Stung by the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s October 10 approval of a resolution characterizing the massacres and deportations of Armenians by the Ottoman authorities during World War I as a genocide, Turkish politicians and journalists are unanimous that Turkey needs to react. But there is... MORE

The October 9 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), stating that compulsory religious instruction in Turkey violates the rights of religious minorities, has highlighted the discrimination suffered by the country’s substantial Alevi community (Aksam, Milliyet, Radikal, October 10). On September 12, 1980,... MORE

As the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) prepares to present a motion to parliament authorizing the deployment of Turkish troops in a cross-border military operation against Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) camps in northern Iraq, the organization is stepping up the pressure inside Turkey. On... MORE

Over the next few days the Turkish parliament is expected to approval a motion authorizing a cross-border military operation into northern Iraq to strike at camps belonging to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the Qandil Mountains. On October 9, a three and one-half hour... MORE

The unemployment rate stands at 70% of the adult population in the shantytowns that surround Diyarbakir, the largest city in the predominantly Kurdish southeast of Turkey, according to a recent study by Istanbul’s Bosphorus University (Milliyet, September 29). Socioeconomic underdevelopment has long been regarded as... MORE

The Turkish Energy Ministry has repeated Turkey’s determination to press ahead with a new natural gas agreement with Iran, despite objections from the United States. On October 3, Turkish Energy Ministry officials announced that that Turkey would not seek international financing for the $3.5 billion... MORE

An attempt by Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) to circumvent the country’s secularist establishment’s opposition to Abdullah Gul becoming president looks set to return to haunt it later this month. Under the current constitution, the president is elected by parliament. In April this... MORE

On October 1, Turkish Chief of Staff General Yasar Buyukanit publicly warned the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) against weakening secularism in the new Turkish constitution, which is expected to be put to a referendum in early 2008. A draft of the new constitution... MORE

On September 29, 12 male villagers were massacred close to the village of Besagac, near Turkey’s border with Iran, by what is believed to have been a unit of the armed wing of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). The killing came the day after Turkey... MORE

Turkish officials have accused Massoud Barzani, head of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq, of excluding the right of hot pursuit from a list of measures to be taken against militants of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) based in northern Iraq (NTV, Radikal,... MORE