants to take it to, as those who do not agree with him are too intimidated to stand in his way.
While a Russia-Turkey rapprochement is driven by their particular national interests, its trajectory and outcome are likely to be shaped by the interplay of several geo-economic and geo-political factors.
While there have been no studies on the motivation of Trinidadian Muslims to travel to join ISIS fighters, it is possible that the idea of the Caliphate has fired the imagination of disaffected youth.
The Joint Communique issued by the recent NATO summit, held on July 8-9 in Warsaw, appears to have sown the seeds of a renewed confrontation with Russia.
China’s push for influence among the Caribbean political elite has been replicated with an equally determined effort to court the military and the bureaucratic elite in the region, often deftly stepping in to take advantage of senseless overreactions on the part of the United States.
The coup has seriously dented Turkey’s image as a stable, secular, progressive and prosperous country. And Erdogan's witch-hunt has tarnished the country's reputation and credibility. Turkey’s polity and economy will take a long time to recover from the crippling attrition of recent days.
While a higher volume of trade through Petrapole should benefit both countries, this new ICP mechanism needs to be suitably leveraged to ensure that the north-east also derives benefits.
It is early days to speculate on the likely outcome and possible trajectory in Saudi-Israeli engagement, but Eshki’s visit has so far been the clearest indication of Saudi willingness to engage with the Jewish state.
The political reality in PoK is that ‘azadi’ is a chimera, and substantive control of the area is shared between terrorist organisations such as the LeT and HM and the political elite of Islamabad. However, a narrative has been fed in the Kashmir Valley that Pakistan is a more favourable option than India.
On July 27, 1990, Trinidad experienced its own day of infamy when the Jamaat-al-Muslimeen staged an armed insurrection and held hostage the then Prime Minister, most of his cabinet and several opposition MPs, plus the staff of the television and radio networks.