The long-awaited Turkish-US strategic mechanism aims to set up regular channels to help the two countries cooperate where they can and prevent outstanding issues from blowing up into crises.
Following months of diplomacy, Turkey and the United States have launched a strategic mechanism to boost cooperation in areas such as economy and defense.
Iran has handed over documents to the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), in order to help resolve questions over uranium particles found at old but undeclared nuclear sites in the country.
What’s left of Turkey’s presidential system may be further eroded if Erdogan follows in Hungary’s “illiberal” footsteps.
Diplomacy has been termed “the art of deceit,” but few doubt that Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was anything but sincere when he phoned Hungary’s Viktor Orban today to congratulate him on his landslide victory in Sunday’s parliamentary elections.
How an Old Map Distorts a New Reality
In early December 2021, the Ethiopian government pulled off a dramatic reversal in its yearlong civil war with rebels from the Tigray region. Armed with a new arsenal of drones and other forms of military support from Iran, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Ethiopian forces were able to push back an offensive by the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front, which itself was supported by Somali fighters, who were in turn backed by Qatar.
A 2017 decision to encircle the Islamic State’s capital at Raqqa inhibited the possibility of civilian escape corridors, a Pentagon-sponsored report found.
A Pentagon-commissioned report concluded that the US military could have done more to prevent harm to civilians during the pivotal battle for the Islamic State’s (IS) capital city at Raqqa, Syria, in 2017.
Why Is the US Bankrolling Them?
Now Western security officials believe that Iran and Russia have struck a cooperation deal to work together to evade Western sanctions once a new nuclear deal has been agreed by the Biden administration.
People with short memories might say that this wave of terrorism is just ISIS/Arab-Israeli related, but Hamas is also plenty involved.
Part of the challenge facing security forces in the face of the terrorist attacks over the past eight days has been their source: the perpetrators came from radically different sectors, and do not fit into a conventional box that holds a clear answer on what to do next.
Turkish-made drones have featured prominently in Ukraine’s resistance against Russia’s invasion, taking out significant Russian targets in the first few weeks of the war. But the conflict, and any possibility of a Russian victory, have cast a shadow over the future of Turkey’s rapidly growing drone industry, which relies on Ukrainian engines.
Turkey played host for the second time as peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine resumed today.
Peace talks between Russia and Ukraine resumed in Istanbul after a two-week pause today. It’s the second time the sides have met in Turkey, which has sought to position itself as an honest broker in the conflict.
The round held at Istanbul’s Dolmabahce Palace “achieved more meaningful progress” than any of the talks held so far, asserted Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu after they ended. Russian negotiators called the talks “constructive.”
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has caused shortages of food in Iraq and forced the government to pay more in gasoline subsidies, but the high price of crude oil plus sanctions on Russia has opened new opportunities for Iraq.