Turkish-American relations Face Another Test Over the Armenian Issue

The United States House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee narrowly passed a resolution, which calls on the president to refer to the killing of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire during World War I as “genocide.” Though it remains uncertain whether the resolution will be brought before the full House, already, it has threatened to affect Turkey’s relations with the US and Armenia.Ankara reacted to this development promptly. Turkish government officials reiterated strongly Turkey’s p...

The Georgia Crisis and Russia-Turkey Relations

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The August 2008 Russia-Georgia war has triggered some major shifts in regional geopolitics. The Caucasus crisis also directly affected the relationship between the two main regional powers – Russia and Turkey. Even before the Georgia war, the relations between Moscow and Ankara were quite complex – combining the elements of largescale cooperation and subtle competition.

The ambivalent situation which existed in the South Caucasus before Au...

Resolution of Turkey’s “Kurdish Question” in Critical Stage as PKK Threatens to End Peace Initiatives

Last October, eight unarmed Kurdish militants and 28 Kurdish civilians returned to southeast Turkey from bases of the Parti Karkerani Kurdistan (Kurdistan Workers’ Party - PKK) in northern Iraq. It was intended as the first of a series of government-sponsored “returns” of PKK activists and part of a larger scheme of reconciliation between the Kurdish militants and the state. When Kurdish activists in Turkey organized a massive parade for the returnees that looked more like a victory march, the e...

Azerbaijan Seeks Alternative Gas Export Routes: Sending a Signal to Ankara

“We are interested in exporting our resources through different routes,” Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev stated during his visit to Bulgaria on November 13 (AZTV). On the same day, he paid a short working visit to Sofia to meet his counterpart Georgi Parvanov and to sign an inter-governmental agreement on the transit of Azeri gas to Europe though the Black Sea. This was the third agreement signed with a foreign country during the past month. Previous agreements were signed with Russia and Ir...

Delays in Turkish-Azeri Gas Deal Raises Uncertainty Over Nabucco

Turkey and Azerbaijan have proven unable to conclude their negotiations on natural gas cooperation, which have been in progress for over one year. Turkish-Azeri gas talks include several issues involving the revision of the price Turkey pays for its imports from Shah Deniz-I, the determination of the volume and price for its imports from Shah Deniz-II, and agreement on the volume and conditions for the transit of Azeri exports to Europe through Turkish territory.Since the delay of the negotiatio...

US House Vote Adds New Twist to Turkey-Armenia Diplomacy

A key committee in the United States House of Representatives has once again approved a draft resolution recognizing the 1915 mass killings and deportations of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire as genocide. The dramatic development, condemned by Ankara and welcomed in Yerevan is widely seen in Armenia as heralding a last-ditched attempt by Washington to salvage the Turkish-Armenian normalization agreements signed in October under American mediation.Armenian politicians and pundits believe that Was...

Turkish Jihadis Respond to Ankara’s Anti-Al-Qaeda Operations

Turkish police units launched their largest anti al-Qaeda operation to date on the morning of January 22. The operation took place in a series of pre-dawn raids in towns throughout Turkey. It led to the arrest of as many as 140 people allegedly involved in an al-Qaeda ring that was plotting to carry out suicide bombings against Turkish troops in Afghanistan as well as attacks on the Turkish police (Hurriyet, January 22). The terrorists’ target appears to have been the International Security and ...

Turkish Jihadis Respond to Ankara’s Anti-Al-Qaeda Operations

Turkish police units launched their largest anti al-Qaeda operation to date on the morning of January 22. The operation took place in a series of pre-dawn raids in towns throughout Turkey. It led to the arrest of as many as 140 people allegedly involved in an al-Qaeda ring that was plotting to carry out suicide bombings against Turkish troops in Afghanistan as well as attacks on the Turkish police (Hurriyet, January 22). The terrorists’ target appears to have been the International Security and ...