Tag: Erdogan

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said Turkey should consider bringing back the death penalty, a decade after Ankara abolished capital punishment as part of reforms aimed at EU membership.

The European Union will lose Turkey if it doesn't grant it membership by 2023, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Tuesday (30 October).

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan raised today (12 April) the prospect of calling on its NATO allies to protect its border after gunfire hit a Syrian refugee camp on Turkish territory.

France approved yesterday (23 January) a bill making it illegal to deny that the mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks nearly a century ago was genocide, sparking angry retaliation from Turkey and threatening a "total rupture" of diplomatic ties.

The recent downgrade in Turkish-Israeli relations is not beneficial to either country, leaving Israel more isolated and depriving Turkey of its role as a mediator at a time of acute instability and change in the region, argue Emiliano Alessandri and Joshua Walker of the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

Turkey's Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan will start a third term of one-party rule strengthened by Sunday's decisive election victory but also burdened by the need for consensus to push ahead with plans for a new constitution.

Turkish EU Affairs Minister Egemen Bağış argues in an exclusive op-ed for EurActiv that a third term for Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would herald a continuation of what he calls the government's "balance between stability and change".

Turkey's top court has decided to bar 12 candidates, including seven Kurds, one of whom is Sakharov Prize winner Leyla Zana, from running in June's general elections. The decision sparked violent protests and led the country's leading Kurdish political party to threaten to boycott the poll. The European Commission deplored the regression of democratic standards in Turkey.

In the context of the Libyan civil war and unfolding revolutions across the Arab region, Turkey is stepping up efforts to make its mark as a role model and diplomatic broker. EurActiv Turkey contributed to this article.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy's visit to Ankara on Friday (25 February) confirmed opposition to Turkey's EU accession bid and, combined with Germany's resistance, appeared to indicate that the country's relations with the EU have hit an all-time low.

Turkey's ruling AK Party of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan won a landmark referendum on Sunday (12 September) introducing changes to the country's constitution. The victory of the 'yes' camp by 58% against 42%, a higher margin than anticipated, is expected to strengthen the AKP ahead of national elections due next year.

Turkish politics is on the brink of a new era as whatever the outcome of the Constitutional Court’s ruling on the Justice and Development Party (AKP), a new political landscape will emerge after the changes are enforced, argues Senem Aydin Düzgit in a 22 May commentary for the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS).

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is in Paris for three days of talks aimed at overcoming French reservations about Ankara's bid for EU membership.