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Not many Turkish people care about the country joining the European Union once such a popular topic of discussion in Turkey. Since the membership process stalled over the past decade or more, Turks have all but given up on this dream, while Europeans perceive Turkey either as a buffer zone keeping refugees out of Europe, or as a holiday destination.

But geography is a real thing, and nothing changes the fact that Turkey is a large country attached to Europe, not only physically but economically and politically, too.

A draft report on this long-discussed problem, produced by Nacho Snchez, Spanish politician and rapporteur for the European Parliament, was delayed due to the Turkish elections. The report is an effort to come up with a creative solution, and aims to offer an alternative to the EU accession process, which seems to have been on the ice for quite some time.

Both sides have legitimate complaints.

Ankara says the EU is discriminating against Turkey, and that the government sees no light at the end of the tunnel, despite waiting 60 years for membership. Even countries which were a part of the Eastern Bloc when Turkey and Europe signed the Ankara Agreement in 1963 have been members of the EU for nearly a quarter of a century now. Turkey, on the other hand, is trying to make do with a Customs Union treaty, which we cannot update, no matter what. All the while, the EU moves increasingly further away in the minds of average Turkish citizens

When it comes to the EUs criticisms of Turkey, the anti-democratic practices that have become more intense in recent years are at the top of the list. Turkeys stance on Cyprus, which both it and Greece claim, is another important agenda item.

In fact, the decline in democracy is more of a real problem for Turkish citizens than for the EU. It would be perhaps more appropriate to criticize the EU for contributing to the authoritarianization of the country by excluding Turkey.

On the other hand, if we look at the situation some other EU member countries, we can also say that membership does not guarantee democratic policies.

The process is gridlocked, no matter how right either side may be. European Parliament Rapporteur Sanchez suggests a creative solution, based on acknowledging that fact. But this is not a new subject: in Europe, some have long argued that full Turkish membership is not a realistic goal, and instead a vaguely defined privileged partnership status would be more fitting. Such theses became more common when former French President Nicolas Sarkozy came into power, but it's fair to assume that Germany tacitly approves of this approach as well.

There may not be any other perspectives left to support Turkey since the UK, which was the country's most vocal supporter, took itself out of the equation via Brexit.

But from the beginning, the Turkish government has strongly opposed the privileged partnership theory, arguing instead that full membership is an earned right via international treaties.

October 6, 2022, Prague, Czech Republic: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan comes to first meeting of European Political Community.

Ondrej Deml/ZUMA

Beyond that, there is also the idea that the accession process was as important as entering the EU itself. Ankara would gain momentum on important matters such as the rule of the law, democratization and a properly running market economy, as long as they remain true to the EU perspective.

But today, we can see that this opinion was not correct. One could argue that Ankara fell behind because they lost the EU perspective regardless, going back to the way things were before is not possible. Even if Turkey does take steps toward democratization and a properly running economy, it wouldnt be convincing to take that path just to satisfy Europe.

If there are those who believe the process would move along if the opposition had won the recent Turkish elections, I have doubts about that, too. A victory for the opposition parties wouldnt untie this Gordian Knot either first, because the problem does not stem only from Turkeys inner dynamics, and also because European policies have drifted further from Turkey's interests.

The refugee issue is becoming the main topic for European voters, and it seems hard to convince the public to support any increase in the asylum system while a recession looms and security fears fuel hostility towards foreigners. This is visible even in Germany, which has been relatively resistant to this concept, where right-wing populist party AfD is on the rise. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, known for being friendly to the Turkish government, was happy about the election results in Turkey, saying that he was glad that Turkey would remain a buffer zone between Europe and refugees. Even politicians who seem to be closer to Ankara dont want Turkey in the EU, but value the country as a barrier which protects them from the masses at their door.

Obviously, the value of Turkey is not limited to the refugee issue. It is impossible to discard Turkey totally, because it is so integrated into the European economy, and because of its geopolitical importance which became even more visible due to the war in Ukraine. Turkeys stability is directly related to Europes own safety. Add Emmanuel Macrons recently voiced dream of Europe being an independent political actor to all of these, and we can see that excluding Turkey completely wouldnt be a rational move. The EU has temporarily burned bridges with Russia because of the war; it would be too costly to turn its back to Turkey.

Sanchez, the European Parliament Rapporteur, argues for an alternative mechanism, based on all of these facts.

On one hand, there is a need to prepare a framework for countries that arent EU members but are integrated into the continent, like Ukraine or the UK. Of course, there is also the fact that countries which are not involved in the decision-making processes of the EU may be reluctant to harmonize with its policies, and would instead rather take care of their own.

On the other hand, politics is the art of doing whats possible. Creative solutions are required if the EU expansion process has ended for the foreseeable future, but the need for harmony between the sides remains. As Sanchez says, if the paused membership process blocks potential cooperation opportunities between the EU and Turkey, those obstacles should be eliminated. Maybe the process is not as important as membership itself. On the contrary, its a part of the gridlock.

Of course, its still too early to be optimistic, given the lack of a solid framework. Turkey's practical demands have yet to be answered, including issues around the Customs Union and the increased rejection rates Turkish citizens have faced when applying for Schengen visas. If a mechanism could be found to satisfy both the expectations of Turkey from the EU and Turkeys agenda for democratization, political and economic reform, that would be a major development. Otherwise, we seem to be continuing on the path in which cooperation opportunities between the sides are wasted, and we remain stuck with a low-quality democracy and Turkish-style economics, just as it has been for the past 20 years.

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Erdogan III & Europe: Is There Any Future For Turkey In The EU? - Worldcrunch

ISTANBULSoccer fans from around the world navigated a logistical labyrinth to reach Ataturk Olympic Stadium on June 10 for the 2023 Champions League Final. During the annual tournament, organized by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA)the governing body of European soccerelite clubs compete to earn the title of best in Europe. The final is widely regarded as the most prestigious match in global club soccer.

This years final pit Manchester City against Inter Milan andbetween the traffic, police barricades, and other security measuressome attendees reportedly walked up to five miles to attend. But they were overwhelmingly merry as they chanted, waved flags, riled up fellow supporters, and teased their opponents. After a tense showdown, Manchester City won 1-0.

The checkpoints were put in place by UEFA and Turkish law enforcement. UEFA was found primarily responsible for chaos at the 2022 Champions League final in Pariswhen visiting fans were tear-gassed and pepper sprayed by local police at congested stadium entrancesand this year no one in event management wanted to take any chances. Turkish authorities and UEFA were also keen to project control after rumors that the match would be moved out of Turkey due to projected political unrest following the countrys pivotal election just weeks before, when President Recep Tayyip Erdogan secured an unprecedented third term in office.

Like many of Istanbuls other cultural landmarks, the Olympic stadium is named after Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder and first president of the modern Turkish Republic, which turns 100 in October. The stadium was originally constructed as part of Istanbuls failed bid for the 2008 Olympics and has served as a venue for one Champions League final in the pastthe 2005 match between AC Milan and Liverpool.

This years final provided the newly reelected Erdogan with one of his first opportunities to face his European counterparts in government and civil society after liberally deploying anti-Western rhetoric throughout his presidential campaign. Prior to attending the final, Erdogan received both UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin and Gianni Infantinothe president of international soccer association FIFAat Ataturk Airport, where they held closed-door talks.

From the stadiums VIP box, flanked by United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan to his left and Ceferin to his right, Erdogans message was clear: He can play the geopolitical game his way and win. Turkey remains a transcontinental countrygeographically, politically, and culturally. But while Erdogans regime has symbolically cleaved Turkey and Europe, there is no separating them. Just look at the Turkish leader, hosting the biggest night in European club soccer.

For Turkey, there was a lot riding on this final. Considering the fact that [Erdogan] has been facing an economic crisis for the last few years, I think its very important for him to give the image of exuberance, of growth, of success, said Berk Esen, an assistant professor of political science at Istanbuls Sabanci University. Football is probably the most convenient venue for him to do that. After all, Esen added, Were a football-loving nation.

After World War II, Turkey began prioritizing friendly matches with European national teams to build closer relations to the West. Encounters with European teams became a reflection of the national psyche, raising issues of competition, nationalism and respect, researchers Ozgehan Senyuva and Sevecen Tunc wrote in their article Turkey and the Europe of football, published in a Sport in History journal issue titled The Origins and Birth of lEurope du football.

Because of Turkeys desire to align itself with the West, its bid for membership to UEFA in 1955 was a foreign-policy priority. The overture was warmly welcomed by UEFAs executive committee, and it helped that the country had recently formed political, economic, and military alliances with Greece and Yugoslavia. But FIFA, soccers international governing body, opposed on the grounds that Turkey belonged de facto and de jure to Asia: Its capital, Ankara, is based on the Asian side of the country. (Istanbul, Turkeys largest city, straddles Europe and Asia.)

The Turkish Football Federation is currently pursuing the countrys sixth consecutive bid to host the UEFA European Football Championship, or Euro, in 2028 or 2032. (Unlike the Champions League, the Euro is a tournament of nationalrather than clubteams.) In 2018, Turkey lost its bid to host the Euro 2024 tournament to Germany, with UEFAs executive committee citing lack of an action plan in the area of human rights in its evaluation of Istanbuls bid. It was the first time such a criterion had ever been applied.

For Ankara, all the above are familiar refrains from European institutions. Turkey has been campaigning for European Union membership for the past 36 years and counting, and its bids have been habitually blocked by other member states, which often cite their concern for human rights in the country.

Turkeyshuman rights recordhas deteriorated considerablyunder Erdogan, particularlyover the past decade,creating an openly hostile environment for independent media, human rights defenders, the LGBTQ+ community, Kurdish political activists, and government critics. But, as Philip Balboni recentlywroteinForeign Policy,many of the EUs espoused concerns precede that backslideandsimilar issues did not stop a number of Central and Eastern European states such as the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia from obtaining EU status while Turkeys petitions were repeatedly deferred.

This rhetoric of Erdogan taking Turkey away from Europe is missing one dimension: Its not like Europe was waiting with open arms and trying to pull Turkey towards them, Senyuva told Foreign Policy. Europe will continue bashing Turkey and putting all the blame on [Erdogan] so they dont have to discuss all the shortcomings on the European side, or the rise of the populist right wing in Europe and their anti-Turkish, xenophobic, and racist rhetoric. Indeed, even when Turkey underwent considerable political and economic reforms, some European politicians still openly leaned into the argument of civilizational difference to justify leaving Turkey waiting at Europes doorstep.

In 2010, Turkey lost its bid to host Euro 2016 to France by a single votewith Turkeys place in Europe a key factor, the Associated Press reported. Frances then-President Nicolas Sarkozy, who had campaigned on his opposition to Turkey joining the EU (arguing it was not geographically a part of Europe), was in attendance at UEFAs headquarters in Geneva to receive Frances win.

Though EU-Turkey accession negotiations officially froze in 2019, Ankaras UEFA bids have not relented. Soccer is not an unfamiliar tool for Erdogan, who has linked the sport to politics since his own days as a soccer player in the 1970s and 80s, when he was active in youth politics while playing semi-professionally at clubs Erokspor, Camialti, and IETT Spor. (He won five titles as the captain of the latter.) As prime minister and now president, he has invested incredible resources into stadium construction in recent years. Recep Tayyip Erdogan Stadium opened in Istanbul in 2005.

While Erdogans confrontations with Europe may be read as intended to move the country further away from the Westand more freely toward authoritarian populismhe is unlikely to sever ties anytime soon, Esen told Foreign Policy. Erdogan is really trying to carve out an autonomous space for himself in the international arena, Esen said. Sometimes that requires challenging the West directly; on other occasions, it requires stuff like this.

Stuff, such as hosting his political peers to softly reenforceas Erdogan put itthe inseparability of Turkey as a part of Europe, albeit on its own terms.

In conversations with Foreign Policy, Turkish soccer fans across Istanbul on the weekend of the final said they saw the sport as Turkeys irrefutable link to Europe. When asked whether he saw Turkey as a part of the continent, Eren Ozdemir, a supporter of Istanbul club Galatasaray, replied without hesitation: Yes.

Its a great tournament, known all over the world, he said. The whole world can see us hosting this great organization [and] promoting Turkey. He saw nothing out of place with Turkey hosting the Champions League final.

Even though Ozdemirs club wasnt in this years final, he was still invested in the tournament for other reasons: Galatasaray recently won the Turkish Super League, securing its place in the qualifying rounds of next seasons Champions League. In Istanbuls city center, flush with banners welcoming Manchester City and Inter Milan, red and yellow Galatasaray flags were just as ubiquitous. The melding of champions appeared seamless, and the association purposeful.

The proximity to prestige is the point: There is no arena more prestigious than European soccer. The next three teams in the Turkish Super League have also qualified to play in UEFA cups in the coming months.

As Turkey enters its centennial year, Erdogan has a reliable outlet to kindle nationalism in his deeply polarized country. In Turkey, love for football is cross-cutting, said Esen, who is also a Galatasaray fan. Its probably one of the few unifying themes.

Whether Turkeys soccer clubsand national teamcan start winning on the world stage is another question. According to Yusuf Atalay, an event volunteer working at one of the concession stands in the stadium on the night of the final, the answer is no. Turkish teams almost cant dream about the Champions League final, he said. In order to make it to the final, you have to have a good economy.

Atalay responded affirmatively, if hesitantly, when asked whether Turkey was still a part of Europe. At the very least, it is when it comes to the beautiful game.

Continued here:
For Turkey's Erdogan, Soccer Is a Hobbyand Geopolitical Tool - Foreign Policy

Explainer

07:00

by Maximilian Hess

The autocrats trade notes. Credit: Getty

The aborted Prigozhin Putsch has rocked Russia, though it was called off before an alleged 25,000 soldiers from the Wagner Group could complete their march on Moscow. What this portends for Russias future or even that of its immediate protagonists remains unclear. Never before has Winston Churchills quote Kremlin political intrigues are comparable to a bulldog fight under a rug. An outsider only hears the growling, and when he sees the bones fly out from beneath it is obvious who won appeared so prescient.

The crisis was without precedent in Vladimir Putins rule. But a comparison can be found in the 2016 coup attempt against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. That attempt similarly saw the rapid launch of fighting in urban areas and a battle for control of key cities. Yet Putin and Erdogans responses were remarkably different. The latter rapidly released a video calling for Turks to oppose the coup and the security forces that remained loyal to him refused to stand-down. At least 265 people were killed.

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Erdogan showed that he was willing to fight to retain a monopoly on the use of force, and rapidly named his alleged opponents. Putin did not even mention Prigozhin in his belated response on the morning of 24th June. On the other hand, Erdogan made clear that he saw the movement led by US-based cleric Fethullah Glen as responsible for the coup against him, even though Glen had once been his close ally just as Prigozhin had been Putins.

Erdogan used it to justify a major crackdown and to further erode Turkeys democratic norms, helping him retain power to the present day. Putin long ago eliminated or jailed Russias democratic opposition, and what remained has largely fled abroad over the last year, but his meek initial response bodes poorly for the system that he has established. Prigozhin has proven that the Kremlin can be put under threat and that Putins promise of stability and prosperity for Russia after the tumult of the 1990s is rapidly evaporating.

Prigozhins threatened march prompted a level of panic amongst Muscovites and St. Petersburgers that the war against Ukraine had failed to cause: despite its wider horrors, they have thus far been immune to its impacts other than a handful of largely symbolic drone attacks. Most remarkable is that their fears were not eliminated by decisive action from Putin himself or the Russian security services with which he is so closely associated, but instead ostensibly by mediation from Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.

Why Prigozhin agreed to stand down remains unknown. He had, after all, been increasingly brazen in his challenges to Putins authority. On 23rd June the Wagner chief dismissed Russias casus belli for the full-scale of invasion of Ukraine and even acknowledged that the Kremlins allegations that enemy forces threatened genocide against Russian-speakers in eastern Ukraine were factually incorrect and poor propaganda. Though he said the war remained worth fighting, he alleged it was engineered by the Minister of Defence, Sergei Shoigu, as well as the siloviki oligarchs who wanted to pillage Ukraines national wealth as they had in occupied Donetsk and Luhansk since 2014.

Prigozhin is ostensibly bound for Belarus itself though Minsk has its own history of bad blood with Prigozhins forces. The Wagner boss was filmed smiling and in a celebratory mood as he left Rostov. His press service has announced that he will have more to say in due course. But Putins meek response has shattered his image of strength in Russia, just as his failing invasion of Ukraine has shattered his image of strength abroad.

Excerpt from:
Will Putin borrow from the Erdogan playbook? - UnHerd

Turkish women continued their sit-in protest against the PKK terrorist organization in the country's southeast, hoping to reunite with their children on Eid al-Adha, one of the two major festivals celebrated by Muslims worldwide.

They say their children were kidnapped or forcibly recruited by the PKK terrorist organization.

The protest outside the HDP headquarters in Diyarbakir province has entered its day 1,394, with more people joining in daily.

Bedriye Uslu told Anadolu that she is protesting in front of the HDP building for the return of his son Mahmut, who was kidnapped "26 Eid ago."

My son is 30 years old now; if he were here, he would have a home, get married, and have children. I hope our efforts will not be in vain, and one day our children will come. We will reunite with our children and spend the holidays with them," she said in an optimistic tone, hoping to see Mahmud soon.

Another protester, Guzide Demir, said his son, Aziz, was kidnapped "18 Eid ago."

"We have no peace left at home ... We want our children from the HDP. It's been 18 Eid, I'm separated from my child My son was an orphan, and I was both a mother and a father to him. I won't leave here without my child, she insisted.

Nihat Aydin, a father, said his son was kidnapped when he was 13 years old.

They took these children to the mountain and left them to die in caves. As with every holiday, we will wait for the path of our children on this Eid.

In its more than 35-year terror campaign against Trkiye, the PKK listed as a terrorist organization by Trkiye, the US, and EU has been responsible for the deaths of some 40,000 people, including women, children and infants. The YPG is the terror group's Syrian branch.

Eid al-Adha, or the Feast of Sacrifice, will be celebrated by Muslims in Trkiye and around the globe on Wednesday, as well as on Thursday in some countries.

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Erdogan look to reunite their children kidnapped by PKK terror ... - Yeni afak English

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has invited Dr Mahathir Mohamad to attend a follow-up event to the Kuala Lumpur Summit held in 2019, in what is seen as the Turkish leader's continued support for the former prime minister's proposal for a new Muslim power bloc.

Following an hour-long meeting in Ankara on Tuesday where Mahathir and wife Dr Siti Hasmah Ali were welcomed at the presidential palace, he said Erdogan was keen to organise the Istanbul Summit to pursue what was discussed during the KL Summit, where top leaders of Malaysia and Turkey, as well as Qatar and Iran, had agreed to cooperate.

"There were also a lot of discussions on the fate of the Muslim ummah and the need to help Muslims and their nations which are facing hardship and wars.

"Mahathir also acknowledged, given Turkiyes rapid development and progress in various fields, that it can be the model nation for other Muslim countries," said a statement on Mahathir's Facebook.

It said both leaders agreed that the Istanbul Summit would be held in either September or October this year, adding that Erdogan would like Mahathir's team to partner his Turkish side for the event.

In 2019, Erdogan alongside Iranian president Hassan Rouhani and Qatari emir Sheikh Tamim Hamad Al Thani attended the KL Summit, which has been renamed as the Perdana Dialogue, a forum that organisers say complements the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in addressing issues affecting the Muslim world.

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Erdogan invites Mahathir to join hands for Islamic summit in Turkey - MalaysiaNow